Please read my below comments about the Unreal Engine 4 coming out from Epic Games, specifically its notes about lowering development costs and resources through a more intuitive, non-programmer-focused UI. Do you think an engine build like this would be beneficial for the DA series?
"I wouldn't mind paying more for AAA games, such as a $80, $90 or even $100 price tag if I knew it was a quality game with tons of replayabilty. I have also not spent a dime on paid DLC or microtransactions for any game. I don't mind paying for quality, but I despise being nickeled-and-dimed for a product I've already purchased.
That being said, there was a very interesting article in this month's Game Informer* that discussed the new Unreal Engine 4 being developed. It has all the new bells and whistles that come with a new engine, including graphics and the whatnot, but more importantly, it discussed how the new engine has an incredibly higher amount of interactivity that does not require programming know how.
We have seen this model apply to Flash game design programs, such as StencylWorks, where little to no programming knowledge is required to make games. The newest Inreal Engine embraces that Kirk of philosophy, where entire locations, character renderings, effects such as lighting or physics... all of this can be set up using an intuitive interface. This is a drastic change from the current model, where each change or feature has to be drawn up by the design/writing/creative side, sent to the programming department for interpretation of the feature, coding for it developed, then looping it back to the design team to see if it is up to spec, THEN having the feature tested in game. This leads to lots of wasteful back and forth and lack of deep testing, since the feature has to be coded for each time if a fault is found.
The guys at Epic say this kind of engine tool would obviously not eliminate the need for programmers, but would greatly widen the ability of the creative and design teams to flesh out their ideas with coding without coding, so to speak, and then has programmers connect the dots in the final stages, after things have been tested and tweaked.
This could result in the huge 300-500 person teams required to make games and whittle it down to much more sustainable and manageable number. It also could give indie developers a shot at making games without a team of tech-savvy programmers, further allowing for more independence and creativity.
We'll see if any of this holds up when the Unreal Engine 4 comes out**, but either way this concept is incredibly interesting. Will we see a DA game in the future where zots won't be a limitation and much deeper content could be created based on branching choice? The verdict is still out.
deuce985 wrote...
That's very interesting if true. That means Epic is jumping on that Indie dev craze, which is flourishing on XBLA/PSN/tablet/social gaming. That means it would cut down on gaming budgets too, as you mentioned. Or at the very least, expand gaming.
Also, it's too early to assume how much gaming budgets will soar on the new consoles. You'd have to think Sony/M$ are aware of publisher concerns about rising budget costs, therefore they're going to do whatever they can to reduce budgets. Otherwise publishers will be less reluctant to adopt the new consoles. Sony could start by making their next system architecture much easier to develop on. Unlike PS3. I know for a fact that would reduce costs...
That also means people like me who aren't in the industry but interested in it makes it more accessible for us to do so? Am I reading that right?
Correct.
In the article, they took one of Epic's artists, Eric Caudle, someone with no programming knowledge and only expereince in the design side of video game making, to have three prototypes games up and running in a few days. These games included a rough clone of Sid Meier's PIrates and a flight simulator, so these games were more than just side-scrolling platforms, but games with more intircate controls and mechanisms.
If this kind of extrapolation is truly possible, then it could tip the scales in development in a whole new direction. The article outlines the model now as stating the design side creates 5% of an idea, and the programmers code 95% of it. With the tools the new Unreal Engie 4 offers, they see it switching to designers/artists/writers/etc developing 90% of the games content, with programmers tackling the last remaining 10%, getting it to tie back into the overall game's design underpinings. That's a huge swing in work. In addition, a designer would be able to create anything they wanted and then immediately test it and see how it would work in game. This is a huge boon to being able to see if a given feature really fits in and works as it is imagined or not, and allows for on-the-fly tweaking.
I am by no means a proponent of Epic. I hear that the CryEngine3, developed by Far Cry creators Crytek and is a smaller competitor of Epic, is on the same level (if not surpassing) the physics and graphics aspect of the engine side. However, I do not know of any of the same philosophy or design decisions to make games as easy to create, which is the most interesting aspect of the Unreal Engine 4. If it can truly accomplish what it sets out to, it could reduce large, big budget game studios down significantly... or, conversely, could offer tons more content, features, characters and ideas in the same amount of time than was previously offered before.
Interestingly enough, the article ALSO discussed how the Unreal 4 was designed to be entirely scalable depending on the platform or the scope of the game in degrees of ten. For instance, if you wanted physics levels, graphics, ambient sound, lighting, etc. of a AAA game, you could tune all the mechanics to achieve that level. Similarly, if you wanted to scale all of these elements down to a tenth of what could be offered on the highhest end PC or a next gen console for a game developed for, same, a mobile phone, this would be possible and a totally natural progression. This could even further open the door for easier and more rich mobile gaming to be developed less expensively, just as easily as the high end AAA titles.
All in all, the CONCEPT of this engine may be more lofty than it delivers (but hopefully not!), but in theory, I love the premise. Then again... since Bioware currently uses their own Lycium engine. But then again, the Mass Effect series uses Unreal Engine 3, so this could be a shot in the arm for the series... assuming the EC can bring it back to life in the mind of some gamers."
I think that even though Bioware has sunk a lot of time and investment into their current engine, looking at an engine like Unreal 4 might give them a serious advantage to making content and features going forward. I don't know all that much about their internal resource management, but given the huge amount of bodies required to make DA2 and TOR (from what we've seen in estimates, at least), this may help alleviate some of the resource drain found in the system.
Anyone's thoughts?
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