PlayStation 5 lead architect Mark Cerny has made a reference to a possible PlayStation 6 in an official dialogue video about future tech.
The video, which was posted on the official PlayStation YouTube channel, has Cerny sitting down with the SVP and GM of AMD’s computing and graphics group, Jack Huynh, to debate the most recent developments from the Undertaking Amethyst collaboration.
Undertaking Amethyst is a joint dedication from Sony and AMD to make use of machine studying primarily based expertise for graphics and gameplay, and within the new video the pair talk about three gaming expertise breakthroughs that they imagine will result in advantages within the video games trade.
It’s Cerny’s feedback on the finish of the video, nevertheless, that may possible garner probably the most dialogue, given their obvious nod to the PlayStation 6.
“Total, in fact, it’s nonetheless very early days for these applied sciences,” Cerny mentioned. “They solely exist in simulation proper now, however the outcomes are fairly promising and I’m actually enthusiastic about bringing them to a future console in a couple of years’ time.”
Ought to Cerny’s remark certainly be referring to the PS6, it suggests a possible 2028 launch window for the console.
The three breakthroughs mentioned within the video are Neural Arrays, Radiance Cores and Common Compression.
Neural Arrays are designed to sort out the issue of upscaling techs like FSR and PSSR creating calls for on the GPU. “As an alternative of getting a bunch of compute items all engaged on their very own, we’ve constructed a method for them to group up, to truly share information and course of issues collectively like a single, targeted AI engine,” Huynh mentioned.
Cerny added: “Neural Arrays will enable us to course of a big chunk of the display screen in a single go. And the efficiencies that come from which can be going to be a recreation changer as we start to develop the following technology of upscaling and denoising applied sciences collectively.”
Radiance Cores are designed to make ray tracing much less demanding on GPU by “rethinking the complete path tracing pipeline from {hardware} to software program”, in line with Huynh. They’re described as “a brand new devoted {hardware} block designed for unified gentle transport”, which handles ray tracing and path tracing in real-time.
“Radiance Cores take full management of ray traversal, one of the compute-heavy elements of the method,” Huynh mentioned. “And that frees up the CPU for geometry and simulation, and lets the GPU give attention to what it does greatest, shading and lighting. The consequence? A cleaner, sooner and extra environment friendly pipeline constructed for the following technology of ray-traced video games.”
The ultimate breakthrough, Common Compression, are aimed to resolve the bottleneck created by GPU reminiscence bandwidth limitations which make it tougher to dealt with 4K textures and ray tracing maps.
Common Compression, in line with Huynh, is “a system that evaluates every bit of knowledge headed to reminiscence – not simply textures – and compresses it every time doable. Solely the important bytes are despatched out, which dramatically reduces reminiscence bandwidth utilization. Which means the GPU can ship extra element, increased body charges and larger effectivity.”
Cerny added: “There’s a mess of advantages from this, together with decrease energy consumption, increased constancy property and maybe most significantly, the synergies that Common Compression has with Neural Arrays and Radiance Cores, as we work to ship the very best experiences to avid gamers.”
Implying that this tech is probably not unique to a theoretical PlayStation 6, Huynh concluded that the plan was “to convey these improvements to builders throughout each gaming platform, as a result of this isn’t nearly silicon, it’s about empowering the creators and communities that make gaming what it’s”.
“And we’re simply getting began,” he defined. “As we proceed constructing with shut companions like Sony, every little thing we’re doing is targeted on one factor – pushing video games ahead for all of you.”
Xbox introduced in June that it had “entered right into a strategic, multi-year partnership with AMD to co-engineer silicon throughout a portfolio of units, together with future first-party consoles and cloud”, suggesting that a number of the expertise described in Sony’s video could discover its technique to Microsoft‘s subsequent console too.
