Not only the pure specifications for the PS5 were the focus of the Sony presentation today, the exciting 3D audio feature has now been explained in more detail. For the next generation, it was therefore particularly important for Sony to catch up in this area, which has been neglected for years.
The foundations for the audio design were found, among other things, on PlayStation VR, which is powered by the Tempest engine on the PS5. This is based on the most important principles of presence and location. PlayStation architect Mark Cerny describes this as follows:
“In today's games, rain is a simple, single sound. With the Tempest Engine, the PlayStation 5 wants to create the feeling of actually being in the shower by simulating the sound of individual raindrops hitting the floor around you. Locality? It's more about being able to track exactly where objects are located – and the science that delivers them is just amazing because it takes into account the shape of your ears and even the size and shape of your head. ”
The Tempest engine therefore functions like a revised AMD GPU processing unit that has been released from its caches and is based exclusively on DMA transfers.
“In the end, we have a device with approximately the same SIMD performance and bandwidth as all eight Jaguar cores in the PS4 combined. If we were to use the same algorithms as PSVR, that would be enough for about five thousand sound sources – but of course we want to use more complex algorithms. ”
The Tempest engine opens the door to a real revolution in game audio, it says, that can be enjoyed without high-end audio hardware. The easiest solution is of course headphones, while the Tempest Engine does the rest. For the future, one is also optimistic that one can also deliver experiences such as the virtual surround sound of TV speakers and sound bars.
