Xbox One cloud is ‘one area console has advantage over PS4’, says Avalanche tech lead

Xbox One’s cloud-side computing is one area that gives Microsoft’s console an advantage over PlayStation 4, Avalanche Studios’ chief technology officer Linus Blomberg has told VideoGamer.com, despite PS4 featuring more impressive ‘raw power’.

Discussing the next-gen console alongside studio head Christofer Sundberg, Blomberg said that the console’s ability to compute processes on the cloud is “definitely an area where the Xbox One has a step up over PS4, and it opens up for many interesting things.

“It’s perfect for open-world games like ours as it enables techniques to make the game worlds more alive and social, such as persistence and asynchronous multiplayer features,” he continued. “We are already using server-side computations in our PC hunting game theHunter, so that’s nothing new for us as a concept. But Microsoft’s solution may allow us to do this more efficiently and to a greater [extent].”

Xbox One’s architecture is said to allow developers to off-load non-latency sensitive processes to the cloud, freeing up system resources on the console.

According to a report on Ars Technica, processes that could be off-loaded to the cloud include physics modelling, fluid dynamics and cloth modelling, each typically CPU-intensive.

A Microsoft representative (via stevivor.com) has also claimed that the cloud’s processing capabilities will make the Xbox One “40 times” more powerful than the Xbox 360.

However, if the technology “proves successful for Microsoft”, Blomberg expects “Sony to follow suit and add similar support” to PS4.

Whether Xbox One games perform will better than PS4 titles (or vice-versa), however, is “too early to say,” Blomberg adds.

“I think [Xbox One and PS4] will be very similar in the end,” Blomberg says. “Of course, if we find areas where either platform is particularly strong then we’ll take advantage of that. But it’s too early to say if our games will look better on any of the two platforms. All I can say is that there’s potential for visually stunning games on both platforms.”

Besides Xbox One’s cloud-processing, Avalanche is also considering making of use of Kinect 2.0 and the console’s TV functionality.

“If it makes the experience better, we’ll definitively support the Kinect and TV functionality,” adds CCO Christofer Sundberg. “We have a few ideas at this point, but will only implement them if it adds to the core experience rather than take away from it.”

Avalanche is currently gearing up for its “biggest” E3 since 2005, where it’s expected to reveal a Mad Max title and a new game in the Just Cause series.

Source: VideoGamer.com interview