Sony is known for adopting small indie developers, and providing them with the necessary funds, resources and support to finish their game while sometimes expanding on its initial concept. At the same time, the PlayStation 4’s lineup isn’t empty on AAA titles as well, with first-party franchises getting new releases, such as Uncharted 4: A Thief’s End, or even third-party.

Inside PlayStation were lucky enough to sit down with PlayStation executive Jim Ryan, and ask him about his own person opinion regarding people judgement towards Sony’s relatively excessive attention to indies. He responded with: “At the end of the day, it’s just about great games. We don’t discriminate between something that’s a AAA or something that’s an indie. If something’s a great game, then it gets focus, attention, and love.”

No one can deny that Sony’s attention to indies have benefited them and their console, since if you take Hello Games and No Man’s Sky as an example, Sony managed to support them throughout the development process, turning their project into something much bigger than it was expected.

Sony showcased a ton of different indie titles that will be coming to the PlayStation 4 (with some also arriving on the Vita). Several of these games should be fairly well known to PC gamers – titles like Invisible Inc. and Don’t Starve Together already made their debut on that platform many months ago to strong critical acclaim.

As it stands, there are plenty of new games to look forward to like Hob, Zodiac: Orcanon Odyssey, Brutal, Dead Star, Guns Up! (which is currently available for free), Fat Princess Adventures and more. Honestly, it wasn’t the worst collection of indie titles but they didn’t exactly come off as big announcements either. Bringing Hotline Miami 2 and Transistor exclusively to PS4 and Vita? That’s big news. Fat Princess Adventures? Die in a fire.

Regardless, it was an indie showcase and there were plenty of decent games to be seen. Which title is your favourite and why? Let us know in the comments below as we update you with more news from the PlayStation Experience.

Prior to working on Submerged, Uppercut Games developed the iOS and Android video games, Epoch & Epoch 2 as well as SnowJinks.

Thus far, Submerged has been officially confirmed to be launching on the PlayStation 4, making it Uppercut Games’ first current generation video game. The game is thought to be releasing on other platforms including Xbox One and PC in “early 2015”.

• 1. Development
• 2. Story
• 3. Gameplay
• 4. Characters

Development

As clearly shown in the official development blog for Submerged, the game will be running on Unreal Engine 4. This has given the developers access to tools that have made the development process a bit easier than if they had been working with previous Unreal Engine builds. Inverse Kinematics, a system that allows for more accurate movement in certain objects, is used to help position the limbs and extremities of Miku and Taku.

Speaking about this, Uppercat Games’ Ben Driehuis has said that ,”Doing basic IK in Unreal 4 is quite easy”. While Inverse Kinematics isn’t revolutionary, it’s an important system in character focused games like Submerged. Driehuis also said, “The other issue we had is once we started adding in the level art the limbs would often look out of place or go through the meshes. The solution was to use Inverse Kinematics or IK. The quick explanation of this is that we can set the hands and feet to exact positions and the IK system will rotate the bones before it in the chain so that they end up there.”

Also talking about the options afforded to them by Unreal Engine 4, Uppercut Games’ Ed Orman said, “We use Unreal Engine 4 to create the gorgeous graphics that you see above.”

The first playable build of the game was presented to Canberra Game Devs during PAX Australia, this served as both a gameplay reveal and a means of locating bugs in the game based on played feedback.

Working on the game’s score, is the Canadian/Australian, BAFTA award winning composer Jeff Van Dyck. His portfolio is extensive, he has worked on titles like Alien Isolation, Medieval 2: Total War, Total War: Shogun 2: Fall of the Samurai among other Total War games.

Talking about getting Van Dyck on board to work on the game, Orman said, “We’ve enlisted BAFTA-Award Winner Jeff Van Dyck to provide the musical score. The gameplay is designed with no failure states: play at your own pace, safe in the knowledge that you’ll never die. It all adds up to create a relaxing, mysterious adventure that everyone can enjoy.”

