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What if...Neverwinter ran on the Unreal Engine?
teapotsmcgee
Member Posts: 11 Arc User
in Off Topic
Think about it for a second. An instanced game like Neverwinter is perfect for it.
Asked for my old account,sent my information, no response from support
Thanks Cryptic
Thanks Cryptic
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About as relevant.
Unreal Engine is open source, too.
"...I grab my wiener and charge!" - ironzerg79
If you want to make your own quests I recommend you try using the Foundry. If the Foundry is too much to program, then what you are suggesting is like rocket surgery something.
And the Foundry is dead.
"...I grab my wiener and charge!" - ironzerg79
2) Not dead yet but in ICU for sure.
2) More like hospice care.
"...I grab my wiener and charge!" - ironzerg79
What i meant was what can be done with the game on unreal engine...
Thanks Cryptic
The performance of the unreal engine isn't exactly the best. I can only speculate but I suspect based on tech articles that I have read throughout the years that the Unreal Engine is normally used for simplicity more so than anything else. It's a tried and true system which can be molded to fit many games on any system but that same versatility can also hamper development and performance in some regards.
Think of it like using an all purpose tool instead of a specialized tool.
Of course that might have changed a bit with unreal Engine 4 but I would doubt it. If there were no disadvantages other than a 5% royalty fee per quarter companies wouldn't try to reinvent the wheel so often.
I doubt the game would look much different and suspect the game wouldn't run much different either. I don't think Cryptic's engine is the most limiting factor for Neverwinter.
I think a lot of issues are just from band-aid fixes that they have done for years (including from STO) that cause compounding issues when they are fixed. Thankfully this is a process they have realized is harmful and have stopped doing.
Additionally there seems to be some correlation between the number of calculations for combat being made and the performance. I am by no means an expert on engine performance but between various skills sometimes causing computers to be brought to their knees and a general trend of these issues becoming more common as the game mechanics become more and more complex I suspect that if they designed the combat calculations in the same way on the unreal engine the same issues would occur. Maybe a bit less but still occur.
As a TL;DR: If I had to wager a guess many of our performance issues are from combat calculations being poorly optimized and would happen to some degree regardless of the engine that does the calculations and many of the bugs are the result of years of code being reused (which is normal) and years of band-aid fixing the using code instead of fixing the source code (not normal) so that when the source code is fixed everything which references the source code becomes bugged.
The graphics in NW are actually quite good if they want them to be. For instance if you set the texture quality way up and zoom into the armor it looks absolutely gorgeous. It does have a cartoon style of sorts to it (the proportions have always kind of irked me) but it is clear they have the ability to put in fine detail in it.
The limitations on graphics is mainly self imposed.
When you up the texture quality in NW and zoom in you'll see there's no lack of texture detail. The engine as it stands right now has the ability to do high quality textures. It simply stops one step too soon, though. And on that note I don't entirely think it's unintentional.
The Witcher 3 and other games which focused on realistic textures embraced dirt and the grime and all of the people, buildings and armor look road worn. NW makes everything look brand new. It's an artistic flair they purposely did. It makes things less realistic for sure but that doesn't mean they couldn't make it realistic if they chose to invest the time.
The quality improvement we see in other titles is mainly polish. Pun half intended.
Games like the Witcher 3 simply go the extra step to add immersion. I remember seeing one of the first gameplay treailers and the reporter commented on liking the way Garelt's hair bobbed while he was riding Roach. The dev's response was that they spent a lot of time on those little stupid details because they feel like those little details make a huge impact (and I agree).
CD Project Red went out of their way to go the extra step on everything. They didn't just make high resolution armor like NW did, they added an extra texture layer to show wear and tear. They added furrows in the skin at various joints such as knuckles and at the neck. They added scarring on all the cloth and leather. All of it ups the realism but again I don't think the devs wanted to make road worn textures by choice.
I really don't think it is the engine which prevents the developers from putting out "better" graphics. It's a combination of wanting an artistic style which is not photo-realistic (realistic textures need to not look brand new) as well as them not going one step further on every detail. The difference between good and great graphics nowa-days is in the fine details which take a lot of time for very little gains on paper.
And as it seems like you somewhat agreed: optimization is mainly on the devs. The engine is not the limiting factor IMO.
Just like a car there's a lot of moving parts to a video game and the engine is only one of them. Replacing the engine of the car isn't going to solve the problem that the tires are flat. Replacing the engine doesn't negate the requirement for developers to optimize the game.
The case and point on that note would be the travesty that occured to Batman: Arkham Knight which runs on the Unreal Engine 3. Ultimately both the engine and the game code play a role in optimization but the game is only as optimized as the slowest component. If the engine is the cause then yes you could theoretically use a different engine and it would work better. In this case as well as the case of Arkham Knight it is the game code which is the root of the problem.
However, this is all purely my own suspicions. Maybe it is the engine...but I highly doubt it.
[starting around 04:24 and onwards]
NW-DC9R4J5EH - 'The Black Pearl' - Spelljammer! Phlo Riders and Space Orcs
Thanks for all the fish.
Additionally all of those tools are great, I have no doubt about the ability of the unreal engine but don't mistake that this is all plug and play open the box and it is all right there to use. They were showing off what you could do if you invest the resources.
The bottom line is I don't think the engine Cryptic uses can't get the same quality of textures or detail. They have just decided for artistic reasons and/or time reasons not to. The unreal engine packages a bunch of tools together but it doesn't do anything if you don't invest the time and effort into using them.
Cryptic did use PhysX in minor areas but it could have been used to make the loincloths and capes behave more realistically, have terrain interaction or even to have hair not be so rigid...
They have the tech but never put the level of polish that games like the Arkham Series or Tomb Raider Series have managed.*
On the other hand if there are tools you wish to use then there are plenty of specific tools you can incorporate without switching engines.
For example the Cryptic Engine uses Simplygon Technology to reduce polygon count. It is a third party tool that they incorporated into the engine at some level to improve performance. There are all sorts of similar tools out in the market which can be added and molded into whatever project.
Unreal is hardly the only place to get tools to ease workflow or add extra polish, Unreal simply has one take of those tools and puts them together in a package. While video capture animation is top shelf tech there are plenty of other tech they could have used if Cryptic wanted to in order to make animations easier to produce and more dynamic.
Overall, those nifty tools are less to do with the "engine" and more to do with the developers actually spending the time on incorporating them into whatever engine they use. The unreal engine is a "bulky" engine because it gives you access to a lot of tools but if you don't use said tools then those features can actually have a negative impact or if used incorrectly can completely cripple performance.
*note I know that those videos show Off Game Works instead of PhysX but half of the features of Gameworks were originally PhysX features.
Knowing what I know about it, I am sure others may know more, but you can take over characters clone them and block all users from entering the server with that engine. Super unsecured no matter how secure you try to make it. You can selectively crash any player you meet in game as well. These things plus much more...