Information Unigine CEO Offers Free Engine License for Wasteland 2

[Crooked Bee]

Tags: Unigine Corp.; Wasteland 2

In his interview with NMA earlier, Brian Fargo mentioned InXile were considering two engines for Wasteland 2, details unknown. Today, Unigine Corp CEO Den Shergin tweeted about his offer of a free Unigine engine license to inXile for Wasteland 2:

As Brian Fargo’s fans we are ready to support Wasteland 2 with free license for UNIGINE. This allows inXile to bring Wasteland 2 to Linux.​

No Mutants Allowed have the following to say about the engine:

Unigine is a multi-platform (Windows, Linux, MacOS, PS3, Android, iOS) engine. It is best known for Heaven benchmarking tool, and I don't think it's been used on too many released titles, though there is Unigine Corp's own Oil Rush. See some gameplay here or listen to Total Biscuit talk about the engine and game here. [Keep in mind this is more of an engine demonstration than a "real" game, though.] The system requirements of Oil Rush are really low (2 GHz processor, 1 GB memory, GeForce 8600/Radeon HD2600), so that's a plus.​

There's also been a follow-up tweet about this:

Is this going to be Wasteland 2's engine? It remains a mystery for now, but we'll keep you updated.

Spotted at NMA

 

[Brother None]

Obviously, it being free doesn't automatically make it the best candidate. They can afford a license as long as the engine fits their needs well. Don't want to run into delays later on for having to customize or wrestle with issues in the engine.

But as an engine demonstration, Oil Rush looks pretty damn good. Add in it being cross-platform and apparently well-optimizable, and it might be a good candidate.

 

[The Vanished One]

Not getting my hopes up yet, but Linux support out of the box would be awesome. Though I wouldn't be surprised if Unigine Corp were doing it for publicity more than to support the project.

Also, what BN said. From atop his pile of loot Fargo can and will choose the engine carefully.

 

[General Maxson]

Looks great to me, especially considering low system requirements, but this:

Obviously, it being free doesn't automatically make it the best candidate. They can afford a license as long as the engine fits their needs well. Don't want to run into delays later on for having to customize or wrestle with issues in the engine.

So, we'll see what inXile thinks about it. It would be nice not to have to spend a dime on a good engine and put it all to gameplay and design. But as far as I know inXile didn't want to work with Obsidian's Onyx because it wasn't well documented and therefore didn't suit their needs, and I don't know anything about Unigine except that it looks good to me.

 

[Gord]

Obviously the system requirements will depend a lot on what effets they use - Heaven benchmark at full details doesn't exactly have "low" system requirements.

But, easy possibility of Linux support sounds cool, and if the engine fits their needs it might be a nice thing for them (and good publicity for Unigine obviously).

We'll see.

 

[Brother None]

Though I wouldn't be surprised if Unigine Corp were doing it for publicity more than to support the project.

Of course. Or a bit of both. But it's cool, regardless.

But as far as I know inXile didn't want to work with Obsidian's Onyx because it wasn't well documented and therefore didn't suit their needs, and I don't know anything about Unigine except that it looks good to me.

Onyx wasn't really designed and documented keeping licensing in mind, as far as I know, it was intended as a specialized, in-studio engine. Unigine Corp also design their own games (Oil Rig is just a demo, I believe they were working on an FPS initially), but they created and documented the engine with the very purpose of it being a videogame and simulation engine that people can license. And they do have a bunch of licensees: http://unigine.com/products/unigine/showcase/

Graphics seems to be an important thing for em, but several of the devs mention modularity, easy-to-use tools and workflow.

 

[Brayko]

Engine looks pretty good to me, hopefully InXile thoroughly pokes and prods it inside and out to make sure it's workable before commiting anything. Hope this works out, or something works out soon.

 

[Cosmo]

I heard Unigine had selling difficulties... Is that true, and if yes, why ?

 

[Brother None]

Seems like Unigine is indeed a serious candidate.

