[lukeman]

The boring nature of the architecture is notable as it puts the focus back on software, which is what people care about. That devs this generation can just make shit without discovering the complexities of custom hardware is a good thing.

[ewzimm]

That's probably true for Playstation, but I think developing for Xbox was already pretty much like developing for Windows, even with different hardware architectures. Most game devs don't looking too deeply at the hardware but just use the tools they're given. The ones who want to understand what's going on in hardware will still study the details of the CPU/GPU.

[Arelius]

The endianess of the Xbox 360 made "already pretty much like developing for Windows" not quite accurate. And causes a lot of problems relating to I/O.

[wmf]

Doesn't the 360 run little-endian?

[Arelius]

Nope, the 360 runs big-endian.

[ewzimm]

It does both.

[Arelius]

Incorrect, the powerPC may be capable of both, but not the xbox360 in practice.

[ewzimm]

Yes, this is correct. Although it is capable if switching, this would cause problems that require a motherboard fix which is not implemented, so the machine runs big endian in practice. I included a wikipedia link to explain.

[wmf]

What, does MS let game developers choose?

[ewzimm]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PowerPC#Endian_modes

[Arelius]

No, the machine always runs big-endian.