Fancy access to the Unreal 4 Source Code for cheap ?
by Jimmy R Armes · 03/19/2014 (2:15 pm) · 44 comments
As of today you can, as an indie developer gain full, (yes I said FULL), access to the Source code to their Unreal 4 engine including their tools. What is the cost you might ask, why a mere 19 smakaroos a month plus 5 percent of your shipped game.
Why would I post this here on Garagegames? Simple the smarter developers will see this a massive boon to their knowledge of game engine development as they can pay to access their source code and study a real triple A game engine and start to incorporate that back into the development and MAJOR refactoring of the Torque 3D engine.
So what similar features could this bring to Torque 3d under the right group of developers ? Lets see what Unreal offers with their features.
What features are included with Unreal Engine 4?
Unreal Engine 4 gives you all the features you need to make just about any game you can dream up! When you get UE4, you have all the rendering horsepower to make a cinematic experience like the Infiltrator demo, and you can also build really simple games like side-scrolling platformers and match-three apps. That call is totally yours to make.
UE4 has many integrated systems, tools and features. There are too many to list!
Here's the abridged version: UE4's DirectX11 rendering features include full-scene HDR reflections, thousands of dynamic lights per scene, artist-programmable tessellation and displacement, temporal anti-aliasing (TXAA) and IES lighting profiles, just for starters.
The new UE4 material pipeline makes use of physically-based shading to give you unprecedented control over the look and feel of characters and objects. Layer materials and fine-tune values at the pixel level to achieve any desired aesthetic.
UE4's robust Cascade visual effects pipeline provides fast, low-cost GPU particle simulation and a collision system that interacts with the depth buffer. Millions of dynamic particles can receive and emit light within a scene, and you can control many particle properties, including size, color, density, falloff and bounciness. You can also use Cascade to create fire, sparks, smoke, dust, rubble and anything else that can be powered by particles.
Blueprint visual scripting is incredibly empowering! Blueprints enable anyone to rapidly prototype and build playable content without touching a line of code. Use Blueprints to author level, object and gameplay behaviors, modify user interface, adjust input controls and so much more.
Built-in Blueprint debugging enables you to interactively visualize the flow of gameplay and inspect property values while testing your game. You can even freeze the game and inspect its state by setting breakpoints on individual nodes in your Blueprint graphs.
UE4 Code View saves time by allowing you to browse C++ functions directly on game characters and objects and then jump straight to source code lines in Visual Studio to make changes.
Make updates to gameplay code while the game is running with Hot Reload. This tool allows you to edit C++ code and see those changes reflected immediately in-game without ever pausing gameplay. Examine your creations from every angle through Play, Simulate and Immersive modes within the Unreal Editor.
Use the Content Browser to import, organize, search, tag, filter and modify terabytes of game assets within the Unreal Editor. The Content Browser features real-time, animated thumbnail previews which can be explored and modified on the fly. Here you can also create any type of asset collection to be used for individual work or shared with hundreds of other developers.
Use the Persona animation toolset to edit skeletons, skeletal meshes and sockets, animation Blueprints and more. Preview animation sequences and morph targets, and set up animation blend spaces and montages.
Modify physics and collision properties for skeletal mesh actors with the Physics Asset editing tool (PhAT).
The Matinee cinematic toolset provides director-level control over cut scenes, dynamic gameplay sequences and movies.
The Landscape system provides advanced sculpting and painting tools so you can quickly create and customize large, open worlds. Landscape paves the way for terrains that are orders of magnitude larger than what have been previously possible thanks to its powerful LOD system and efficient memory use. Quickly and easily create outdoor worlds allow for any type of game! Dip into the foliage editor to apply trees, grass, snow, sand and other terrain elements.
Give AI-controlled characters increased spatial awareness of the world around them and enable them to make smarter movements with UE4's gameplay framework and artificial intelligence system. Dynamic navigation mesh updates in real time as you move objects for optimal pathing at all times.
Define your game's audio pipeline using the Sound Cue Editor.
