The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim

THE BUZZ: Joshua Sawyer, Director for Fallout: New Vegas, has revealed that the PlayStation 3 Skyrim issues may be due to an ”engine-level issue” and would take a ”large time commitment” to fix.

Sawyer explained that the size of save files can be a massive problem on the PlayStation 3:

“The longer you play a character, the more bit differences on objects (characters, pencils on tables, containers, etc.) get saved off and carried around in memory,” he explained. “I think we’ve seen save games that are pushing 19 megs, which can be really crippling in some areas.”

“As with Fallout 3 and Skyrim, the problems are most pronounced on the PS3 because the PS3 has a divided memory pool. The Xbox 360 has a unified memory pool: 512 megs of RAM usable as system memory or graphics memory. The PS3 has a divided memory pool: 256 megs for system, 256 for graphics. It’s the same total amount of memory, but not as flexible for a developer to make use of,” he added.

EGM’s TAKE: If this is the case then PlayStation 3 owners may be waiting a long time for that fix they’ve been asking for.

Source: Formspring