Issue link: https://digital.copcomm.com/i/1436283
was unified memory and you had to get a budget for your piece of that. They said, "Why do we need to give you more than you had on the PS2?" So early on, while they were still deciding how to carve up the cake, I loaded up the first playable level with tons of high-res sounds in the hopes the team would be able to appreciate the importance of devoting more resources to audio for this next-generation console. To some extent, it was a useful ploy. Naughty Dog Co-president Andy Gavin had written this proprietary language called "GOAL" (Game Oriented Assembly Lisp). It was great and programmers loved it. Their game engine was built on it. I think they originally wanted to continue with GOAL for the first PS3 game, but I believe a new Sony Worldwide Studios directive requiring code and tech sharing amongst the game studios put an end to that. The code base for Uncharted: Drake's Fortune needed to be a ubiquitous language like C++. This was actually fortuitous for audio because heretofore we had been using an old piece of tech called "Overlord" to interface with Sony's SCREAM libraries. Overlord was written by an ND programmer who had departed the company early on, so it was buggy and poorly supported. Since the game engine had to be rewritten, the audio engine had to be as well. Enter Jonathan Lanier. ND had just hired Jonathan Lanier for I/O, disc management, and controller stuff. Andy informed me that Jonathan was super-interested in audio programming, so being an opportunist, I did everything I could to bond with him. At first, ND was reluctant to dedicate a programmer to audio, but the reality of the situation forced their hand, and we were off to the races! We started working on this data- driven audio engine that in some form or another you're still using. Right Rob? RK: Yeah, you would still recognize it, Bruce. The core is still the same. BS: Then Phil hooked us up with Paul Fox and managed the Sony side of the audio process while we were doing the first Uncharted. That was a time where if doors opened a crack, I scrambled or slithered through them. Some I kicked down. With Jonathan involved, we were off to the races. PK: My involvement at the time was little, but I do remember the aesthetic change and Bruce bringing his sensibility into the game. Certain systems and choices of sounds were brought in to deliver character in this hyper-realistic way, since it was a serial adventure instead of a cartoon. Lots of aesthetic choices that came into play with that game. It was a big change and was noticed across Sony how important this game was for the platform, as well as Naughty Dog. Jak and Daxter are ready for action in Jak 3