And, as mentioned before, when you sign up for UE4 subscription, you get full C++ source code access through GitHub! If you require custom license terms, you also have the option of source control via Perforce and SVN. Each solution enable teams to easily coordinate their game development and design efforts, and efficiently manage version control.
Now let me reiterate, access to the full Unreal 4 source code to STUDY and LEARN from and develop SIMILAR systems and tools for Torque 3D.
Why would I post this here on Garagegames? Simple the smarter developers will see this a massive boon to their knowledge of game engine development as they can pay to access their source code and study a real triple A game engine and start to incorporate that back into the development and MAJOR refactoring of the Torque 3D engine.
So what similar features could this bring to Torque 3d under the right group of developers ? Lets see what Unreal offers with their features.
What features are included with Unreal Engine 4?
Unreal Engine 4 gives you all the features you need to make just about any game you can dream up! When you get UE4, you have all the rendering horsepower to make a cinematic experience like the Infiltrator demo, and you can also build really simple games like side-scrolling platformers and match-three apps. That call is totally yours to make.
UE4 has many integrated systems, tools and features. There are too many to list!
Here's the abridged version: UE4's DirectX11 rendering features include full-scene HDR reflections, thousands of dynamic lights per scene, artist-programmable tessellation and displacement, temporal anti-aliasing (TXAA) and IES lighting profiles, just for starters.
The new UE4 material pipeline makes use of physically-based shading to give you unprecedented control over the look and feel of characters and objects. Layer materials and fine-tune values at the pixel level to achieve any desired aesthetic.
UE4's robust Cascade visual effects pipeline provides fast, low-cost GPU particle simulation and a collision system that interacts with the depth buffer. Millions of dynamic particles can receive and emit light within a scene, and you can control many particle properties, including size, color, density, falloff and bounciness. You can also use Cascade to create fire, sparks, smoke, dust, rubble and anything else that can be powered by particles.
Blueprint visual scripting is incredibly empowering! Blueprints enable anyone to rapidly prototype and build playable content without touching a line of code. Use Blueprints to author level, object and gameplay behaviors, modify user interface, adjust input controls and so much more.
Built-in Blueprint debugging enables you to interactively visualize the flow of gameplay and inspect property values while testing your game. You can even freeze the game and inspect its state by setting breakpoints on individual nodes in your Blueprint graphs.
UE4 Code View saves time by allowing you to browse C++ functions directly on game characters and objects and then jump straight to source code lines in Visual Studio to make changes.
Make updates to gameplay code while the game is running with Hot Reload. This tool allows you to edit C++ code and see those changes reflected immediately in-game without ever pausing gameplay. Examine your creations from every angle through Play, Simulate and Immersive modes within the Unreal Editor.
Use the Content Browser to import, organize, search, tag, filter and modify terabytes of game assets within the Unreal Editor. The Content Browser features real-time, animated thumbnail previews which can be explored and modified on the fly. Here you can also create any type of asset collection to be used for individual work or shared with hundreds of other developers.
Use the Persona animation toolset to edit skeletons, skeletal meshes and sockets, animation Blueprints and more. Preview animation sequences and morph targets, and set up animation blend spaces and montages.
Modify physics and collision properties for skeletal mesh actors with the Physics Asset editing tool (PhAT).
The Matinee cinematic toolset provides director-level control over cut scenes, dynamic gameplay sequences and movies.
The Landscape system provides advanced sculpting and painting tools so you can quickly create and customize large, open worlds. Landscape paves the way for terrains that are orders of magnitude larger than what have been previously possible thanks to its powerful LOD system and efficient memory use. Quickly and easily create outdoor worlds allow for any type of game! Dip into the foliage editor to apply trees, grass, snow, sand and other terrain elements.
Give AI-controlled characters increased spatial awareness of the world around them and enable them to make smarter movements with UE4's gameplay framework and artificial intelligence system. Dynamic navigation mesh updates in real time as you move objects for optimal pathing at all times.
