Why D3 engine?

[JackpotDen]

One thing, even though this seems extremly stupid, but with half life, you could pick things up.

Therefore, the physics was used, by our will.

This was not true in D3.

[Gryph]

JackpotDen said:
One thing, even though this seems extremly stupid, but with half life, you could pick things up.

Therefore, the physics was used, by our will.

This was not true in D3.

That doesn't mean that Doom III doesn't have a fully capable physics engine.

[Vexed]

Wait, what? anyway you can pick thing up in Doom3's expansion pack thing.

[JackpotDen]

GryphonKlaw said:

That doesn't mean that Doom III doesn't have a fully capable physics engine.

I know, but its just not in the game (To be honest : ***** the expansion pack, im poor), therefore, I cant use it properly. Nothing says physics like "lob shit around"

[Vexed]

What's the point you're trying to make?

[John]

HL2 proved their physics by allowing you to pick up just about any object within weight capabilities. In Doom 3, you had less freedom in this way.

Ofcourse, this has nothing to do with the engine itself. Just the games; Doom 3 felt like it had less freedom for some reason.

And is it me, or whenever you punched an object and it flew somewhere, did it sorta go by too fast? I'd punch a box and it'd FLY across the room, rather than look like it's being punched.

[Lengis]

ishak540m said:

My guess is that the Doom 3 engine can do just about anything the UE3 engine can do and vice versa obviously but both engines and Source need better particle systems.

Uhh no. Other than the fact that UE3 just plain looks better, it can handle outdoors MUCH better. Doom 3 engine was never known for it's ability to render elaborate outdoor enviroments. Or anything organic for that matter.

With that said, I don't think iD ever made an engine that could do outdoors very well. Epic makes better game engines, this is demonstrated by the sheer amount of 3rd parties that license it's tech, compared to the amount of companies that licensed iD's tech over the years.

Then there's the flexibility of the UE3. You can make pretty much any game you want with it. RPG, Strategy, Action, etc. Doom 3 is just good for FPS action.

I think Dark Pulse would agree with me on this

[lvlmaster]

You can pretty much make any engine work for whatever game you're willing to create. Just because UE3 has the ability to render outdoor areas, like terrain and forests, doesn't mean its the better engine.

Not every product on the market needs to have Unreal style terrain in order to be good...Its all a matter of content and how the game plays.

Doom3 isnt a good example of what Doom3 tech can do...They made their game and they wanted to make it a corridor crawler...It doesn't mean every game using that engine is doomed to be...well...Doom.

[Lengis]

lvlmaster said:
You can pretty much make any engine work for whatever game you're willing to create. Just because UE3 has the ability to render outdoor areas, like terrain and forests, doesn't mean its the better engine.

Can Doom 3 create a grand GTA3 style city scape? No, I don't think so. UE3 can.

[lvlmaster]

Why couldnt it? Have you tried? And how do you know UE3 can? Because of a silly tech demo? Id suggest actually learning something about the tech before you doom it completely.

Or are you the kinda guy who thinks every game should be GTA style?

[Gryph]

Out of the two I'd have to side with lvlmaster since, you know, he's actually worked with Doom III engine.

Could you answer one question, is the game lit?

[lvlmaster]

Check out the shots in the PCGamer ;D

[Lengis]

lvlmaster said:
Why couldnt it? Have you tried? And how do you know UE3 can? Because of a silly tech demo? Id suggest actually learning something about the tech before you doom it completely.

Or are you the kinda guy who thinks every game should be GTA style?

If it could be done, we would have seen it already. Where are all these great examples of D3 showing off it's true potential? I'm supposed to trust your word alone?

And yes, I trust a tech demo over the fillabuster of some employee of humanhead (if u really are)

[lvlmaster]

We wouldve seen it already? Theres no Doom 3 engine games on the market right now besides Doom 3.

So..once again...No one knows what Doom 3 can really do because all they have to look at IS Doom 3.

