BioShock PS3 Being Ported by Four Studios
Along with 2K Boston and 2K Australia, which originally produced and released the game on PC and Xbox 360 last August, 2K Marin and external studio Digital Extremes are aiding in the port's development.
Formed late last year, 2K Marin is said to be made up of several ex-BioShock staffers and has been tasked with the next BioShock game. Digital Extremes' past efforts include Dark Sector (PS3, 360) and Unreal Tournament 2004 (PC).
The exact role each studio is playing in the development is unclear, though 2K noted that Digital Extremes is helping "optimize BioShock's performance on the PlayStation 3."
There has been no indication of Digital Extremes' current internal project or projects.
BioShock is expected to hit PS3 in October with as-yet-unspecified new features and content.. An untitled sequel is slated to hit unknown systems by October 2009.
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In before "zOMG PS3 is so bad it needs four studios to port this game!!!!"
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3 of them can be easily explained by having worked on the game originally given 2K Marin's origins. Digital Extremes seems a likely candidate to be doing content optimization while I assume BioShock's content team at their respective studios are working on their next titles.
I highly doubt it's 4 fully-staffed teams doing the work.-
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Yeah, I suspect you're right there. It seems odd of 2K to say there are 4 studios working on it but not give more details about why, or how many people are working from each studio, and so on.
Did they say it without thinking and for no particular reason? (Or reveal it in an investor conference call or something.)
Is it supposed to make us think "wow, they're really putting a lot of effort into the port?"
Or is it a publisher having a little dig at the relative difficulty of development on the PS3?
In general, knowing that 4 studios worked on a port makes me feel more nervous about the quality of the game/port, rather than less. It may be completely the right thing to do and give great results but I don't see what 2K gain by telling us instead keeping those details internal.
In this case I would be pretty surprised if it's a bad port, though.
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