Define your game's audio pipeline using the Sound Cue Editor.
And, as mentioned before, when you sign up for UE4 subscription, you get full C++ source code access through GitHub! If you require custom license terms, you also have the option of source control via Perforce and SVN. Each solution enable teams to easily coordinate their game development and design efforts, and efficiently manage version control.
Now let me reiterate, access to the full Unreal 4 source code to STUDY and LEARN from and develop SIMILAR systems and tools for Torque 3D.
#2
Already posted on another thread about this but, hell yeah! The deal seems legit and I have to say... As for the 'price scheme'; Pretty simple from my POV: 19$ a month for access to their GIT and if you publish a game using the build you are required to pay 5% of your gross. So, if you sell a game at 10$ on an app store, (lets say the apple store for argument sake) The store will take their percentage. So you make 7$ or so per-sale. Epic will still take their 5% (from the gross sale (aka $10.00) they get $.50 per title sold since 10$ was your gross. So, your end result, App store gets 3$, Epic gets 50 cents and you walk away with $6.50 per sale. I have seen MUCH worse (based on a typical 10$ per item sold model).
I am in and will most definitely work this. Good post and thanks for the heads up!
03/19/2014 (2:46 pm)
Jimmy, Already posted on another thread about this but, hell yeah! The deal seems legit and I have to say... As for the 'price scheme'; Pretty simple from my POV: 19$ a month for access to their GIT and if you publish a game using the build you are required to pay 5% of your gross. So, if you sell a game at 10$ on an app store, (lets say the apple store for argument sake) The store will take their percentage. So you make 7$ or so per-sale. Epic will still take their 5% (from the gross sale (aka $10.00) they get $.50 per title sold since 10$ was your gross. So, your end result, App store gets 3$, Epic gets 50 cents and you walk away with $6.50 per sale. I have seen MUCH worse (based on a typical 10$ per item sold model).
I am in and will most definitely work this. Good post and thanks for the heads up!
#3
I have also done the math and I agree with you 100 percent. 5 percent is way better then spending millions up front and then an additional 20 to 25 percent per title like their old licenses.
I brought this up not to get people to switch over to Unreal engine but to bring it to their attention that they can get unprecedented access AAA game engine to study and then bring what they learn over to Torque 3d.
But like you I will be working this as well.
Lukas,
Right now yes, only the current version of the engine, sometime in the future it will be updated on a daily baises from what I read.
03/19/2014 (3:18 pm)
Ron,I have also done the math and I agree with you 100 percent. 5 percent is way better then spending millions up front and then an additional 20 to 25 percent per title like their old licenses.
I brought this up not to get people to switch over to Unreal engine but to bring it to their attention that they can get unprecedented access AAA game engine to study and then bring what they learn over to Torque 3d.
But like you I will be working this as well.
Lukas,
Right now yes, only the current version of the engine, sometime in the future it will be updated on a daily baises from what I read.
#4
Totally agree! I have learned a HUGE deal and I am now a changed developer. I say USE what you can and make the best choice based on what you need. This is a great opportunity, not to 'steal' but to learn and adapt.
03/19/2014 (3:20 pm)
Jimmy,Totally agree! I have learned a HUGE deal and I am now a changed developer. I say USE what you can and make the best choice based on what you need. This is a great opportunity, not to 'steal' but to learn and adapt.
#5
03/19/2014 (3:20 pm)
been looking forward to this. i love learning and improving!
#6
03/19/2014 (7:28 pm)
Did I miss the minimum system requirements?
#7
03/19/2014 (10:51 pm)
Sorry, am I missing something here? This is a good thing because suddenly for $20 a month UE is now easier to use and I will be able to 'improve' it because I have source code? Or am I really meant to believe that adapting the UE source code to improve T3D is a good idea because...? Pretty much sounds the death knell for torque 3D and all it's derivatives or am I wrong? I mean if the Holy Grail of game engines has suddenly fallen into my lap can't figure out what advantages I would have in using anything else or am I wrong about that as well?