And sorry...Not a random forum kid...This is the Prey forum, and Im a level designer on the game.

EDIT : You quickly changed your random forum kid to an employee comment...Smooth moves ;D

[Lengis]

>>>>>And sorry...Not a random forum kid...This is the Prey forum, and Im a level designer on the game.

Yea I realized that after I read your profile.

>>>>>We wouldve seen it already? Theres no Doom 3 engine games on the market right now besides Doom 3.

It would have been in tech demos. There were plenty before Doom 3 was finished, showing off the tech. It makes sense for iD to show off everything it's capable of.

[Gryph]

I don't really remember too many tech demos shown by id for any of their engines. Everytime they showed the tech it was only part of the game and nothing special. If you have any links to the videos I'd really appreciate it. I only remember the MacWorld unveiling of the engine and I already have that video.

EDIT: Oh yeah, and showing clips of the game at QuakeCon.

[Lengis]

http://www.gamespot.com/pc/action/do...x.html?page=22

Tech demo screenshots. It was shown in Tokyo for the Geforce 3. They wowed the audience with it's fantastic visual display, there's no doubt they would have shown everything it was capable of durring this presentation.

[lvlmaster]

Thats a good point...Why not show it in a tech demo if its possible to do it...

The only problem with that is how old is the Doom 3 engine? The tech demos were from at least 2 years ago, if not more. It could date to even back to 2001/2002...GTA 3 came out in 2001.

Cut to the point here....GTA style games were just getting popular. The whole idea of a massive city wasn't the "coolest" thing in the world at that time. The coolest thing for ID to show was that they could have completely badass shadows and some high poly stuff on the screen.

Gamers today want everythign to be large...Large open scale battles, Epic cities and terrain, vehicles. UE3 is brand new, so why not show everything that gamers want to see?

Hell, even look at Quake 4, its using Doom 3 and they are promising vehicles and large areas, including terrain.

[John]

Dude...he's a level designer on the game using the D3 engine He might know alittle bit about this.

[Lengis]

lvlmaster said:

Hell, even look at Quake 4, its using Doom 3 and they are promising vehicles and large areas, including terrain.

But it's no where on the same level as what we saw in that UE3 tech demo.

Do I think you are completely full shit? No, but I think you are way over exageratting. If it's so easy to do, why not put it in Prey? You are a level designer after all. Tangible evidence speaks much louder than words.

[lvlmaster]

And Im agreeing with you on the fact that UE3 can do outdoors better...Sure...Its newer. Its still not even done.

But you said this engine can't do it at all...and Im simply saying it can.

And why dont we do it in Prey? Why do we have to make a GTA style game like everyone else? We have a chance to make a completely unique game with stuff you havent seen before...We aren't a cookie cutter company, either is 3DR.

We have good ideas, we're making cool original games.

If you want to play the same GTA style stuff over again, buy something that has gangs and is set in an urban city.

Oh, and dont forget the cool hip-hop soundtrack.

[Gryph]

I'm expecting phat beats by P. Diddy with guest singer Beyonce to be in Prey. If it doesn't have it, well I'm sorry but I'm not going to play.

[John]

Do you atleast have modern day looking rooms and such, like in the original Prey?

A room filled with furniture, not all dark and such.

[Lengis]

Doom 3 is a fine engine. I'm sure the game will be at least decent.

[lvlmaster]

awww giving up? I was having fun

[lvlmaster]

haha but seriously, UE3 is by far a better engine...Sure.

But then again, FarCry can do much larger outdoor areas than UE3 So, its just a toss-up.

It all depends on what you wanna make...Whatever engine sounds good and whatever tweaks you can do to make it better. It all comes down to the gameplay...Hell, If I could still make levels with the BUILD engine I would be

[Lengis]

You haven't convinced me if that's what you are thinking. I still believe D3 can't do organic outdoors. Yea, it can do outdoors, but with a lush jungle type setting? Quake 4 will be fine, Prey will be fine, but they both still look exactly like Doom 3.