Speaking by way of the European PlayStation blog, Orman has expressed an interest in introducing Virtual Reality support, but only if it’s introduced in a meaningful way. Answering a question put to him by a gamer about Project Morpheus support, Orman said, “We are interested in VR support, but we would want to put some real thought into designing for it – don’t want to just slap it in. That said, I’d sure love to be able to stand in the world of Submerged and have a good look around.”

Story

Submerged focuses on siblings Miku and Taku, who arrive at a strange location by boat. Due to Taku being injured, the sister Miku must explore the area and find supplies to help him recover. Finding supplies will be a bit of an issue though due to the collapsing nature of the nearby city. Exploring by boat, Miku will use her telescope to discover supply caches and ultimately explore various, deteriorating structures to find resources to help her brother.

Gameplay

Submerged is an adventure video game that focuses on the two main characters, the game is designed in a way that the player cannot lose, given that there are no “fail states”.

Arriving in a strange and mostly collapsing and submerged city by boat, you must find shelter for your wounded brother whom you will also provide for.

Navigating the game world with your boat, finding your way and locating useful items thanks to a telescope and climbing your way through the ruins, you will gather the items neccesary to shelter yourself and your brother as well as supply aid.

Talking about this, Uppercut Games’ Ed Orman said, “As she traverses the sunken metropolis, Miku starts to uncover the secrets of how this world came to be. And in turn, we begin to learn about Miku and Taku: what drove them to this mysterious city, where the only inhabitants appear to be malformed copies of the native sea-life?”

Character

At this time, not a great deal is known about Miku and Taku, the brother and sister duo that serve as the primary protagonists of Submerged.

Note: This wiki will be updated once we have more information about the game.

GamingBolt spoke to Deery about his project including the changes made with its transition to the PS4, the concept itself, the chances of an Xbox One release and much more.

"Largely the game is focused on exploration and experimentation. Winding your way through the factories, discovering tapes (among other things), finding different things to warp them."

Rashid K. Sayed: What has it been like to develop something Small Radios Big Televisions completely on your own? How do you feel things have changed in terms of what solitary developers can achieve with today’s technology?

Owen Deery: Working on this project alone has been hard, but it’s a lot of fun. It’s really easy to get burnt out working on a big project but with Small Radios Big Televisions I can switch to working on music or art or level design if I feel stuck when programming and then come back later with a clear head. Things have never been better for solitary developers!

It’s so easy to learn about any aspect of game development just by searching or even asking someone on Twitter. The recent influx of free game engines also allows lone developers to tackle much bigger projects than before. The console makers push to open access to smaller teams is huge as well. A few years ago no one would have let me near a console.Small Radios Big Televisions has an intriguing premise, one that an almost old-time feel to it.

Rashid K. Sayed: How did you originally conceive of the idea for the game?

Owen Deery: I wish I could say that there was one specific thing that ‘inspired’ me, but it was really just sitting down to come up with ideas. Last Summer I decided to take a few weeks off from making web games and build something cool that people might enjoy that I wouldn’t have to worry about selling to a web portal.

I sat down and wrote 20-30 quick ideas and the core idea for Small Radios Big Televisions happened to be the second one and the one I liked the most.

Rashid K. Sayed: The original browser version of the game seemed to dwell more on phenomena like natural distortion and the effect produced by decaying magnetic tape. Are those still present in the PS4 release and how you best present these various concepts to players?

Owen Deery: Definitely! A big part of the game is a focus on analog distortion and decay rather than digital. A lot of the time if something digital gets distorted or loses some of its data then it simply won’t work anymore (like scratching a CD). That’s one of the cool things to explore with analog media, that when the data gets changed it will be played back with errors and everything.

Rashid K. Sayed: Thus far, what little we’ve seen of the game indicates collecting these cassettes which have entire worlds contained in them. But what does one do in the game in terms of actual gameplay?

Owen Deery: Largely the game is focused on exploration and experimentation. Winding your way through the factories, discovering tapes (among other things), finding different things to warp them. There’s also a big point-and-click influence on the game, so there are a lot of environmental puzzles throughout as well.

