How to make a creative game in 2010: Ensure your CEO never hears of the game

Muzman on 27/6/2010 at 08:07

Examples?
I'm not disgreeing per se. I just noticed that I can't think of any off the top of my head (except maybe Unreal 1. Was Mass Effect big? I haven't played that yet)

Eldron on 27/6/2010 at 09:33

Quote Posted by Muzman

Examples?
I'm not disgreeing per se. I just noticed that I can't think of any off the top of my head (except maybe Unreal 1. Was Mass Effect big? I haven't played that yet)

Take your pick:

(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Unreal_Engine_games)

most noticable examples would be all the mmo's built with unreal engine, and as an unreal engine 3 example, APB has gigantic maps.

Map non-linearity has most to do with game design, map size+graphical fidelity has more to do with what kind of GPU memory hardware you will be targeting, since you can only fit so much in the vram. But then again, optimized art by good artists will lead to better graphical fidelity in bigger areas and shorter loadingtimes, the "pop-in" streaming also helps alot.

The bioshock engine was built on the unreal engine 2 core, and the stuff that was replaced and upgraded was the rendering capabilities, not the core of the engine.

EvaUnit02 on 27/6/2010 at 11:28

Quote Posted by thiefinthedark

While I am terribly excited for a new BG&E, the article really did alot to further incense me regarding the state of the games industry these days. Namely, the fact that anything half decent inevitably comes from the indie crowd.

Jesus Christ, so you're one of those people who thinks in cliched obtuse sweeping generalisations like "all multi-million AAA projects from major publishers are shit"?

Briareos H on 27/6/2010 at 11:46

because they aren't?

Zygoptera on 27/6/2010 at 13:11

Quote Posted by Eldron

Unreal engine has always been super flexible, There has always been vast games made in the Unreal engines, way bigger than bioshock.
[..]
most noticable examples would be all the mmo's built with unreal engine, and as an unreal engine 3 example, APB has gigantic maps.

Well yes, Deus Ex itself was UE after all. Citing APB or other MMOs as examples seems a little fatuous though as it ignores the second part of what I said, ie multiplatform. If you could come up with other recent multiplatform games using UE3 and with a good balance of large level sizes/ detail/ non linearity then I would stand corrected (haven't played either but I would guess maybe Borderlands or Mirror's Edge might qualify). In any case I suspect the limitation is not so much consoles' 5 year old hardware but the fps certification requirement forcing conservatism.

I'm not really saying Bioshock is great in this regard either, as shown by the references to Deus Ex and Thief being better, just that it is the best of the multiplatform/ 'UE3' (ue3 renderer over UW backbone, wasn't it, or was it UE2 then UW then UE3 renderer bolted on?) games.

Eldron on 27/6/2010 at 13:52

sorry, I thought we were talking about unreal engine itself, but its about platforms now?

well, back to nonlinearity, thats as I said all about design, and has little to do with the engine or console, and size is all about scales and how much stuff you can stuff in there in that level.

We can say that consoles do make it so that developers have to cut up their levels in smaller pieces, due to the 256+256 memory they have, and it still is the bane of any fellow developer I've met, memory is always the downside.

However, athough computers do have the upper hand in regular ram, many still only have graphics cards with 256mb vram, so that's the same issue there.

as a multiplatform example, the vehicle levels in the first mass effect were quite massive, and if you'd jump out of the vehicle you'd notice, but it was all about scale and what they put in there.

irrational has a more experienced bunch of people when it comes to creating optimized art, and way more experience with the unreal engine tech they've been using, they're going to get more out of it.

And obsidian, well, look at nwn2, that was an unoptimized train wreck, artisticly and how costy the art was, so I'm not shocked if they had troubles when they made alpha protocol.

As with APB again, it has been a bit on and off if it would come to consoles or not, and I believe it first and most has to do with the fact that mmo titles dont go home well on consoles.

EvaUnit02 on 27/6/2010 at 18:37

Quote Posted by Zygoptera

Well yes, Deus Ex itself was UE after all. Citing APB or other MMOs as examples seems a little fatuous though as it ignores the second part of what I said, ie multiplatform.

APB for much of its lifecycle WAS multiplatform. Microsoft's red tape involving pricing schemes as usual resulted in the 360 version being delayed indefinitely, as has happened with many other MMOs like Champions Online.

thiefinthedark on 27/6/2010 at 19:41

Quote Posted by EvaUnit02

Jesus Christ, so you're one of those people who thinks in cliched obtuse sweeping generalisations like "all multi-million AAA projects from major publishers are shit"?

Unfortunately, I've yet to encounter a PC AAA title in the past several years that even holds a candle to ones from 5 or 8 years ago. It seems anything half decent is either coming out of small european studios (Witcher, STALKER, etc) or being made by teams of 4 people.

When the discussion at the design table is more about marketing & VFX than game design, you start to see why we only get "Generic Shooter 6000: The Shootening" these days. I've been struggling against it for 2 years, and I'm pretty much ready to cut loose and go indie myself.

june gloom on 27/6/2010 at 19:59

Quote Posted by thiefinthedark

So what you're saying is, unless it's indie or foreign you're physically incapable of enjoying it?

Briareos H on 27/6/2010 at 20:05

Quote Posted by dethtoll

So what you're saying is, unless it's indie or foreign you're physically incapable of enjoying it?

This logic deserves a facepalm so much that I'm on the verge of breaking my own principle of never using 4chan memes.