It was only a matter of time, but it looks like Uncharted developers Naughty Dog are beginning to delve into the land of the "next-gen" console.
A job ad seeking a Character Artist has hinted at what Naughty Dog is possibly looking for with next-gen consoles.
"This digital sculptor will be responsible for making million poly models game ready," the job description reads. As a comparison, character models in Uncharted 3, which many say is the best looking game for the PlayStation 3, contains about 30,000 polygons. Quite a lofty goal for Naughty Dog if you ask me – especially if they are constrained with the PS3.
But then we get to the requirements line which reads, "Prior professional experience with normal map extraction of human models for next-gen games."
There are plenty discrepancies as to what "next-gen" means. Many believe it means PS4 and Xbox 720, while some consider it to just be the Wii U. However, given Naughty Dog's exclusive PlayStation development, it's likely they are looking at PS4. I just don't see where they would find the extra 970,000 polygons with the current PS3 technology.
So while we don't have any official PS4 announcement from Sony, it would only make sense given the 1 million polygon goal that they are looking forward to developing on future technology. Currently, Naughty Dog is working on The Last of Us, but other than that we have no idea what is up their sleeve. The success of Uncharted 3 could lead to the Naughty Dog team to create a follow-up Uncharted 4, possibly for the PlayStation 4.
Could you imagine the PS4 with a launch title as strong as Uncharted 4…especially with a 1 million polygon count!? Talk about a strong selling point.