"I put the original version of the game online for free to see if there would be anyone interested in it, and a bunch of people were so I decided I’d try to make it into a full-sized game."

Rashid K. Sayed: What engine have you developed Small Radios Big Televisions on?

Owen Deery: Small Radios Big Televisions is written from scratch in C++. I’m using a library to handle a lot of the input and sound stuff on PC, but otherwise I’ve written everything else. The original web version was written in Javascript using WebGL.

Rashid K. Sayed: What kind of length is Small Radios Big Televisions targeting? Will there be a reason for players to go back and explore more?

Owen Deery: At the moment that game is still very deep in development so I don’t have a specific number, but ideally I’d like it to be a 4-5 hour experience. There are winding, branching paths and extra tapes not essential to the game in the world so if a player wanted to “100%” the game there’s reason for them to continue exploring.

Rashid K. Sayed: Tell us more about the sound design and music. What famous artistes or bands helped you to properly identify and capture the synthesized feel of the soundtrack?

Owen Deery: The sound and music of the game is hugely important to me, more so than any other project I’ve worked on. I’ve had an idea for the musical feel of the game pretty much before anything else. I made up a playlist as soon as I started working on the game that I would listen to while figuring out visual style etc. and try and make everything work together.

Boards of Canada are a big one and what most people compare the music from the game to. Other big influences were Neon Indian, MegaDrive and Lazerhawk. One resource which was invaluable for finding new music I could draw from was Adult Swim bumps. You can go online and watch the little segments that they air between shows and usually they have some of the coolest music I haven’t heard of, and that made up a big chunk of my playlist.

Rashid K. Sayed: What motivated you to bring Small Radios Big Televisions to the PS4 and is there a chance it could arrive on other platforms (besides PC of course) at a later date?

Owen Deery: I put the original version of the game online for free to see if there would be anyone interested in it, and a bunch of people were so I decided I’d try to make it into a full-sized game. In October I was at a games festival in Toronto called Gamercamp, where Sony was doing a presentation about bringing games to PS4.

I just went up and asked, “Hey, maybe I could put my game on PS4?” and that was pretty much it. I would love to bring the game to as many platforms as I can but at the moment I’m focused on PC and PS4 since I want to give them the attention they deserve, and I don’t really have time to work on other platforms.

" At some point it would be cool to do an Xbox One version if I get the chance. I spoke to both Sony and Microsoft reps at the same event and after emailing them both Sony was the only one that ever emailed me back."

Rashid K. Sayed: How has your experience developing on the PS4 been till now and how does it differ from PC development?

Owen Deery: I’ve only very recently been given access to the PS4 development ecosystem since there’s a lot of paperwork to go through, but so far it’s been a very positive experience. There’s so much they’re doing for small developers that you realize how difficult it would have been for earlier console generations.

It can be very overwhelming to come face to face with a new system that until now has been hidden behind a curtain, but at the same time it’s nice to know that if you can get it running on a PS4 it will run on every PS4. On a PC you have to do extensive testing just to make sure it will run on most systems.

Rashid K. Sayed: You’ve talked about possibly bringing the game to the Vita but focusing on the PS4 version since it’s only you developing it. What features about the Vita intrigue you and how could they be used if you do decide to bring Small Radios Big Televisions to the handheld?

Owen Deery: I’m not a handheld gamer (I think my last handheld was a GameBoy Pocket?) so I honestly can’t speak to the capabilities of the Vita personally. This just goes hand in hand with the earlier question of wanting to get the game onto any platform that players might want it on. Once the game has its initial release then I’ll be able to see if there’s large enough demand for a Vita release.

Rashid K. Sayed: Is there a specific reason why the game is not coming on the Xbox One?

Owen Deery: Nope! At some point it would be cool to do an Xbox One version if I get the chance. I spoke to both Sony and Microsoft reps at the same event and after emailing them both Sony was the only one that ever emailed me back.

