Square Enix Isn't Sharing its Fancy New Engine

The Wooster

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Jul 15, 2008
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Square Enix Isn't Sharing its Fancy New Engine

No, you can't license the Luminous Engine. Get out.

By now you've probably seen that impressive tech demo showing off Square Enix's next-gen Luminous Engine. Agni's Philosophy, as the video is called, is just all different kinds of sexy, with realistic hair, stunning particle effects and gorgeous shadows. Rumor has it its animation suite is even more impressive, with a selection of automated processes that adjust character animations in response to equipment weight, musculature parameters and uneven terrain. So you're probably thinking that you could do something amazing with this engine, right? Well, you can't. Not unless you want to work for Square Enix. The developer-turned-publisher is keeping the tech to itself, according to US CEO, Mike Fischer.

"This is an in-house tool. We're not building this around a licensing model," he told Shack News.

It looks like the plan is to use the engine to attract development teams to Square Enix's growing stable of studios. Only developers that sign a publishing deal with the company will have access to the tech.

"It's my hope that this makes teams and creative people around the world excited to work for us because they'll get their hands on some of the best technology in the industry," Fischer continued.

Of course, while Agni's Philosophy was both stunning and running in real-time, that doesn't mean the visuals achieved in the video will be possible for most developers, or indeed any. The demo was running on a reasonable PC rig (by enthusiast standards), sporting just a single GTX 680. But that card currently retails for around $500, that's more than an entire console (and for good reason). Whatever kind of GPUs are included in the successors to the 360 and PS3, I'll bet my first born son they're nowhere near as powerful as a GTX 680.

Now, if you'll forgive me just one moment of cynicism and bitterness; I can't help wonder if Square Enix's might want to hold off on splurging on the super realistic sweat technology and instead invest in some writers.

Source: Shack News [http://www.shacknews.com/article/77237/how-luminous-studio-is-preparing-square-enix-for-the-next]

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fenrizz

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Feb 7, 2009
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That is too bad.

What have they got to lose by licensing the engine?
Surely they could always use the extra revenue?
 

fix-the-spade

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Feb 25, 2008
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This is very Squenix isn't it.

Build a wonderful piece of technology, people are lining up to buy it. What's the best way to react?

NO! We don't want your money! Stay away from our toys!

It makes me wonder what exactly Squenix's investors are playing at.
 

TheComfyChair

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Sep 17, 2010
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It's just what EA are doing with frostbite in the end, it gives them an 'edge' over other publishers when it comes to signing up studios.

But like the article correctly stated, it doesn't matter all that much as next gen consoles will never produce anything close to those visuals anyway. Although that's assuming next gen consoles will stay relevant for all that long anyway, i think developers will get more than a little annoyed with developing for them when phones and tablets are kicking their arses by 2015/6 :p

So we'll see how it pans out in that regard.
 

The Wooster

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TheComfyChair said:
But like the article correctly stated, it doesn't matter all that much as next gen consoles will never produce anything close to those visuals anyway.
Still, that's a LOT of eye candy for a single GTX 680. The engine apparently scales really well too.
 

Milanezi

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I don't understand, it looks gorgeous, but it's nothing we haven't seen in CGI's before...

Edit: but then again I'm nowhere near understanding anything of those fancy tech program graphical things.
 

Andy Shandy

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ForgottenPr0digy said:
so Square-Enix has two graphics engine? Luminous Engine and Unreal 4.0??
Epic Games owns the Unreal Engine, not Squeenix.

Anyway, I can sort of see the reasoning behind it, but it still seems like they'd be better off licensing it. Cause then they can have all the realistic sweat they want AND hire the writers that they need.
 