[Drazula]

This is a ridiculous argument. UE3 cannot run on the hardware that Doom 3 can run on. And given the bigger hardware, Doom 3 can run bigger levels.

But Doom 3 is not targeted to that hardware. So it will reach its limitations before the hardware reaches its limits. However, Doom 3 subsystems are flexible enough to be improved and expanded to match the improved hardware.

[Ninja]

Regardless of what engine Prey uses, I hope there's vast landscapes (as partly seen in the 1998 video interview) and unique art direction; I'd hate to see it look like all these generic sci-fi shooters of late.

[Nailed]

Stop irritating the level designer. He'll put in a bunch of jumping "puzzles" to pay us back.

LvlMaster, here's some things you can do to make the public happy. Most of them you already know, but it can't hurt to repeat them:

1. Don't let the artists shine things up too much. People really don't like everything to be shiny.

2. Stick in some good secret areas. People love talking about those sorts of things, and it helps to spread the game by word of mouth.

3. Constantly compare your work to the levels in Doom3. If they're too similar in style, don't be afraid to redo things to make Prey different.

4. Keep asking yourself why the level is fun, and if it's not fun, redo it. Learn from your mistakes.

5. Keep the crates to a minimum. Come up with more original props.

6. Don't spawn enemies where the player is certain there shouldn't be any, such as areas he has just explored.

7. Keep up the good work.

Also, any links of your previous work for us to check out?

[Krid]

Vexed said:
What's the point you're trying to make?

The point is that the first game ID releases on an engine is always a tech demo - this has been true since they realized they could license their engines out.

DooM 3, however, sucks as a tech demo. The engine itself it fully capable of outdoors areas, multiple lights, high-quality physics, etc... However, they didm't show those features off at all.

Valve, however, did a wonderful job showing engine features off, and the ones they didn't they plan to demo for free. They gave people the ability to play with the physics directly, they had an entire section of the game devoted to large-scale maps with fast transport, they ran their shaders into the ground, they gave you plenty of time to look at their facial features system up-close, and they adored showing-off the lighting system. In actual technical specs, the engine is roughly equal to the DooM 3 engine, but they used what they had better and are reaping the rewards. Case in point, DooM 3's problem with distorted normal maps is likely a result of lackluster texture use, while HL2 has everything looking silky-smooth (Albet blurry) on even the lowest video settings.

---

Re: Nailed, point 5: No, barrels are NOT an acceptable alternative.

[Gabrobot]

Krid said:
The point is that the first game ID releases on an engine is always a tech demo - this has been true since they realized they could license their engines out.

DooM 3, however, sucks as a tech demo. The engine itself it fully capable of outdoors areas, multiple lights, high-quality physics, etc... However, they didm't show those features off at all.

What? id Software has stated many times that Doom 3 is not a tech demo. The most obvious proof of this is that it doesn't show off what it can do. I'd say Quake IV is much closer to being a "tech demo game" because it's doing large outdoor areas with tons of enemies and vehicles. Of course, maybe it could be to that some people don't understand the concept that a game can still be tons fun without actually doing anything new...just because it's not "innovative" doesn't mean it's a tech demo.

Was Quake III a tech demo? (If you answer yes, then you might want to talk to all the hardcore DM fans who can't imagine playing anything but Q3) It didn't even come close to what the later (of the huge number of) Q3 powered games did (look at Wolfenstein ET for an example).



An interesting thing that I have noticed with Doom 3 is that it's technology is actually much better suited to organic enviroments. This should be pretty obvious (to anyone who actually played through the whole game) since the most stunning things in the game are the organic growths and the Hell and ruins levels.

A good example of an outdoor level is this level. (The hills are part of the level, and not in the skybox)

Oh, and I really do care about Prey, not just Doom 3 (I'm anxiously awaiting my issue of PCGamer which ought to arive soon!). I just tend to post when I get pissed off about people talking about the D3 engine.

