Goblin Squad Member
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BigWorld engine has been fairly successful. There's a couple fantasy MMOs using it as well as some really popular off-the-wall concepts (World of Tanks!).
HeroEngine is what I thought BioWare was using for SWTOR, but I can't remember.
Icarus Studios makes an MMO engine, but I don't know anything about any games made on it.
Multiverse died and went open source. Being as Ryan said that they'd negotiated a contract, I highly, highly doubt that this is their engine.
Monumental Dev Suite disappeared off the face of the planet never to be seen again.
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BigWorld is the most likely candidate, but if that fell through then I'd guess HeroEngine.
I don't know enough about Icarus to even start to predict them as using it.
Unity, anyone? http://unity3d.com
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Goblin Squad Member
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Unity, anyone? http://unity3d.com
I don't think it can handle the server side of things as above with source engine? There is Battlestar Galactica which is a browser mmo and shadowrun online which is effectively a corpg that I know of.
Castle Story is a ks project that is also using Unity and looking very nice however. Unity is cool just not the "full mmo solution" I reckon. I think also that Ryan mentioned PfO would not initially have mac support, so another indication Unity is not being used.
HeroEngine is what I thought BioWare was using for SWTOR, but I can't remember.
Yes, Bioware's SWTOR uses a heavily-modified Hero Engine, I've read about. I remember seeing people interested in the graphics never happy with this game and also performance issues. But I think the latest version of Hero Engine resolves the performance issue and the art style is completely based on the developers choice also.
Unity is supported on mac.
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Goblin Squad Member
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Unity is supported on mac.
Personally I'm somewhat hoping it isn't considering there isn't even a jerry rig attempt way to get it on linux. (Note this is not a comment that I think GW should change their plans to make linux a possibility, just a statement of personal preference, I can boot to windows if I absolutely have to).
Though I do have to say there is actually an interesting possibility that people using linux for games may be near an uptick. Considering in the near future it sounds like valve is actually getting ready to do some legwork to encorage and support it.
Unity 4 has native Linux support. I don't know exactly when it comes out but they're heavily marketing it so I'd guess within the next couple months.
Even so, I see zero reason why you couldn't import a unity 3 project into 4. If you couldn't it'd be pretty useless.
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Goblin Squad Member
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Unity 4 has native Linux support. I don't know exactly when it comes out but they're heavily marketing it so I'd guess within the next couple months.
Even so, I see zero reason why you couldn't import a unity 3 project into 4. If you couldn't it'd be pretty useless.
Of course, Ryan said that they're using an engine that supports a full MMO back-end and not just the graphical front-end. As such, Unity falls into the same box as Unreal Engine and is unlikely to be the client, because it lacks the billing and support infrastructure on the server side.
Unity has full networking support built in. How that translates to the MMO space I don't know but its not "just a graphical front end." It has a built in physics engine, content pipeline and authoring tools etc.
I don't see how billing has to tie into an engine to be considered MMO quality though. No engine I've ever seen claims to support a certain payment infrastructure. Its much more likely there's another 3rd party tool to do that for you.
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Goblin Squad Member
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Unity has full networking support built in. How that translates to the MMO space I don't know but its not "just a graphical front end." It has a built in physics engine, content pipeline and authoring tools etc.
I don't see how billing has to tie into an engine to be considered MMO quality though. No engine I've ever seen claims to support a certain payment infrastructure. Its much more likely there's another 3rd party tool to do that for you.
http://www.bigworldtech.com/
http://www.icarusstudios.com/
http://www.heroengine.com/
Those are three of the big ones.
Of those, only icarus mentions a billing system. That's not to say the others don't have one, of course.
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Goblin Squad Member
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So, Gregg Reece posted a guess in a blog thread that looks like it could be exactly what Ryan has been talking about.
xScape from Icarus Studios, where Pathfinder Online's new Lead Game Designer, Lee Hammock, used to work.
It also has multi-platform support which would be handy for creating 'apps' to allow us to access certain in-game functions, i.e, guild chat and auction houses.
