PS3 Vs Xbox 360: Final Fantasy XIII is ‘significantly poorer’ on 360

By: Alan Ng | February 17, 2010 | 19 Comments

Consider this the first of many similar articles to come out, as the gaming world prepares for the release of Final Fantasy XIII. One website has spent time with both versions of the game and has concluded that the Xbox 360 version is ‘significantly poorer’ than its PS3 counterpart.

That is the views of Nowgamer, who have wasted no time in giving their thoughts on what they could clearly see between the two versions of the game.

In terms of visual quality, they state that character’s clothes on the Xbox 360 appear to be lacking finer detail, while you can also make out the ‘notably lower resolution textures’.

Other differences between the two include less details for environmental objects and textures, while the CG on the Xbox 360 is extremely compressed, compared with the smoother visuals seen on the PS3.

Remember that this is their views, not ours. They have clearly spent a lot of time studying the two versions, so keep your opinions clean.

Did you expect such a bold comparison, considering Square’s promises that both versions would be ‘equal’?

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Tags: PS3 Vs Xbox 360

Obviously!!
If anyone dares to say that the 360 version is superior than the PS3 version they deserve to be slapped Mr.Queermo Style
PS3 was the leading platform so how the f#ck is the 360 version gonna look better
Ben
What annoys me most is how PS3 gets loads of X360 ports with arguably poorer graphics, and yet as soon as 1 PS3 -> X360 port comes out with poorer graphics, the whole community has to be up in arms about it all, even though the PS3 has been proven to have marginally better graphical capabilities. Although Final Fantasy is known for pushing it's consoles to the limit, that;s not all there is – the real prize for final fantasy is the story telling, the gameplay and the music – even at a lower quality I don't think the graphics will be anything to complain about.
Mark
It’s a myth that PS3 ports are porer, one which Microsoft, their media partners like Eurogamer/Digital Foundry and Joystiq are happy to continue to push.
Of course they get away with it, as nobody buys both games on 2 consoles…
Anyone however that’s seen how much better PS3 Bioshock is, compared to the 360 version will surely know what a total crock the Digital Foundry comparisons are.
http://collectorsedition.org twistedsymphony
@Mark sometimes the graphics are just better on one console over the other. I own both and there are some games where the 360 has an advantage and some games where the PS3 has the advantage. And whenever possible I've downloaded the demos for both and compared them by turning turning both consoles on and flipping between the two input channels on my projector. For the most part I'd say the Digital Foundry comparisons are accurate.
I'd say 90% of the time while there are differences they are negligible and most people shouldn't even care. the other 10% of the time I find it to be a deal breaker for one console over the other (personally) Stuff like lack of AA gives me headaches so even if one has better textures but less AA I'll go with the one with better AA personally. Similarly frame rate and screen tearing are annoying to I tend to avoid that when I can.
Chances are Bioshock came out better on the PS3 because they had a boat load of extra time to work on it and spruce up the graphics engine…. similarly the orange box looked pretty bad on the PS3 compared to the 360 because it's obvious that Valve has struggled to work with the PS3's architecture.
Nether console is clearly "better" than the other, but they are different and developers work with them differently… so there's benefit to drawing comparisons on a game by game basis.
As someone who owns both consoles I like to make an informed decision when buying a game to make the most of my $$.

holz77
using a projector is your first mistake

Keiran
Yes I agree with you because the game us always going to be better on PS3 because Square Enix has spend way more time on PS3's than Xbox360
RAIZE
This game was designed for the PS3 first, then ported to the xbox 360. This is why it looks MARGINALLY better on PS3. When a game is developed then ported to another format, the original format ALWAYS looks better. This was the case with "ghostbusters" as you will recall, which was made for 360 and ported to PS3. The PS3 version lacked "more detailed textures", due to the porting process. This is just the way things work. Although, both games were basically identical in every way, aside from some minor aliasing, and slightly less detailed texture maps. This game is no different. It will be the same, great game on whatever console you buy. Just "slightly" more aliased and with slightly less detailed textures. Unless you're playing on a 60+ inch HD set, you'll NEVER probably notice those differences. So in short , will be epic on both major consoles. 360 version will sell more copies though, only because there are simply more 360's out there. In the end, Sony gets a very "slight" graphics advantage, and MS gets more sales. Win – Win for both consoles.

Guest
The graphics don't suck on xbox because it's a port. The graphics suck because everything has to be compressed and the xbox has weaker hardware to begin with. Sorry dude. They won this one.
Also I'm not so sure MS will even win in sales. There is a very high concentration of PS3 owners that are Final Fantasy fans. Most xbox users are new to the series. Guess we'll find out in 5 days.
Anyone else ticked that US didn't get a collectors edition?

Robin
No offence, but I think you along with a hell of a lot other people are misinformed. Since the PS3 was announced all anyone has been able to talk about how amazing the hardware was and how much better it supposedly is than that of the Xbox 360. However, I would argue that it was only with the release of Uncharted 2 that there has been any proof to back up these claims. So yeah, the numbers say the PS3 is more powerful, but so what? If developers can't access all this power, there is no benefit to the consumer. If, as you suggest, the poorer graphics on the Xbox version of FFXII are because of lower system specs and not because its a port, how do you explain the superior Xbox versions of even recent releases like Arkham Asylum or Bayonetta? And there are many than that I think. In any practical terms, aside from a couple of exclusives like Uncharted 2 which I mentioned, Xbox had been the performance champion of this generation no question. Although of course the 'quirks' of the hardware, such as red rings of death etc, are another matter.
Just to clarify, I'm not a fanboy. I actually only own a PS3, I bought a 360 at launch but the fan noise was too much for me.