I heard Unigine had selling difficulties... Is that true, and if yes, why ?

I don't know. PR? I've been reading up on some of their history on Phoronix, who seem to have strong contacts within Unigine Corps. They talk about some of the strengths and weaknesses and strengths of Unigine as a multi-platform engine compared to some alternatives here: http://www.phoronix.com/scan.php?page=news_item&px=MTA4NzA

My impression is the Unigine guys are more technically capable than gifted at PR. Oil Rush sold like shit via their own store, too: https://store.unigine.com/products/stats/ though I certainly hope it did better once they got it on Steam.

 

[deus101]

Well its visually pleasing, so unless you're a crysis tard or worse thats all you could ever want.

Middleware solutions seems like a prudent choice, but the architecture may or may not get in the way...not to mention there are a ton of problem probably waiting to be unearthed when they implement their own gameplay engine inside that thing.
And as much knowledgebase, testing and experience people have had with this...well...I've never heard of it....and I've done research looking for a realtime engine for my company.
Point is...Fargo&co should get an extensive support deal in place first if they go for this, because this engine might not have had much experience in the firering line.


I do sorta wish them the best of luck though...because I'm not that impressed with the "realistic" rendering which is....a big must for the visualization market.
....that...and I'm also wondering if autodesk is going to corner the market with autocad and showcase...the latter having realtime raytracing.

 

[Peter]

Well, it's certainly pretty. And, of course, support for a wide variety of platforms is good. But yeah, they really should evaluate all of their options and find the engine that suits their needs the most.

 

[Humanity has risen!]

At least they have some very experienced people on board to deal with the technical side of things.

And I think any engine is going to be hard to adapt to an RPG format.

 

[mindx2]

It's certainly a pretty little engine... but functionality/documentation/support is the key.

 

[Burning Bridges]

Not getting my hopes up yet, but Linux support out of the box would be awesome. Though I wouldn't be surprised if Unigine Corp were doing it for publicity more than to support the project.

Also, what BN said. From atop his pile of loot Fargo can and will choose the engine carefully.

I mean it's clear Brian will only chose the best engine. And he can afford to pay for it.

But I think it's not nice to say this must be a publicity stunt. It may be a serious offer by a bro. Such programmer types are often really generous.

In the end BF can always say: No thank you, but no.

 

[sgc_meltdown]

from all reports oil rush is pretty but there are flash games with better 'blob takeover' combat

and you end up playing zoomed the fuck out anyway so all the awesome graphics you see in the publicity screenshots is lost as you direct dots around

 

[Peter]

Well, Oil Rush does seem to just be a glorified tech demo. Bad gameplay does not equal a bad engine.

 

[Crooked Bee]

Another game using the Unigine engine -- Cradle:

http://www.rockpapershotgun.com/2012/02/14/new-cradle-footage-gently-rocks/

 

[hiver]

Not getting my hopes up yet, but Linux support out of the box would be awesome. Though I wouldn't be surprised if Unigine Corp were doing it for publicity more than to support the project.

Does it matter? Good business sense is good business sense.

from all reports oil rush is pretty but there are flash games with better 'blob takeover' combat

and you end up playing zoomed the fuck out anyway so all the awesome graphics you see in the publicity screenshots is lost as you direct dots around

Not really is it?
In isometric you are still a bit close to the ground (like fallout) and having nice capable graphics can only help overall feeling of the game in every aspect, even translate more nicely into some mechanics and gameplay features.

Another game using the Unigine engine -- Cradle:

http://www.rockpapershotgun.com/2012/02/14/new-cradle-footage-gently-rocks/

Beautiful stuff. One of the very few upcoming games i have in my bookmarks.

 

[shihonage]

If they don't start with an engine that has templates/tools for generic RPG mechanics already built-in, or pluggable, they'll never make their release date.

