Namco Bandai plots a cell-processor driven arcade board
by Nick Doerr 
{ Mar 26th 2007 at 8:30PM }
Namco Bandai has recently announced that they plan to create a set of arcade games using none other than the PlayStation 3's Cell processor. In fact, the arcade machines are supposed to use the same Nvidia designed RSX graphics chips as the PS3 -- making conversions later on that much easier. Like Tekken 6. Oh, yeah.According to Gamasutra, this will be the first time the Cell processor will be used in a consumer product other than the PlayStation 3. That's pretty cool, especially the notion that it'll decrease the time needed to get the game put onto a home console, into eagerly awaiting hands.
Now if only we could get all of our consumer electronics outfitted with the Cell and somehow make the PS3 and everything else wirelessly talk to one another. Completely useless and unnecessary, sure, but that'd be pretty crazy to go out with a camcorder (or whatever you kids call 'em these days) and have it streaming real-time on the PS3, possibly on a YouTube-ish website. As we said, completely useless, but hey. Random ideas are fun.
Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)
massive_98 @ Mar 26th 2007 9:34PM
I don't get what this means for me?
mccomber @ Mar 26th 2007 9:41PM
What this means for you massive_98 is three-fold. First, since they'll be making games for arcades using what is essentially the same setup as is used in the ps3, the ps3 will be getting perfect ports very quickly. As was pointed out in the first paragraph. And second paragraph.
Secondly, the cell is something that STI, as the group is known, wants to put this thing into a lot more products than the ps3. The more they make, the less they cost, the less the ps3 costs, the more people will buy it... hopefully you can see where that leads. The ps3 was the first consumer application. It's not going to be the last.
Finally, this leads to my third point. The more products with the cell, the more familiar developers should be with it. More developers, especially from more than just gaming, will mean better tools, will mean better games produced faster for the lovely black ps3. You know, for all those increased number of consumers I mentioned last paragraph.