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Tim Sweeney Talks Unreal Engine 3
An anonymous reader writes "Following the recent unveiling of Epic's Unreal Engine 3, Beyond3D has interviewed Tim Sweeney of Epic about the next-gen videogame engine. The discussion is mainly about the 3D requirements, but they also touch on other technologies that are used or required: 'Off-the-shelf 32-bit Windows can only tractably access 2GB of user RAM per process. UT2003, which shipped in 2002, installed more than 2GB of data for the game, though at that time it was never all loaded into memory at once. It doesn't exactly take a leap of faith to see scenarios in 2005-2006 where a single game level or visible scene will require >2GB RAM at full detail.'"
Tim Sweeney will, in my mind, forever be linked to the wonderful ZZT. This interview, given some time before Unreal 2 is an interesting contrast to the one posted above. In particular, he talks about ease-of-creation:
Hercules: You moved onto to other, bigger projects long ago. It must be good to know that the first thing you ever created is still used/played a lot. Does ZZT still cross your mind, sometimes?
Tim Sweeney: Yes, one of the interesting things to do is contrast ZZT and Unreal, and look at how incredibly far we've come in graphics quality in that time. But also to see how little the industry has progressed -- or maybe even gone backwards in some respects... So, how will game development be 10 years from now? If levels take six months to build, and compiles take 5 hours each, and it costs $20 million to develop a game, then developing games won't be fun or even possible anymore.
I'm a fan of creation tools that are accessible to anyone who can play the game. (Casual players who may not be technically inclined.) As a developer, I'm hoping that we will be among the first to offer something that lets even the most casual user plink around. As a player, I'm hoping that Sweeney has retained this philosophy, and that future Epic offerings let us build -- at least a little bit -- with the same ease that ZZT did.
We're indie. We're working on our 14th game.
Why? Is it because newer games simply look more realistic? Or maybe because the threshold for suspension of disbelief somehow goes up the older and grizzlier you get, so your aged brain needs to see that particles are moving in the right direction and speed?
Or maybe realistic physics somehow makes games more FUN?
Me, I think people are impressed by realistic physics (especially with regards to PC games, and within that group, especially FPS) because that's what developers tell them to look forward to. It's something that a bunch of mathematicians in a back room can easily improve upon from the previous generation (along with graphics and AI), not something that necessarily makes games more fun to play.
So I can somewhat agree with the original poster. Gameplay hasn't improved, or even gone backwards; it's stagnated. It's just the display technology and marketing that's improved.
Yeah. UT2004 at least had vehicles, but I've been using those on Battlefield 1942 for almost two years now. Show me new gameplay, and I'll consider buying one of the new games. I'm just sick of the same old FPS crap. Deathmatch is dead.
I bet Epic and ID Software are making these new engines just to license them to other companies.
More than enough BS
the Quake3 engine gave us Return to Castle Wolfenstein and Jedi Knight 2: Jedi Outcast
The Unreal engine gave us Deus Ex and America's Army
We all know that even if Doom 3 sucks as a game, the engine will licensed and used in an even better game
"Some things have to be believed to be seen." - Ralph Hodgson
Given certain constraints, the more complicated the rules that govern a FPS, the more depth it can have. You could try totally non-sensical rules, such as:
"If you enter water while strafing, your movement speed while you are in the water will be 300% normal"
but that's not usually very much fun because people can't relate to it. More realistic physics allow more fine-tuning of strategy with a minimum of annoyance incurred by adding more rules, since it's an approximation of what people are already familiar with.
I used to bulls-eye womp-rats in my pants
Give an artist a number and he'll easily double it with content. I've never seen an artist have problems filling up space. The sort of problem will be solved. There's always a company out there that's will to make a content creation tool to help out. If you're seeing copied and pasted rooms, that's more due to a poor developer than due to a space limitation.
You do raise some better points at the end of your post. A good 2D team could have a larger profit margin, if they're lucky to make any money at all. Doom 14 with a 1% margin will make more money overall than a no-name 2D game with a 10% margin just based on volume of sales. Publishers know this and are willing to go with the amount of money rather than the profit margin.
Higher production costs is a big deal and is having an effect on the industry. The recent slate of studio closings is proof of this in my opinion. Smaller publishers, much like the smaller movie studios, are going to be the sources of innovation in the gaming industry.
Realistic physics makes sense in some games, where photorealism is a goal. But realistic physics is a loss for most games.
Think of the great games of the past. Donkey Kong- realistic physics? Nope. Good game? Yup. Mario- realistic physics? Nope. Good game? Yup. Zelda- same. Even other genres of games: Street Fighter 2, NBA Jams, etc. None featured realistic physics, but all were great games.
Realistic physics is a crutch "feature" that developers claim do to the current realism push. Its the same thing that makes them claim 1st person and 3D are better because "its more realistic", when truthfully most games would be better without them. The truth is that it makes all games indistinguishable- you can play any FPS of the last 5 years and have a hard time telling them apart. Its why the industry is in a rut right now- gameplay has been ignored at the expense of "realism" and graphics.
I still have more fans than freaks. WTF is wrong with you people?
And they think I'm going to have 2 gigs of ram in just two years? Not at these prices! Hell, I'm still running a Radeon 7500! I've been waiting to upgrade until Half Life 2 and Doom 3 come out. No sense in buying a new card before then.
They're nuts. I develop games. I don't see any need to use that much ram for textures. Look at what games like Metal Gear on the PS2 look like, and they've only got a fraction of the ram that PC game developers have.
Before they switch to high res texture,s maybe they ought to start hiring artists who can make the most of what they have. Because IMO, Unreal's art looks like crap, and they're wasting 90% of thr polygons on the characters rather than the environment, because it's easier to throw more polygons at chracters than to build more detailed levels.