SCEE: No secret memory-increasing feature in PS3 FW 2.80

Sony has moved to clarify reports that a secret feature included in firmware 2.80 opened up more of the PS3’s memory to developers, most likely stemming from a reduction in the console’s OS footprint. Details after the jump.

Sony has moved to clarify reports that a secret feature included in firmware 2.80 opened up more of the PS3’s memory to developers, most likely stemming from a reduction in the console’s OS footprint.

The reports surfaced after the following comments were made by Naughty Dog staff at Comic-Con about Uncharted 2: Among Thieves:

Naughty Dog is constantly working to improve every aspect of the gameplay; be it animation, lighting, sound, texture fidelity. You know if you look at the game itself with the 2.80 engine update, you know we’re adding more memory, so we get a lot more utilisation of the SPUs, so we increase our optimisation of the Cell processor as well.

As explained by SCEE (and as evidenced by Naughty Dog’s use of the word “engine”), what was updated was actually the Naughty Dog Engine. It was a simple matter of confusing “2.80” with “2.0” due to the Comic-Con rush.

Naughty Dog community manager Arne Meyer also echoed SCEE’s explanation:

This was just a typical blunder with all the info and people coming up to us constantly at the PS booth at San Diego ComicCon. He was actually referring to Naughty Dog Engine 2.0 updates we made. We had just been making sure at the event that all the PS3s brought in were on FW 2.80, since that is what that build needed to run on, so I have no doubt it was top of mind.

The last time the PS3’s OS footprint was made public was way back at firmware 1.80 when it was reduced to 72 MB. Of course, that was a while back so it’s still possible that the OS footprint has been reduced further.

• Lempel: A hidden update on FW 2.80, the beautiful XMB, and an ‘open offer’ to Microsoft
• Comic-Con 09: more Uncharted 2: Among Thieves details from Naughty Dog

Via Gamezine