I approached a rep from Microsoft at the same event last Autumn where I talked to the Sony reps. I talked to them briefly about my game and working on it for id@xbox, and then I sent some follow up emails but never got a response. By that point Sony had already replied and said they wanted my game so I ran with that and forgot about Microsoft.

I just want to clarify that it’s not “never coming to Xbox ever” I just haven’t been in talks at all with the Microsoft people. It’s not coming to Xbox in the same way it’s not coming to PS Vita or Wii U.

"I’ve always had a thing for writing my own rendering systems, so it’s really nice to see a wave of technology that looks like it will try to wipe out all the old legacy code and structure from graphics APIs."

Rashid K. Sayed: What are your thoughts on the PS4’s unified architecture? Is it safe to assume it’s a super charged PC?

Owen Deery: I can’t really give an opinion on it at this point since I’ve only been working with the system for a few weeks.

Rashid K. Sayed: Will the game run at 1080p and 60 frames per second? Furthermore, did you face any challenges achieving that target?

Owen Deery: That’s the ideal that I’m shooting for. On my non-cutting edge PC it’s already up to that spec, and I’m still working on porting to PS4 so no word yet. I don’t expect it should be a big problem since the game is not very graphically intensive.

Rashid K. Sayed: A lot of exciting new technologies are on the frontier such as DX12, Vulkan, Cloud Gaming and Mantle. As an indie developer, do these new technologies excite you?

Owen Deery: I’m really interested in these new explicit graphics APIs (Vulkan, Mantle). I’ve always had a thing for writing my own rendering systems, so it’s really nice to see a wave of technology that looks like it will try to wipe out all the old legacy code and structure from graphics APIs. I’m not writing crazy intensive renderers like you’d find in the Unreal Engine or triple A games, so chances are it won’t affect my projects too much but it’s nice to see the industry try and take a big step forward.

Rashid K. Sayed: Is there anything else you want to tell us before we let you go?

Owen Deery: If you want to hear about the development of the game follow me @owendeery on Twitter, I do my best to try and post interesting shots of the game while I’m making it!

While most MMO’s are generally considered to be falling out of favour with most gamers, it’s still a large portion of gaming that exists and continues to thrive. With that in mind, PS4 gamers can look forward to the upcoming, exploration based, combat free indie developed MMO Wander which is set to drop later this month or possibly early in May.

Speaking about the resolution and frame rate, the developers have said, “We love working on PS4. The control options are great and having a fixed system makes testing a lot easier. There are some challenges compared to PC, mostly involving paperwork but Sony are great to work with. Wander is a slow moving game, so better looks are more important than high frame rate for us, so it’s 1080P@30FPS.”

In regards to the games release date, it would appear that they want you playing Wander sooner than later, “We’re aiming to release on Steam and PS4 in late April-early May, but that’s as specific as I can get at the moment!”

With the game running on the CryEngine, the developers have praised it for delivering what they need, “It’s a great choice for producing a dense, beautiful rainforest. Rainforest are hard work for rendering. Obviously Unity and UE4 have some great advantages but so does CRYENGINE.”

[Source]

It’s an interesting direction though considering Supergiant already delivered a brand new experience on the Vita and PS4 with Transistor. How will Bastion fare on the newer platforms, especially on the PS4? GamingBolt spoke to writer Greg Kasavin on the same, including the various improvements and changes one can expect.

"Folks have been asking us to bring Bastion to the PlayStation ever since we announced it. Given that, as well as Transistor's success on the PS4, not to mention the health of the platform overall, we wanted to bring Bastion over to this new audience."

Rashid K. Sayed: Bastion has been an unmitigated success for Supergiant Games. How does it feel to return to it especially following the release of Transistor?

Greg Kasavin: We’re very happy that Bastion has had such staying power, to where there’s still interest in it after all these years. We couldn’t have expected that when we first released the game in 2011. We’re excited to be bringing our first game to PS4, and to a PlayStation platform for the first time, following the success of Transistor. For many players, Transistor was their first exposure to our studio, so Bastion will be a whole new game for them. Despite their differences, we think the games share similar values, seeing as we made them both, so we think those who enjoyed Transistor are quite likely to enjoy Bastion as well.