#8
03/19/2014 (11:01 pm)
One thing it may do is show the casual game developer community how Unreal compares with T3D in source code. For better or for worse.
#9
As many people have said here, and elsewhere many a time: there's no such thing as a perfect, fits-all game engine.
It may be that UE4 fits your purpose perfectly, and that's awesome, feel free to use it.
Other people may prefer Torque because they're more comfortable with the codebase. I personally will probably stick with using it because I've spent enough time working on it to know a lot of it's quirks(and am part of fixing those ;) )
Switching to UE4 means you have an entirely new engine and codebase, with it's own ocean of quirks to learn.
Most developers will tell you that you need to have an astoundingly good reason to switch engines midway through a project because that's the sort of thing that kills game projects. It's never as easy as plopping art in and poof, your game is over there.
In terms of what it means for Torque3D, I was looking at their rules(I need to get intimate with the EULA, but I have read through the FAQ) it seems like part of their reason for this is education. You're freely allowed to look at the source code, learn and understand how they do stuff, and implement it on your own elsewhere. You only pay royalties if you actually use their code.
This means nothing stops someone from looking at UE4, and going 'this is a cool feature, I wish it was in Torque/Unity/MyTotallyCoolBestGameEngine3D' and learning how they did it in UE4 before writing your own implementation in your engine of choice.
I'd wager part of the reason for that is twofold:
a) it gives Epic a ever expanding pool of competent developers they can poach who already know about their system, even if they're working on different engines
b) they can exploit community work for fixes, much as Torque3D has.
In the end, it means that pretty much everyone benefits from it, even if you're not using UE4 at the time.
Rambling aside, what it really boils down to, is it's one more tool in a game developers' toolbox to enable them to actually Make Games.
If UE4 is the engine for your project, use it. If it's not, don't ;)
03/20/2014 (12:07 am)
@JEDAs many people have said here, and elsewhere many a time: there's no such thing as a perfect, fits-all game engine.
It may be that UE4 fits your purpose perfectly, and that's awesome, feel free to use it.
Other people may prefer Torque because they're more comfortable with the codebase. I personally will probably stick with using it because I've spent enough time working on it to know a lot of it's quirks(and am part of fixing those ;) )
Switching to UE4 means you have an entirely new engine and codebase, with it's own ocean of quirks to learn.
Most developers will tell you that you need to have an astoundingly good reason to switch engines midway through a project because that's the sort of thing that kills game projects. It's never as easy as plopping art in and poof, your game is over there.
In terms of what it means for Torque3D, I was looking at their rules(I need to get intimate with the EULA, but I have read through the FAQ) it seems like part of their reason for this is education. You're freely allowed to look at the source code, learn and understand how they do stuff, and implement it on your own elsewhere. You only pay royalties if you actually use their code.
This means nothing stops someone from looking at UE4, and going 'this is a cool feature, I wish it was in Torque/Unity/MyTotallyCoolBestGameEngine3D' and learning how they did it in UE4 before writing your own implementation in your engine of choice.
I'd wager part of the reason for that is twofold:
a) it gives Epic a ever expanding pool of competent developers they can poach who already know about their system, even if they're working on different engines
b) they can exploit community work for fixes, much as Torque3D has.
In the end, it means that pretty much everyone benefits from it, even if you're not using UE4 at the time.
Rambling aside, what it really boils down to, is it's one more tool in a game developers' toolbox to enable them to actually Make Games.
If UE4 is the engine for your project, use it. If it's not, don't ;)
#10
Official news: Game developer and publisher Crytek today announced the launch of its "Engine-as-a-Service" (EaaS) program, making its revolutionary CRYENGINE technology accessible to a vast new audience.
Looks like "big guys" are fighting...
03/20/2014 (12:57 am)
From this article:Quote:
Unreal Engine isn't the only tool offering indie devs cheap monthly access. Following this morning's announcement, Crytek has also revealed that it will be offering a monthly subscription option for their CryEngine.
