Final Fantasy XIII will use “nearly 100 per cent” of the processing power available on the Sony PS3, according to the game’s Japanese producer Yoshinori Kitase. What does that mean for the European market, where Final Fantasy XIII is due to be released simultaneously on both Sony PS3 and (supposedly less powerful) Microsoft Xbox 360?
Speaking to Japanese games magazine Dengeki PlayStation 3, Kitase said: “We are finishing up development” of Final Fantasy XIII. Kitase said that a demo version of the game, available to Japanese Sony PS3 owners on 16 April, uses “about 50 percent of [the Sony PS3's] power? The retail version will make use of nearly 100 percent.”
The issue is that while Final Fantasy XIII is a Sony PS3 exclusive in Japan, it’s due to launch simultaneously in the US and Europe on Microsoft’s rival Xbox 360 console. Sony has long maintained that its PS3 console is superior in terms of processing power to Microsoft’s Xbox 360. So do Kitase’s comments mean that western Xbox 360 will be getting an inferior version of Final Fantasy XIII? Or does it mean that, as ex-Bungie Xbox 360 developer Christian Allen believes, the two consoles are very similar in terms of power?
Kitase added that there would not be any need to swap discs mid-way through playing on the Sony PS3 because of its hard drive and high-capacity Blu-ray discs. This will almost certainly not be the case on Microsoft’s Xbox 360 – it uses much lower-capacity DVD discs.
Out 2010 | £TBA | Final Fantasy XIII