[Giblet]

Are you just making things up to sound right Lingus?

UE3 is made for gfx cards that really haven't come out yet. You won't be getting more than 30 fps with anything but the top gfx cards.

If one thing id can do, it's scalable engines. Add a few more polys, write some more shaders to do proper displacement mapping, make new textures then add some HDR , and you can get any style you want. Doom i3 is out a few months now, UE3 won't be seen for a while. It probably won't be seen until the XBOX2 (I have a feeling the first UE3 games will be on the XBOX2 over the PC)

I mean, why bother making up "facts" about what each engine can do. Trust me, the Doom III engine can do more than was showing in the game. People seem to forget that the more you add the more problems you get performance wise. This won't be a problem in another 18 months time.

[Drazula]

Krid said:
The point is that the first game ID releases on an engine is always a tech demo - this has been true since they realized they could license their engines out.

I disagree. I have yet to see an id game take full advantage of an engines capabilities. None of the Quake games did. Maybe Doom. This is not a slam on id. Trailblazers push to new areas, they don't examine the potential of area they are in.

Krid said:
DooM 3, however, sucks as a tech demo.

Because it's based on a game design document, not an engine's capabilities. The engine is built to accomadate the design, but if additional capabilities can be added with minimal impact, they get put in. While it may have been easy to add the feature in the engine, it may be hard to put in the levels/models/design/etc.

They should not go back and change a game's design because an engine can do something better than expected. That is feature creep. And the game will never get completed if every time a cool thing is added to the engine a design change takes place (See 3DR). Save that for the expansion pack! (See ROE, the best expansion pack EVER!)

Krid said:
The engine itself it fully capable of outdoors areas, multiple lights, high-quality physics, etc... However, they didm't show those features off at all.

I agree. You have to look at future game engines (like UE3) to find anything comparable to Doom 3.

[FireFly]

Drazula said:
I disagree. I have yet to see an id game take full advantage of an engines capabilities. None of the Quake games did. Maybe Doom. This is not a slam on id. Trailblazers push to new areas, they don't examine the potential of area they are in.

You're proving his point. To take full advantage of the tech requires focus on gameplay, i.e examining "the potential of area they are in".

So id's games are considered tech demos not because they fully exploit their new tech but because they fail to. This leaves an unexploited tech framework, i.e a "tech demo" that showcases new tech but doesn't have the gameplay to fully utilise it.

I agree. You have to look at future game engines (like UE3) to find anything comparable to Doom 3.

Future game engines exceed Doom 3. Current game engines are on par with Doom 3, feature-wise. What does the Doom 3 engine do that other engines don't?

I mean, the sound system is pretty simple, the specularity system is incredibly limited, there's no support for pre-computed shadowing, there's no support for post process effects, there's no advanced squad based A.I system.

[Lengis]

Stop irritating the level designer.

I'm getting a little tired of kids who jump to the rescue of the developers. They are big boys, they can handle themselves. I have an opinion, and I'm allowed to have it. Stop irritating me.

UE3 is made for gfx cards that really haven't come out yet. You won't be getting more than 30 fps with anything but the top gfx cards.

This was not my point. What does this have to do with anything?

Giblet said:
I mean, why bother making up "facts" about what each engine can do. Trust me, the Doom III engine can do more than was showing in the game.

Actually, I didn't make up any facts goblet. And no, I won't trust you.

[lvlmaster]

"I'm getting a little tired of kids who jump to the rescue of the developers. They are big boys, they can handle themselves. I have an opinion, and I'm allowed to have it. Stop irritating me."



Indeed, Its not a big deal He's making good points about past-tech and future-tech.

[Kristian Joensen]

What physics engine does Prey use ?

[Lengis]

Thanks lvlmaster


btw, I believe the physics are megon?

[Kristian Joensen]

Where have you read that ?