Sonic 4 Episode II, powered by Tegra 3

[MWC 2012] Earlier today in Barcelona, we’ve played with the latest Sonic for mobile devices on a Tegra 3 platform (an Asus Transformer Prime). Obviously, SEGA’s Sonic is still a huge franchise, and the game is going to be released on multiple platforms, including game consoles and mobiles. What makes the Tegra 3 version interesting is that (we’ve been told) that it is the only mobile version that uses the exact same art assets as game consoles. In the world of mobile gaming, it is quite common for developers to adapt (“shrink”) the art assets because it is a reliable way to improve performance. In this case, SEGA has been able to fit the console content in the Transformer Prime (and other Tegra 3 devices).

Of course, this is never a hardware-only game: NVIDIA is investing quite a bit of engineering resources to help developers work and optimize games for its platform, and although every chip maker does it at some level, NVIDIA is out-investing everyone when it comes to “content” – after all, content sells hardware, not the opposite. It is smart, because in good times (like now) NVIDIA can enjoy the benefits of having faster hardware on the market. Then as competitors join the party, many games simply don’t work on other chips, so “availability of content” becomes the main selling point for the platform. For instance, some Tegra 2 games are still not available in their “Tegra form” on faster competing hardware because developers don’t get the engineering support they need to get the job done. Sonic 4 Episode II runs at a solid 30fps on Tegra 3.

Other games optimized for Tegra 3 were also demonstrated:Golden Arrow THD, Dark Kingdom THD, Eden to GREEEEN THD and Hamilton’s Great Adventure THD