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Goblin Squad Member
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Icarus have a poor website (even this one is poor imo: http://icarusstudios.com/pages/total-solution) for show-casing their product however. They only seem to have Fallen Earth to showcase/proof of working example also.
A quick question, the chosen middleware, how well-aligned is it with the GAME design goals for PfO?
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Goblin Squad Member
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... how well-aligned is it with the GAME design goals for PfO?
I think most of the game systems will be outside the middleware/engine.
Ryan listed out some of the things they're looking for in this post. Basically, the middleware/engine should support the things that every MMO needs, leaving GW to focus entirely on their game.
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Goblin Squad Member
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... how well-aligned is it with the GAME design goals for PfO?I think most of the game systems will be outside the middleware/engine.
Ryan listed out some of the things they're looking for in this post. Basically, the middleware/engine should support the things that every MMO needs, leaving GW to focus entirely on their game.
I should have provided an eg to illustrate. Eg with SWTOR the devs heavily moddified the Hero engine - so they could implement eg the speech wheel thing (not a feature of a standard mmo) to create their vision etc. Problem is, that all puts their heavily modified Hero engine out of sorts with the Hero Engine updates of the latest version...
The other problem is, if these engines are "standard mmo features", if PfO is far from a standard mmo eg trinity combat etc... I think this is an issue for choosing middleware if the devs want a really unique combat system for eg, there are going to be limitations without recourse to an building there own from the ground up, so to speak?
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Goblin Squad Member
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Yeah it is complicated, the flow chart of one "complete solution" reminded me of a chart of all the chemical pathways in a living cell!
Makes that "deal" GW's have said they've secured all the more intriguing.
I've just struggled to find really big names of mmorpgs that have used the middleware packages in a big way. SWTOR, World Of Warplanes/Tanks seem about the 2 biggest I've heard about. And the CryEngine3 being used by ArchAge.
edit: Did not realize The Repopulation is using The Hero Engine
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Goblin Squad Member
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Can we get an update on the middleware?
It seems like forever since we were told that we would hear/see something soon (TM) in conjunction with the tech demo preview.
Now we have seen some tech demo screens, but still no middleware announcement?
Any news, or did I miss something?
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Ok. So here is my guess. This is not a shot in the dark guess but an edgucated guess. We won't know for sure until Ryan says something but here it goes (to be followed by my reasoning)
HeroEngine
Tidbits of evidence:
1) June 20, 2012 Blog post:"We've brought in a team that already has experience with the engine we've selected, so things will happen swiftly."
2) Job postings: Craigslist reference. The actual craigslist ad is long dead. Here is another of the same job posting in Atlanta. How many studios are developing an MMO at this time in Seattle. They both reference heroengine as something the applicant should be familiar with.
3) Hirings: They hired Stephen Minkin, Da Hsia and Michael Wallin. All of whom worked for Pitchblack games on heroengine. I am guessing that this was good timing as Dominus had just been canned. All of whom are also referenced in this quote from the Aug 29, 2012 blog post: "Stephen, Da and Micheal have been building 3D models of characters and structures, creating animations for those objects, and importing them into the engine to test their look and range of motion."
Then I am wrong. That's ok. I felt I at least had something to base my guess off of then a gut instinct or random choice.
I am less interested in the actual engine and more in why you chose what you did and what you can do with it. I think overall people put way to much emphasis on the engine as the solution or problem behind a game.
I will be following the updates. Thanks for all you have done so far. I will be awaiting the final game!
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Goblin Squad Member
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You're an evil man, Decius...
From Kickstarter Aftermath - The Middleware Situation:
We have finalized our middleware selection.
However, that was from June 20th, 2012, and things can change, and I think I remember Ryan saying that the Tech Demo was capable of running with a variety of Middleware engines, so.... *shrugs*
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Goblin Squad Member
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@Decius, I was reading over that blog again looking for another piece of information and read the Middleware section more carefully.
