Former 30-year Sony veteran Shawn Layden, who served as one of Sony’s top gaming bosses during his tenure, has commented on the state of video game hardware advancements. He said at Gamescom Asia this week that he believes increased power alone no longer moves the needle.
“It has plateaued. We’re at the stage of hardware development that I call, ‘Only dogs can hear the difference,'” he said, as reported by VGC. “If you’re playing your game and sunlight is coming through your window onto your TV, you’re not seeing any ray tracing. It has to be super optimal… you have to have an 8K monitor in a dark room to see these things.”
Layden went on to say Microsoft and Sony are “fighting over teraflops,” but he believes this is not the right approach. Instead, he wants to see game companies “compete on content” because he believes video game consoles have “reached the ceiling.”
The real winner of the so-called console war, Layden said, is AMD. The company’s chips help power both the PS5 and Xbox Series X|S. Looking to the future, a recent report said Sony will partner with AMD once again for the PS6, after Intel reportedly courted Sony for a deal.
While Sony has yet to officially confirm plans for a new PlayStation console, Microsoft has discussed its intention to create the “biggest technological leap” ever for any video game console. It remains to be seen what that means in practice, but a recent report said the next Xbox could be paired with a handheld device.
Instead of focusing on improvements to gaming hardware, Layden said the video game industry has “reached the precipice” for how games are made, and it’s no longer sustainable.
“We cannot continue to do things that we have done before,” he said. “It’s time for a real hard reset on the business model, a hard reset on what it is to be a video game.”
Also during his Gamescom Asia speech, Layden spoke about what he believes is a “collapse of creativity” in the video game industry.