Beginning in May, indie developers will be able to access the full version of CryEngine for a monthly subscription fee of $9.90 per user. According to Crytek, it will be "royalty free," making it significantly cheaper than Epic's offering.
Official news: Game developer and publisher Crytek today announced the launch of its "Engine-as-a-Service" (EaaS) program, making its revolutionary CRYENGINE technology accessible to a vast new audience.
Looks like "big guys" are fighting...
#11
03/20/2014 (2:15 am)
I see it more as a direct attack on Unity than T3D. royalties aside, that is much cheaper than unity 3d pro. Also remember that you will need to know C++ to use UE4 (and crysis I believe) as they do not have scripting languages. Unreal script was dropped in UE4 in favor of C++ code. They added the ability to live reload C++ so it can be used like a scripting language. Although as a C++ developer I see that as a plus since i would not have to learn a new language, just the engine API.
#12
03/20/2014 (3:37 am)
Sad that we cannot drop our price any more.
#13
@Tim Newell - Unity is not a AAA engine, UE 4 is optimized for PC and MACs and consoles. These engines only compete in the minds of fanboys. UE 4 is the holy grail of polished game engines. The same people would swear on how great UDK was before it. Show me the thousands of games made by lone developers that used UDK or even Cryengine. In fact Cryengine last year refused a license to a team that had completed a game using their SDK because they have final approval. That game was more than a year in development by a group of indies and was cursorily dismissed by the license holders.
Epic are playing a very cynical game. In effect they are after a new revenue stream and throw out candy to get it. Let's see in a year or two whether there are a great many more indie games made with UE 4 and where they are sold. Lets see if the number of games as a percentage of sales in the mobile and tablet market for UE 4 and cryengine increase to even a one figure percentage. Let's see how many people throw money down this drain and still not produce a game at the end of it. To quote shakespeare 'All that glitters is not gold.'
03/20/2014 (4:36 am)
@Jeff Raab - sorry I come from a generation not used to using Smileys, they were kind of rhetorical questions. Had I wanted to make FPS games aimed at AAA and somehow had the resources to do that I would have long since been using UDK. If the big thing is source code, which I don't personally believe, my point is that if UE 4, the Holy Grail of AAA game engines is now giving away it's source code there is no logical reason for even considering T3D anymore. I don't need to compare the source code I simply need to look at the games recently released with T3D and those with UE4 and if that didn't convince me, look at the tool set provided. @Tim Newell - Unity is not a AAA engine, UE 4 is optimized for PC and MACs and consoles. These engines only compete in the minds of fanboys. UE 4 is the holy grail of polished game engines. The same people would swear on how great UDK was before it. Show me the thousands of games made by lone developers that used UDK or even Cryengine. In fact Cryengine last year refused a license to a team that had completed a game using their SDK because they have final approval. That game was more than a year in development by a group of indies and was cursorily dismissed by the license holders.
Epic are playing a very cynical game. In effect they are after a new revenue stream and throw out candy to get it. Let's see in a year or two whether there are a great many more indie games made with UE 4 and where they are sold. Lets see if the number of games as a percentage of sales in the mobile and tablet market for UE 4 and cryengine increase to even a one figure percentage. Let's see how many people throw money down this drain and still not produce a game at the end of it. To quote shakespeare 'All that glitters is not gold.'
#14
Rhetorical or not, it's still a good point of discussion.
As for the appeal to popularity, if all we're going on is a) there's source code, and b) lots of other people have used it, then logically Unreal should have been the only game engine in use for a long time now.
Sure, it's absolutely popular and for good reason. But clearly there are lots of individuals and teams that look at Unreal - both at a AAA level and independent - and decide that the engine doesn't serve their needs.
That's what I was meaning about the 'no such thing as a one-size-fits-all engine'.
Even after this, you'll have people using other engines, especially if they were used to using it before this whole thing happened.
It also goes without saying lots of people that try to make a game will fail. That's always been the case, and Epic doing this won't change that.
Even if UE4 doesn't serve their purpose for their project, working with a full engine will let them learn a lot.