Rashid K. Sayed: What motivated the decision to bring Bastion to the PS4? Was there any decision to focus on a new project as opposed to revisiting an old one?

Greg Kasavin: Folks have been asking us to bring Bastion to the PlayStation ever since we announced it. Given that, as well as Transistor’s success on the PS4, not to mention the health of the platform overall, we wanted to bring Bastion over to this new audience. We’ve brought Bastion to a number of different platforms in the past and each time we end up hearing from a lot of folks who never saw or heard of it before but end up really liking it.

Rashid K. Sayed: Will Bastion see any significant graphical improvements in the PS4 version?

Greg Kasavin: Bastion for PS4 is meant to be an exacting translation of the original version of the game. Part of the reason we’re releasing this new version of the game is because we think the presentation has held up well. I think 2D games with hand-painted artwork have a tendency to age a little more gracefully than most.

Rashid K. Sayed: It’s interesting that Bastion is on the PS4 since Transistor was also exclusive to the console (along with the Vita). How much has Sony’s indie approach prompted you to stay on PlayStation?

Greg Kasavin: Transistor launched on PlayStation 4 as well as PC, so we never saw it as being exclusive to any platform. Certainly we’ve enjoyed working with Sony and appreciate all the support they’ve given to our small team and to our games. The folks over there genuinely seem to like our games, and that means a lot. As a game player I respect Sony’s approach to bringing lots of independent games to their platform, and think it’s very smart. Unlike the previous console generation, there are many fewer big studios making games these days, due to all the ways the business of making games has changed. But a console still needs software, so the Sony team has looked to many smaller developers to help round out its catalogue.

"While we have no other versions of Bastion or Transistor planned at this time, we haven't ruled anything out for the future. Certainly if you had asked me a year or two ago if Bastion would ever come to the next-generation PlayStation, I would have been very doubtful, but here we are!"

Rashid K. Sayed: Will we ever see Bastion or even Transistor arrive on the Xbox One? If no, is there a specific reason behind the same?

Greg Kasavin: While we have no other versions of Bastion or Transistor planned at this time, we haven’t ruled anything out for the future. Certainly if you had asked me a year or two ago if Bastion would ever come to the next-generation PlayStation, I would have been very doubtful, but here we are! That’s why I always put it this way, because circumstances change and I don’t know what the future holds. One of the nice things about being small is we can make decisions tactically and keep our options open.

Rashid K. Sayed: What will the PS4 version of Bastion add to the core game? Given its original release was almost four years ago, can we expect any new content?

Greg Kasavin: Bastion for PS4 is intended to be an exacting translation of the original game, so those who’ve played the game before should only get this version if they want to play it again on PS4. We didn’t want anyone who’s already played Bastion to feel pressured to get this version because of some added scrap of content that wasn’t intended for the original game. That being said, this version of Bastion does contain the free DLC content we released later in the game’s first year, which added alternate modes of play and a challenging new sequence to the New Game Plus second play-through.

Rashid K. Sayed: Will Bastion support cross-play or cross-buy on the PS4/Vita? Similarly, is Remote Play looking like an option at this point?

Greg Kasavin: Bastion for PS4 and Vita will support cross-buy, so if you purchase one, you will have access to both, once the Vita version becomes available. Bastion is a single-player-only game so cross-play wasn’t a factor in our consideration. As we still don’t have a release date announced for the Vita version, hopefully Remote Play will hold folks over in the mean time!

Rashid K. Sayed: How difficult has it been to translate Bastion to the PlayStation 4, especially considering the game’s age? Has it been harder or easier than developing Transistor from scratch with the PS4 in mind?

