The PS3 is a powerful, powerful machine, but harnessing that power isn't easy. There are confusing, technical ways of explaining just why this is, but we like Midway developer Shaun Himmerick's explanation better.
Interviewed by This Xbox Life, Himmerick - who served as Executive Producer on the upcoming Wheelman - speaks at length on the topic:
The politically incorrect answer is that the PS3 is a huge pain in the ass. Anyone making a game, if you're going to make it for both [360 and PS3], just lead on the PS3 because if it works on the PS3 it'll work on 360.
The easiest way to look at it is, the 360 has one big chunk of memory, but the PS3 has two chunks of memory that in total are the same size as the Xbox, but because they're split you can't share memory the same way. That will bite you in the ass, and it bit us in the ass bad.
We had to play catch up on the PS3 because of the memory constraints and how it renders, how it processes is just different. And it's harder on the PS3. The Xbox is just like a dumb PC, which is great because it's easier to build a game on a PC.
Nice, simple, to the point. Just the way we like it.
This Xbox Life Podcast Episode 27 - Wheelman [This Xbox Life, via D+Pad]