 

[sgc_meltdown]

Not really is it?

that was more of a anti oil rush post than I don't want dis for my wastelands post

funnily enough it does tie into them wanting to demonstrate that their engine can do an actual multifaceted game rather than just something pretty

what better way than to offer it to the highest profile kickstarter that isn't going to be 2D

 

[deus101]

If they don't start with an engine that has templates/tools for generic RPG mechanics already built-in, or pluggable, they'll never make their release date.

Ehe...really..thats the last thing they need.

I mean, its their game design which means they have to code their own data structures, there is no single template for that.
They have to weave it into the scene graph...for projects like this you can't just run make and start scripting.

 

[Davaris]

If they don't start with an engine that has templates/tools for generic RPG mechanics already built-in, or pluggable, they'll never make their release date.

Yeah I don't see it either. How long did Fallout 2 take to make? They had an engine that was ready to go. Productive tools are more important than shiny graphics, considering how little time they have given themselves. I'm sure BF understands that.

TBH I am surprised this game is going to use a 3D engine. When I pledged, I assumed it was going to be top down 2D.

 

[Bladderfish]

I believe Brian Fargo said last night that it wasn going to be isometric with limited camera movement options, so using this engine with a locked perspective is definitely doable. Sounds perfect to me. Top-down lacks the ability to add detail.

 

[hiver]

Not really is it?

that was more of a anti oil rush post than I don't want dis for my wastelands post

sure. just sayin from my side.

funnily enough it does tie into them wanting to demonstrate that their engine can do an actual multifaceted game rather than just something pretty

what better way than to offer it to the highest profile kickstarter that isn't going to be 2D

Of course. And why not. Its good for them, its good for inXile. Everyone wins.
As opposed to some other engine creator who on top of that would still be asshole enough to charge extra - and not only for general license to it but for every fucking installation on different machines separately, as its usual.

/
Of course inXile will go over it in detail and check it top to bottom and everything else required, including can Obsidian specific tools be transplanted into it easily.
Im not sure why are people even questioning that angle at all around here.

If they don't start with an engine that has templates/tools for generic RPG mechanics already built-in, or pluggable, they'll never make their release date.

Yeah I don't see it either. How long did Fallout 2 take to make? They had an engine that was ready to go. Productive tools are more important than shiny graphics, considering how little time they have given themselves. I'm sure BF understands that.

Brian already made several points on why exactly does he think they can get it done in time he projected.
Im sure no one would mind even a full year extra anyway.

TBH I am surprised this game is going to use a 3D engine. When I pledged, I assumed it was going to be top down 2D.

I never had any doubt. This might have been an issue some time ago but 3d has advanced enough to really catch up with 2D quality, inlcuding -including 2D art assets into itself.
IF its done by real experts and artists and people that really want to.

 

[shihonage]

If they don't start with an engine that has templates/tools for generic RPG mechanics already built-in, or pluggable, they'll never make their release date.

Ehe...really..thats the last thing they need.

I mean, its their game design which means they have to code their own data structures, there is no single template for that.
They have to weave it into the scene graph...for projects like this you can't just run make and start scripting.

That's true, but they are sort of in a corner with their release date. If I was cornered like this, I'd take my best shot with finding the most generic RPG libraries possible, things that let me have a basic inventory, basic RPG UI elements, and just go from there.

I don't like that approach, but that's the only way to even remotely attempt meeting the deadline.

If they don't start with an engine that has templates/tools for generic RPG mechanics already built-in, or pluggable, they'll never make their release date.

Yeah I don't see it either. How long did Fallout 2 take to make? They had an engine that was ready to go. Productive tools are more important than shiny graphics, considering how little time they have given themselves. I'm sure BF understands that.

TBH I am surprised this game is going to use a 3D engine. When I pledged, I assumed it was going to be top down 2D.

I really don't think Brian Fargo is closely acquainted with what it takes to implement RPG mechanics in a "generic" engine. I hope they have a strong gameplay programmer onboard.