TheComfyChair

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Grey Carter said:
TheComfyChair said:
But like the article correctly stated, it doesn't matter all that much as next gen consoles will never produce anything close to those visuals anyway.
Still, that's a LOT of eye candy for a single GTX 680. The engine apparently scales really well too.
Aye, and if the developers put the effort in, i'll love them for it (I have a gtx670 here, with the overclock it's easily a gtx680 level card, so if i could have those visuals running in real time on my own PC it would be amazing) :D But i'm just going to assume they'll just be making their AAA games focused on consoles and scale some things up to lower mid range PC level (~hd5870) like they are now, at least for a few more years. By that point the gtx680 will seem really slow :D

P.S. Note i don't blame them for this practice, it ensures they target the majority of their sales, as most PC gamers also tend to be in the mid range anyway, so focusing heavily on the extreme end generally isn't a fantastic idea financially. But still, would be nice to have another Crysis level of graphical jump like the tech demo for this engine represents.
 

daibakuha

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fenrizz said:
That is too bad.

What have they got to lose by licensing the engine?
Surely they could always use the extra revenue?
It's actually a fairly common business practice. There are tons of companies that make engines like these and don't share them. It seems to me that they didn't design it for wide use, and they don't want some random developer to mess with it.

OT: that jab at the end of article, while true, comes completely out of left field and has nothing to do with the topic at hand. It seemed like an unnecessary jab, when by all rights Square Enix is a pretty good publisher.
 

Quaxar

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fenrizz said:
That is too bad.

What have they got to lose by licensing the engine?
Surely they could always use the extra revenue?
A monopoly on stunning new graphics for their games. Although they could probably make more money by licensing such a tool maybe they want to try and gain advantage for their games.
Or this isn't actually a new engine but every frame hand-drawn and manually animated so they can claim to have a superior new render technique. Come to think of it, which is actually more likely?
 

BrotherRool

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So the ID engine is only for Zenimax, the Frostbite for EA and now Luminousity for Enix. That's a lot of no licensing and it allows Epic to do well selling the Unreal to everyone else who actually wants to make a game
 

The Wooster

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Quaxar said:
fenrizz said:
That is too bad.

What have they got to lose by licensing the engine?
Surely they could always use the extra revenue?
A monopoly on stunning new graphics for their games. Although they could probably make more money by licensing such a tool maybe they want to try and gain advantage for their games.
Or this isn't actually a new engine but every frame hand-drawn and manually animated so they can claim to have a superior new render technique. Come to think of it, which is actually more likely?
They actually demonstrated real-time changes at the demo by changing hair colours and, I shit you not, adding more beads of sweat to a character's head using a slider.
 

TheComfyChair

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Quaxar said:
fenrizz said:
That is too bad.

What have they got to lose by licensing the engine?
Surely they could always use the extra revenue?
A monopoly on stunning new graphics for their games. Although they could probably make more money by licensing such a tool maybe they want to try and gain advantage for their games.
Or this isn't actually a new engine but every frame hand-drawn and manually animated so they can claim to have a superior new render technique. Come to think of it, which is actually more likely?
You would hope the former, since new engines are supposed to make it easier and cheaper to make pretty games :p Yes, yes, 'games are more expensive to make now because of pretty', but it's now very cheap to make games at the graphical fidelity which would have cost millions upon millions and a ridiculous amount of time to make a decade ago.

I've also seen a [edit: Nvidia produced, so not necessarily the most experienced engine builders] tech demo (albeit far less cool in terms of action) on my gtx670 as a remake of their fairy tech demo from years ago (dawn i think it's called), and that is easily as pretty on the actual techy side of things. So this is definitely more than feasible for experienced engine builders.
 

Milanezi

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Grey Carter said:
Milanezi said:
I don't understand, it looks gorgeous, but it's nothing we haven't seen in CGI's before...
Yes. But that isn't a CGI. It's real-time footage.
JESUS! Well, that IS impressive, we only need the gameplay to make all that as exciting as the video was. Thanks for explaining.
 

Baresark

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I can't help but feel that it's a mistake not licensing this engine. Epic makes stupid amounts of money from licensing Unreal. It could be something that would produce steady income for the company, which from what I understand, they could use. By not licensing the engine they are spending lots of money to make a games with it and hoping they sell well. You need to cover the cost of making the game and the cost of making the engine. And with Squarenix's development times they run the risk of only using it for a few games before it's obsolete. But, meh. It's there money to waste doing it.