Our second take on a middleware contract is also a fairly complicated deal to structure and execute, but the terms are finalized, and there is no concern on the part of any of the parties that the final documents won't be executed.
I think that makes it pretty clear that those final documents had not been executed at that time, and perhaps the deal feel through despite everyone's confidence that it would not.
@Decius, I was reading over that blog again looking for another piece of information and read the Middleware section more carefully.
Our second take on a middleware contract is also a fairly complicated deal to structure and execute, but the terms are finalized, and there is no concern on the part of any of the parties that the final documents won't be executed.I think that makes it pretty clear that those final documents had not been executed at that time, and perhaps the deal feel through despite everyone's confidence that it would not.
Reading back through the blog too. Oddly enough I found another tidbit that promotes the idea of HeroEngine having been used for the tech demo. "The middleware vendor is making pretty significant upgrades to their graphic systems in the near future, and we intend to be ready to take advantage of those changes when they become available." June 20, 2012 blog. This fits in nicely with HeroEngine 2.0 being in alpha as we speak.
Some new thoughts:
My thoughts at this point are that the tech demo was done with HeroEngine but something has come up and that may or may not be the case for the actual game. In fact HeroEngine seems like an ideal choice for a Tech Demo but a very expensive choice once you have procured enough funding to see the game to release (30% of revenue). Another candidate, Big World, for example has a commercial licencing fee of more than $100,000 and so would not be a financially sound choice for a tech demo with a budget of a little over $300,000. The kickstarter would have precluded goblinworks from buying an indie licence ($299) as it garnered more than $200,000 -maybe the first deal that fell through. However Big World only takes 10% (may be different for commercial licence) once your making money.
The concept of switching engines once you get going is not unheard of in the business. Elder Scrolls online did this exact thing. They used HeroEngine as a scaffold to get things up and going and then started to program their own engine after they had roughed out the game.
Just noticed that the job postings for:
Animator
Combat Systems Programmer
Game Systems Programmer
Graphic System Programmer
PvE Systems Programmer
Visual FX Artist
All have a job responsibility of "Recommend middleware to implement those systems." Definitely makes me think that there is a swap or at least a rethinking of middleware going on.
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Goblin Squad Member
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Just noticed that the job postings for:
Animator
Combat Systems Programmer
Game Systems Programmer
Graphic System Programmer
PvE Systems Programmer
Visual FX ArtistAll have a job responsibility of "Recommend middleware to implement those systems." Definitely makes me think that there is a swap or at least a rethinking of middleware going on.
Or, mayhap they are trying to keep the engine a surprise/secret.
And for fun, let's just throw the Abyssal Engine out there.
Actually, the engine that they get/select will more then likely influence time to release, depending on what is already built vs. what needs to be developed... Perhaps the Engine is picked and this Kickstarter is helping to secure it instead of taking a path requiring development of parts of the engine that could otherwise have been purchased. I don't mind that idea so much.
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Goblin Squad Member
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Unity, anyone? http://unity3d.comI believe Buri called it back in July...
Fixed.
Just happened acrossed CCP's "World of Darkness". If we get graphics with the same quality of tenselation <or how ever you spell it> I will be happy. Seeing the new DirectX and vid cards in action are just awesome looking. Or maybe thats because I am used to WoW and Rift.
i run rift on max settings, i pray PFO looks that good. have yet to see an mmo with the same amount of detail for character models, it is simply mind blowing seeing a death rift open up over your head.
My guess will be the unity engine..wait.. they already anounced that..does my guess still count ? lol
on a side note does anyone know what games other the list on the unity site have been made using unity? most of the ones on the list looked rather disappointing, and i would like to see what else has been made with it before i form an opinion of the engine.
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Goblin Squad Member
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on a side note does anyone know what games other the list on the unity site have been made using unity? most of the ones on the list looked rather disappointing, and i would like to see what else has been made with it before i form an opinion of the engine.
I've played none of the games, but the engine looks promising.
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