Crytek Plans Free Version of CryENGINE 3 75
Develop reports that Crytek, makers of the Far Cry series, the Crysis series, and the game engines behind them, have plans to release a free-to-use version of CryENGINE 3, the software's latest iteration. Quoting:
"Unreal vendor Epic Games and Unity have both seen their user-bases mushroom overnight since launching versions of their own engines that, while tied to different royalty rates, are completely free to download and operate. Now the CryEngine 3 group has revealed it wants to tap into this thriving market. The firm's CEO Cevat Yerli told Develop that Crytek already gives away a CryEngine 2 editor to the mod community, but explained that Crytek's expansion strategy stretches beyond. 'We have a very vivid community of users and modders and content creators, and usually that's a great way of unlocking the engine,' he said. ... 'So far that's what we've been offering for free, and it's easy entry into the production environment. [But] we do want to make a standalone free platform that people can run independent of CryEngine that will also be up to speed with the latest engine.'"
Re:Ok.. now if there were OSS engines of this qual (Score:3, Insightful)
Now I'm just a simple country hyperchicken, but it seems to me that 3d engines tend to age relatively quickly and FOSS tends to be less than cutting edge.
We are talking about Crytek of yes-but-does-it-run-crysis fame.
Re:Great! (Score:3, Insightful)
Being able to use it for free during development is definitely an advantage. If you only have to pay when you publish a game, that makes the development of games a lot more accessible.
Re:Ok.. now if there were OSS engines of this qual (Score:3, Insightful)
Making a graphics engine is hard and costs a lot of man hours (thus lots of $$$). There's not many people who can just start contributing to them (compared to other OS projects). The Open Source engines will always be at least a generation behind, simply because they're always going to be slowly implementing what's already been done in the commercial engines, while companies like Crytek are busy working on their next-gen stuff.
On the plus side, the Open Source engines (Ogre and CrystalSpace anyway) are good enough for people to make decent looking games if they wish to do so. Gameplay is what counts right? I'll take TES: Oblivion quality graphics (hell, Morrowind even) if the game play is great. Unfortunately making games is as hard as making the engines that they run on...
Re:Ok.. now if there were OSS engines of this qual (Score:1, Insightful)
They age quickly, yes, but it doesn't really matter much as far as game play, or popularity is concerned. A lot of very popular games still use graphics that will run happily with Dx7 on a GeForce 4.
But for some reason, the free software community has managed to produce more 3d engines than 3d games, and generally these engines are not really that helpful in writing a game anyway.
Putting polys on the screen, writing a scene graph and stuff, really isn't *that* hard. Focus needs to shift from engine making to game making.
Re:Ok.. now if there were OSS engines of this qual (Score:3, Insightful)
Ogre I believe is strictly graphics (maybe stretching out a bit more than that, but definitely far from a complete engine)
There is a difference between game engines and graphics engines. Ogre is definitely not a complete game engine, but it does not aspire to be one. In my opinion it is a complete graphics engine. Why wouldn't it be?
Re:Ok.. now if there were OSS engines of this qual (Score:1, Insightful)
Putting polys on the screen, writing a scene graph and stuff, really isn't *that* hard. Focus needs to shift from engine making to game making.
Yes, but that requires crossing disciplines. Any good coder can make a game engine, but few have talents outside their field; namely the artistic and creative writing abilities.
So you either end up with very simple games or games that never get finished.
Re:Ding! (Score:4, Insightful)
First one to open-source an older version wins!
Carmack's been winning for a long time, then.
Re:Ok.. now if there were OSS engines of this qual (Score:4, Insightful)
You're misunderstanding that phrase. Whether something ran crysis was a potshot at how badly crysis was coded, not how advanced it was.
Re:Becuase it is hard work (Score:3, Insightful)
Explain to me, which corporation is going to fund the development of a leading database?
Explain to me, which corporation is going to fund the development of a leading web server?
Explain to me, which corporation is going to fund the development of a leading programing language?
Explain to me, which corporation is going to fund the development of a leading OS?
Explain to me, which corporation is going to fund the development of a leading application framework? ...
Um, coproration in business of making money?
They will always win:
Small fry doing few projects and not paying? Their developers are later going to be employed by someone who will pay for extended support.
Big company? Someone will want their asses covered and pay for support to make sure engine problems do not land on their head, and developers will demand suport for bugfixes/new features/training.
Noone is going to fork their project, as long as they work on it and new kids on job market will have skills in their engine because they were able to mess with it.
And there are always some patches from random basement guys that imporve stuff or fix bugs.
Just because they are gonna give out source for free does not mean they can not make money.
Re:Ok.. now if there were OSS engines of this qual (Score:3, Insightful)