@Tim
Yeah, I agree with it likely being an attack on Unity. It'll be interesting to see how this year pans out. Gunna be a lot of back and forth between the big engine makers.
03/20/2014 (5:04 am)
@JEDRhetorical or not, it's still a good point of discussion.
As for the appeal to popularity, if all we're going on is a) there's source code, and b) lots of other people have used it, then logically Unreal should have been the only game engine in use for a long time now.
Sure, it's absolutely popular and for good reason. But clearly there are lots of individuals and teams that look at Unreal - both at a AAA level and independent - and decide that the engine doesn't serve their needs.
That's what I was meaning about the 'no such thing as a one-size-fits-all engine'.
Even after this, you'll have people using other engines, especially if they were used to using it before this whole thing happened.
It also goes without saying lots of people that try to make a game will fail. That's always been the case, and Epic doing this won't change that.
Even if UE4 doesn't serve their purpose for their project, working with a full engine will let them learn a lot.
@Tim
Yeah, I agree with it likely being an attack on Unity. It'll be interesting to see how this year pans out. Gunna be a lot of back and forth between the big engine makers.
#15
As you say there are a lot of game engines out there. In fact the main market for Unity is not the AAA engine market at all, they are on record as stating they are after those individuals and small companies that build their own game engines and on mobile that is a big portion of the market.
Even if it was an attack on Unity, which I don't get to some extent because those that have the Unity Pro licenses, which I have myself, are not going to run over to UE 4. So they're actually pulling over Unity Free users. So I think I will just wait until the dust settles. This has the feel of a Gold Rush atmosphere, which I don't quite understand really. Besides it one thing to have access to sourcecode it's something completely different to dissect that source code and get useful stuff out of it.
03/20/2014 (6:08 am)
@Jeff - Yes it probably is a good point of discussion. As you point out the availability of UDK has been there for some time and it's not been jumped on.As you say there are a lot of game engines out there. In fact the main market for Unity is not the AAA engine market at all, they are on record as stating they are after those individuals and small companies that build their own game engines and on mobile that is a big portion of the market.
Even if it was an attack on Unity, which I don't get to some extent because those that have the Unity Pro licenses, which I have myself, are not going to run over to UE 4. So they're actually pulling over Unity Free users. So I think I will just wait until the dust settles. This has the feel of a Gold Rush atmosphere, which I don't quite understand really. Besides it one thing to have access to sourcecode it's something completely different to dissect that source code and get useful stuff out of it.
#16
I think many people are here for this reason, with Torque3D you get an engine that you can "own" and with other engines you are always tied to the main company through licenses and paying them money, even if it is not much.
03/20/2014 (6:13 am)
For me this is still not an option, I came here because Torque3D went open source under MIT license, that was my only reason, otherwise I would have stayed with cry engine from the beginning.I think many people are here for this reason, with Torque3D you get an engine that you can "own" and with other engines you are always tied to the main company through licenses and paying them money, even if it is not much.
#17
Oh, definitely. It's really going to be chaotic in the next few months. Inevitably some people while jump, mid-project, others will wait till current projects are done, others will check it out in their free time.
While I think this move by Epic is targeted at Unity, I don't profess to know how well it will work. Even if it doesn't "work", they'll still get some secondary benefits(community help in bugfixes, priming newbies for talent poaching, etc) so even if they don't hit Unity hard, it could easily still be 'worth it'.
It'll be an interesting next few months for sure.
@Duion
Also a good point. While Epic's license is pretty loose, it's not as flexible as MIT, and that alone might draw some people in(as you said it did for you).
Like I'd mentioned above, while it's really hard to guess the short term effects, I think the long term effects will benefit everyone, either they use UE4 or not. Should be fun to watch, if nothing else ;)
03/20/2014 (6:29 am)
@JEDOh, definitely. It's really going to be chaotic in the next few months. Inevitably some people while jump, mid-project, others will wait till current projects are done, others will check it out in their free time.
