Ex-Sony Dev Says "New Consoles Will Be Hard To Develop For"

Former Sony studio employee decided to enlighten gamers on the potential problematic development issues that could appear in Sony and Microsoft's future consoles.

Although neither company has confirmed the existence of new rumored consoles, enough evidence is provided that it seems impossible now for either device to not actually exist. The Xbox Scorpio, which is said to be four times more powerful than the Xbox One, and the PS4.5 or NEO 4K, Sony's upgrade on the PS4, seem like enough at this point that for most it will be a surprise if both aren't revealed during the E3 2016 week.

Kenny Linder, a former employee of now inoperative Sony UK studio Bigbig, has spoken out about the challenges of developing for multiple PS4 and Xbox One SKUs, and his comments seem more like predictive than hyperbolic. Linder responded to a commenter on the NeoGAF forums who thought that QA testing is becoming much more difficult, suggesting “Yep, that will be where the main issues will lie. Additional TCRs and testing requirements.”

Technical Certification Requirements, or TCR's, are essentially what game developers must obtain in order to ship a game for a company. The process seems harder now, as many believe that Sony wants PS4 and NEO versions of games to ship at the same time once the confirmation of PS4.5 arrives and a release date is available.

Linder quickly pointed out that just because new SKUs could offer more challenge for developers doesn't make them necessarily a bad thing. When another commenter speculated that the multiple SKUs development on consoles would be a bad idea, Linder simply stated "It’s no different to working on PC or mobile.” That's because, for instance, mobiles have many different version of Android or iOS software for which to develop.

Of course, this story is founded upon what is still a speculation that the Scorpio and NEO are in development. While that is highly plausible, gamers will have to pay close attention to Sony and Microsoft's E3 2016 presentation schedules to find out whether Linder's comments about the extended certification periods hold any weight.