Greg Kasavin: The PS4 is a powerful console that’s very capable of handling a 2D game like Bastion, so from a technical standpoint bringing over our first game hasn’t taken us as long as building a new game from scratch. We’re working with a team called BlitWorks, based in Barcelona, on the translation effort. We thought they did a great job on the PS4 versions of games like FEZ and Don’t Starve, so they’ve shouldered the heavy lifting when it comes to making Bastion work well on PS4.

Rashid K. Sayed: Will Bastion support features like the PS4’s Touchpad or Share button in unique ways?

Greg Kasavin: We didn’t contrive any new features into this version of the game, though the Share button will work in the way it works with most PS4 titles. We use the Touchpad as a button for accessing the player’s inventory, and we ended up making some use of the light bar to reflect the player’s current health, and made some light use of the controller speaker as well for certain sound effects. It’s small stuff though we really like the DualShock 4 and wanted to take advantage of its unique aspects in ways we thought made sense for the game.

"Being small, we don't tend to plan too far ahead. We would like to stay small with this same team we've assembled and keep making games in the same spirit and with the same kinds of values as how we've been doing things so far."

Rashid K. Sayed: So, Microsoft’s ID@Xbox Policy parity clause has been a subject of much controversy. Microsoft seems to have been relaxing it for some cases but the clause is still there. As an indie developer what is your take on the parity clause and why do you think it only applies to indies and not AAA games?

Greg Kasavin: I understand how from Microsoft’s perspective it may not be desirable to have a library of “hand-me-downs” from other platforms. It’s far less of an issue for AAA games because AAA games have the budgets and team sizes to ship their games simultaneously on many platforms, whereas for smaller developers, it can be almost impossible to go to every platform at the same time. Certainly that’s been true of us at Supergiant. At the same time, as a game player all I want is for my consoles of choice to have good, diverse lineups of games. I don’t care if they’re also available on other platforms as long as they’re great games for the console.

Rashid K. Sayed: I guess the game will run at 1080p and 60 fps, right?

Greg Kasavin: That’s correct!

Rashid K. Sayed: What is your take on the ongoing resolutiongate and frame rate debate? Do you think it will settle down anytime soon?

Greg Kasavin: I don’t have a take on it. I am in general against the act of diminishing or dismissing people’s feelings about things that are important to them. In the case of this particular debate, I think it’s reasonable for game players to expect great things from the current generation of consoles, especially given the long gap between console generations and the relative power and ease-of-use of modern-day gaming PCs.

Rashid K. Sayed: What’s next for Supergiant Games in 2015 and beyond?

Greg Kasavin: I’ll be at least as curious as you to find that out! Being small, we don’t tend to plan too far ahead. We would like to stay small with this same team we’ve assembled and keep making games in the same spirit and with the same kinds of values as how we’ve been doing things so far. What comes out of that process, I guess time will tell!

Rashid K. Sayed: Is there anything else you want to tell us before we let you go?

Greg Kasavin: Thanks for taking the time to check in with me! We’re excited to be bringing Bastion to a new audience come April 7, and really appreciate that PlayStation fans never relented in asking us for the game since it first came out. We appreciate everyone’s patience, and hope you enjoy it!

Some rather good news for those of you that have an appreciation for Indie games which, in recent years anyway, have more substance and depth than some major releases. So, there’s been a revival in indie games on consoles, especially on the PlayStation 4 recently. Well you will be pleased to know that they (Sony and Versus Evil, that is) are bringing a number of exceptionally good indie games to their platform.

We have Armikrog, a point and click adventure game created by the developers of the original (and excellent) Earthworm Jim video game using stop motion clay animations. Imagine how long that took to make. There’s The Banner Saga, it’s an award winning turn based strategy game like no other with a beautifully realised art style that makes use of 2D animations. A modern classic with a sequel in the works.

There’s also Kyn, a tactical role playing game developed by Holland based duo. What are your thoughts on this? Let us know in the comments section below.