Mort
I think that you answer you own question in your post. By all accounts the 360 is an easier system to develop for hence most cross platform titles being made for the 360 and ported to the PS3, meaning as you rightly said the real power of the machine is not being harnessed. The reason that Uncharted 2 shows of the superiority of the hardware is that it was made from the ground up for this system by developers who understand this system. In the same way that GT5 will blow away the currently best in Genre Forza 3.
The PS3 is a more powerful piece of HW and that is a fact, the thing to remember is that whilst you make light of Uncharted as an exclusive in this day and age it is the exclusives that make or break a console.
The way the console war is at the moment their can only be one winner which is us the consumer as they both try to come up with more reasons why we should own their system.
All ill say is when is the last time that Sony had to pay $1million a week for a timed exclusive?
Tubnut
I'm an all around gamer, owning a PS3, a 360, Wii, high end gaming PC and a few other 'toys'. Everytime a new game comes out that piques my interest i have to spend considerable time working out which is the best platform to buy it for. FFXIII was a no brainer, PS3 all the way. Call of Duty MW2 was difficult, looks better on PS3 but for online fun and controller layout, 360 won it, although i will probably get it for PC too. Bioshock 2, when i get around to it will be back to PS3. The 360 is like an all-rounder with a better online experience, PS3 is for when u want a superior single player experience. For example, Killzone 2 looked incredible and i loved the single player but i wont play it online, not worth the trouble.

Tacvb
Actually Killzone 2 is very fun online, I love it, its good.

Haris
I have both versions and the only thing I could notice was a little difference in CGI quality, but not really. You have to be playing on a 120 inch 1080P projector. Otherwise you will not see the difference. It is as simple as that…..
Doctor
The ps3 is far superior then the xbox 360.
people keep talking but they dont have a clue or understand what and why.
The ps3 has 7 processors (CPU). the xbox has 1 CPU. when a third party make a game they just port it to both consoles.
which means sadly the ps3 only uses just 1 of its processors making the 360 look graphicly superior.
third parties have started putting more time and effort into the ps3 ports, like with final fantasy. The xbox can only go so far graphics wise.
final fantasy’s graphics are stunning one of the best looking games around. people will say there are so many 360 games that look better but they are just ports, with better graphic games coming out the 360 is starting to show its wear and tear. while the ps3 is getting better.
uncharted 2 a stunning game, the 360 would not be able to handle the graphics and counld never run at the level the ps3 does.
along with kill zone 2 and metal gear solid 4. so far we have seen just half of what the ps3 can really do.
the ps3 the more powerful out of the 3 consoles, will out live the wii and 360 and gone on the be crowned king. sorry 360 users.
it doesent matter it comes down to which console have the better games and online network.
Killer B
Has anyone considered the medium that both versions of the game comes on?
Perhaps it's not the CPU or GPU of either console, but the fact that the PS3 version is one BD (single or dual? Can anyone confirm?) while the X360 version is on three dual-layer DVDs?
Given that information…roughly 24 GB of info on the X360 between three discs (which some may have duplicate content…similar to the PSX FFVII, VIII, and IX games) while the PS3 has up to 25 GB (50 GB if dual-layered) to work with. The 360 FMVs are compressed, while the PS3 FMVs are not.

Setsuna
regardless
white engine -the engine final fantasy 13 is made on
only used 4 of the 6 spus availble for processing they released a demo for it with final fantasy advent children and the demo looked way better than the finished product you know why
they downgraded the graphics for both ps3 and 360 version cut out alot of things for the game and i quote"the volume of content cut was, in itself, enough to make another game."
so even at 4 spus the 360 was still holding it back
also dont make excuses for the 360 when this generation started blu ray sucked the cell sucked ps3 games sucked is all the 360 fan boys said

MesonW
Really really, how many fanboys? PS3 version is superior, but all PS3 owners can do is wave their dicks about as though *they’re* the superior ones, not their console.
Look at ALL the reviews… crippled CGI on the 360 and fuzzier hair/texture details in-game. It’s little to do with console performance and all about data storage. What there *is* to do with performance is down to Square Enix doing a half-arsed job of porting PS3 code to the 360. They’ve vastly different architectures and will always show differing results if code is optimised for one and not the other. The 360 has better technically looking games than FFXIII so don’t go workin yourself into a tiz over how the “360 couldn’t handle it”.
Either they couldn’t be bothered to beef up the 360 version, or were too afraid of what 5 DVDs would suggest (?!), or didn’t have the time and resources to enhance the 360 version to take better advantage of its architecture in the time alotted. It’s a shame, but it’s not a game-breaker.
Erika
It depends on how developers create the game. FFXIII was created mainly for the PS3, for the multicore cpu, andX360 has only 1 core almost the same power (it all depends on how you make the game), but a better gpu and more ram. So they probably compressed the graphics to make it fit….
PS3 has less ram and less powerful gpu, thats why you cant voice chat while gaming….for single player games like these you might wanna stick with the ps3 exclusives ONLY cuz it looks real good, all multi-platform games must be played on XBOX it looks better than in ps3.
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