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PS3 Development Update

With the PS3's release date now set for some time in November, third party developers who'd been working away for a Spring release date (if there were any who actually believed the date), now have some extra breathing room to prepare their games. At the PlayStation Business Briefing in Tokyo today, Sony Computer Entertainment president Ken Kutaragi provided further insight into how the company is hoping to help developers get the most out of the complex new system.

We're not sure how seriously SCE was actually taking its original Spring release date promise, as it turns out that development tools for the PS3 won't even approach a final state until the middle of May. By the end of March, Sony will update current loaner development kits with the "DEH-R103X" rev, which offers final versions of the Cell and RSX along with prototypes of the controller and the Blu-ray drive. In mid-May, loaner kits will be updated to the DEH-R104X kit, which finalizes the controller and Blu-ray drive.

Final development kits will be available for purchase by developers in July. Of course, most developers will have been making games on the incomplete loaner development kits by then.

Sony will also be delivering tools to developers who want to make their games compatible with the PS3 network, which seems to be Sony's answer to Microsoft's Xbox Live service. The tool schedule looks like this:

End of March: Dev. Server/Client SDK 1st release
End of April: Dev. Server/Client SDK 2nd release
End of June: Full functions completed on dev. Server
July and on: Full function test starts for licenses
Beginning of September: Production environment available

Kutaragi didn't get into specifics on what type of functionality will be included in each revision.

Fifteen companies were listed at the press conference as providing tools for PS3 development. The list includes a few names that you might be familiar with:

Graphics Tools
Alias Systems Corp.
Autodesk Inc.
Web Technology Corp.

Physics Simulation
Telekinesys Research Ltd. (HAVOK)

Graphics Middleware
Interactive Data Visualization, Inc. (Speed Tree)

Game Engine
Epic Games, Inc.
Emergent Game Technologies, Inc. (NDL)
Silicon Studio Corporation

AI / Behavior System
Kynogon S.A.

Sound
Firelight Technologies Pty Ltd.

Codec
RAD Game Tools, Inc.
CRI Middleware Co., LTD.

Compiler/Debugger
Freescale Semiconductor Inc. (Metrowerks)

Network
IGN Entertainment, Inc. (GameSpy)
Quazal Technologies, Inc.0

We expect more details on PS3 development to come our way at next week's Game Developers' Conference.

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