You know how that old song goes – you say 120fps, I say 60fps / you say ray tracing, I say I'm so bored, I just fell asleep / let's call the whole thing off! Something like that. That's what it might as well be now that multiple industry leaders, including former PlayStation Indies head Shuhei Yoshida, agree that gaming technology has hit a big brick wall.
"Graphics [have] almost hit the level that even I cannot tell the difference between some of the [graphical capabilities] like ray traced or not ray traced, unless it's side by side, or higher frame rate," Yoshida says during a recent episode of Skill Up's Friends Per Second podcast.
Not long ago, former Sony CEO Shawn Layden expressed a similar sentiment, wondering, "How many of us can really tell the difference between 90 frames per second and 120 frames per second?" Even PlayStation design consultant Mark Cerny – who's worked with Sony through multiple console cycles and helped create the PS4 and PS5 – feels like "the current approach" to ray tracing and lighting "has reached its limit."
Continuing this point, Yoshida says about PlayStation that, "clearly they just cannot do the same thing they have been doing, [which] is increasing the graphics power and providing high-end experiences."
With the superheroic power of the PS5, though, that may not be the worst thing ever. Yoshida explains: "I think PS5 is amazing system in terms of quality of experience. I think the adoption of SSD was like an almost miracle."
"I think PS5 and SSD has made almost every game a better game," he concludes.