While I think this move by Epic is targeted at Unity, I don't profess to know how well it will work. Even if it doesn't "work", they'll still get some secondary benefits(community help in bugfixes, priming newbies for talent poaching, etc) so even if they don't hit Unity hard, it could easily still be 'worth it'.
It'll be an interesting next few months for sure.
@Duion
Also a good point. While Epic's license is pretty loose, it's not as flexible as MIT, and that alone might draw some people in(as you said it did for you).
Like I'd mentioned above, while it's really hard to guess the short term effects, I think the long term effects will benefit everyone, either they use UE4 or not. Should be fun to watch, if nothing else ;)
#18
What some of you are missing, (And by some of the response you have not read what I wrote), is that this is an opportunity to see how a major engine is put together.
Studying their implementations of PBR, Animation, and so on. And once a developer understands how certain features were done, they could start writing their own implementation for Torque.
This is an opportunity to bring Torque up to the big leagues.
Now as for Crytek, it unsure if they will be releasing their source code in May with their subscription plan. And Crytek uses the Lua engine for scripting.
But if Crytek does release their code, then that is two engines to learn from and any developer with his salt could cherry pick features that he would like in his version of Torque.
This is an opportunity to LEARN and ENHANCE Torque.
03/20/2014 (7:29 am)
Whoa, Whoa, Whoa, I didn't start this blog as an attempt to start an engine war.What some of you are missing, (And by some of the response you have not read what I wrote), is that this is an opportunity to see how a major engine is put together.
Studying their implementations of PBR, Animation, and so on. And once a developer understands how certain features were done, they could start writing their own implementation for Torque.
This is an opportunity to bring Torque up to the big leagues.
Now as for Crytek, it unsure if they will be releasing their source code in May with their subscription plan. And Crytek uses the Lua engine for scripting.
But if Crytek does release their code, then that is two engines to learn from and any developer with his salt could cherry pick features that he would like in his version of Torque.
This is an opportunity to LEARN and ENHANCE Torque.
#19
I don't feel it's an engine war, but it is pretty unusual for such major engine developers to knuckle down this hard to tackle the competition. I think it's worth discussing ;)
That said, I fully agree. I plan to nab at least base access of it and dick around with it and learn from the code, but my current engine of choice is still Torque, and I'll keep improving it.
03/20/2014 (12:53 pm)
@JimmyI don't feel it's an engine war, but it is pretty unusual for such major engine developers to knuckle down this hard to tackle the competition. I think it's worth discussing ;)
That said, I fully agree. I plan to nab at least base access of it and dick around with it and learn from the code, but my current engine of choice is still Torque, and I'll keep improving it.
#20
Nay. UnrealScript is quite powerful. UE also has a lot of powerful tools, including Blueprint with which you can create simple games without even having to use script. Having the source code is huge, though, truly putting indies on the same playing field as the big houses.
There is a lot to be learned from UE, but people will have to be very careful with that. Being on the wrong end of IP infringement with something like UE COULD be the death of T3D.
03/20/2014 (1:36 pm)
I doubt it will be the death knell of T3D, since UE4 as a AAA engine is aimed at higher-end hardware. T3D no longer has the distinction of being the only commercial-quality engine with source code available at a reasonable price, though, which is going to lose a LOT of it's draw.Quote:Also remember that you will need to know C++ to use UE4 (and crysis I believe) as they do not have scripting languages.
Nay. UnrealScript is quite powerful. UE also has a lot of powerful tools, including Blueprint with which you can create simple games without even having to use script. Having the source code is huge, though, truly putting indies on the same playing field as the big houses.
There is a lot to be learned from UE, but people will have to be very careful with that. Being on the wrong end of IP infringement with something like UE COULD be the death of T3D.

Torque Owner Lukas Joergensen
WinterLeaf Entertainment
That is, if you pay and then cancel the subscription, you wont lose access to the engine, you just wont get updates.
You can make the 19$ payment everytime you need updates, the only long-term payment you need to make is the royalties.