14 DAY TRIAL // Sony and Microsoft, the companies behind the current PlayStation 3 and Xbox 360 consoles, need to match up to the configuration of current gaming PCs with their new devices, at least according to Epic Games Vice President Mark Rein.
A lot of companies have been talking about the next generation of consoles recently, with Microsoft and Sony being rumored to announce their new devices, the Xbox 720 and PlayStation 4, respectively, next year.
Epic Games has now joined the fray, with its Vice President, Mark Rein, talking about the new consoles, as well as the very impressive Samaritan demo the studio showcased earlier this year, depicting some of the features that will be built into the next version of its Unreal Engine.
"[Samaritan] was kind of our love letter to hardware manufacturers," he said to Eurogamer. "The next-gen, we expect, will look like that. If you fast forward a year or two years that should be a fairly common gamer's spec."
Rein even advises hardware manufacturers to look at the current generation of gaming PCs, and try to emulate that performance with their new devices, in order to make sure that the consoles are going to stay relevant in front of the PC platform for at least a few years.
"We hope the console manufactures look at that and go: 'Jeez, if we aim for that in our next consoles we'll be competitive with what you'll be able to do on a PC in a year, year and half from now.' [That's] a reasonably priced PC - obviously you can do it on an expensive PC already."
Rein confirms that in his eyes, the PC has overtaken consoles in terms of capabilities and, with the right resources, current PCs can emulate the performance of even the next-generation of consoles.
As of yet, however, neither Sony nor Microsoft talked about their new devices, saying that the current ones, the PlayStation 3 and Xbox 360, are still halfway into their lifecycle.