[Source]

Microsoft’s ID@Xbox indie development program may be a significant improvement over its initial policy for independent games on the Xbox One but there’s still work to be done. Case in, the infamous parity clause which states that if indie developers are creating for multiple platforms, then these must release on the same day as the Xbox One version. For several developers who expressed interest in the program after initially committing to a release date for the PS4 and/or Vita, this was more than just an inconvenience and Heart Machine’s Alex Preston, who’s working on crowd-funded Hyper Light Drifter, believes it won’t last.

Speaking to GamingBolt, Preston was asked whether the parity clause was on his mind when the decision to develop Hyper Light Drifter for the Xbox One was made. “So the Parity Clause is, well, I understand why Microsoft has been doing it, but it’s something that I don’t think they’ll be enforcing long term.

“I mean, they’ve even come out and said that they have made exceptions to the rule, because indie developers just don’t have the resources to do that all the time, to make sure that they’re really on the same platforms, concurrently, it’s kind of too much to ask that if they really want to get these games on their systems, and I think they understand that, and I think it’s kind of a relic system to a degree. They’re still enforcing it, but I feel like they won’t be long term, down the line, it’s not the greatest thing, and most people recognize that.”

Is the policy on borrowed time? Preston responded that, “I just think long term, it’s not the greatest policy, and I think they recognize that to a degree, and I don’t know if it will be around for the entirety of the console generation.”

What are your thoughts on the same? Let us know in the comments.

If you’ve played Bohemia Interactive’s DayZ, you know that Dean Hall isn’t just any one else. This is a man who not only created a mod that became more popular than the original game but managed to monetize it through early access alone. GamingBolt spoke to Hall about a variety of things, but most importantly about the PS4 and Xbox One.

Upon asking whether the Xbox One would be capable of running high end games at 1080p resolution and 60 FPS, Hall replied, “Well, I think that remains to be seen.” He followed up by saying that, “It’s a very exciting time. I would not want to be Microsoft or Sony right now, and I think I’ve said that to them.”

Which makes sense, given the frenzy that’s been created over 1080p/60 FPS games on the current generation of consoles. “That’s a lot of pressure, and the margins are really tight, and the consumers are right in their face with everything. Every decision they make gets torn to pieces on reddit or on the internet.

“It’s a really hard time for them, but good on them for getting in there and doing it. I haven’t looked a lot at the Xbox One or the PS4, I don’t actually own one myself, but what I have seen, it looks impressive. It’s a pretty big step in the right direction, particularly for the PS4. I was pretty critical of the PS3. It was very hard to develop on if you were a third party, but the PS4’s a lot easier to develop on.” This is primarily due to the PC-like architecture of the console.

“I had never worked on a first party PS3 title, but from what I could tell, you got a lot of special, good tools from Sony. Microsoft is coming from a position of strength here where the Xbox was always pretty easy to develop for because it was fairly similar to PC architecture as well. I think their push towards being very indie friendly is something Sony had been doing for a long time.

“I went to an expo in the UK, and saw Sony there doing their ‘We love indies’ thing, and Microsoft really wants to get into that. I think the cool thing is that they’re trying to take the best parts of PC gaming and bring them to consoles, and I hope they do that because I’m not a traditional console gamer, so if they can capture that market, perhaps they’ll capture my interest as a consumer, too.”

DayZ is currently bound for the PS4 but not the Xbox One. What are your thoughts on Hall’s opinions? Let us know in the comments.

Humble Hearts’ Dust: An Elysian Tail, developed by a single indie designer Dean Dodrill, has been announced for the PlayStation 4. Through a very ham-fisted and somewhat adorable speech delivered by side-character Fidget, it appears that the game will run at 1080p resolution and 60 frames per second.

The game takes place in the world of Falana where the central character Dust wakes up in a forest one day with no memory. With the help of his weapon, the Blade of Ahrah, and its guardian Fidget, Dust sets out on a quest to discover his identity and find out just what’s going on. The game released on Mac, PC and Xbox 360, and has received rave reviews for the quality of its combat, gameplay and visuals.

Though no information was provided regarding a release date, Humble Hearts promises more details in the coming months. Are you excited to see Dust: An Elysian Tail heading to the PS4? Let us know in the comments.