Square Enix Isn't Sharing its Fancy New Engine

[cidbahamut]

I've said it before and I'll say it again: SE needs to stop making games and stick to making awesome visuals for people who can actually design good games. License that engine and do some good for the industry.

On the other hand, FFXIV's original engine was godawful and unoptimized as could be, so maybe they're just too ashamed of what's lurking underneath the hood to let anyone else get their hands on it, lest they make it better and put it to good use.

 

[Gearhead mk2]

...oh Squenix, why are you such morons? I WANT to like you, I really do! You've made some great games, your music is beyond compare, and Kefka is the greatest villain in gaming history. What happened to you? Please, enough with the annoying protagonists, enough with pouring every cent into graphics, enough with making every character look like they just came out of a fetish shop. Go back to the great plots, the interesting worlds, the amazing character writing and visual design. I would kill for another Dissidia, instead of you turning it into a freaking RYTHM GAME.

 

[cidbahamut]

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.

Actually SE refusing to take people's money has been a running gag in the FFXI community for years. They're not nearly as bright as people give them credit for.

 

[FFP2]

Calling it now- Square will beat Crytek by far in terms of graphics in next gen consoles. Maybe not in terms of super high res textures and stuff that's barely noticiable but in sheer jaw dropping prettiness. It also seems really easy for devs to use ala UE3.

I think Square doesn't wanna share it with external peeps because they might make bad games with it and taint the engine's popularity.

And before idiots fanboys jump and say FF13- shut up.

 

[Andy Shandy]

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.

I fucking know that epic owns the unreal engine

I'm just saying square enix has their own graphics engine and they also using unreal 4.0.

Well then I apologise, the way I read your post made it sound like you thought that Square Enix owned both of them.

 

[Coreless]

Calling it now- Square will beat Crytek by far in terms of graphics in next gen consoles. Maybe not in terms of super high res textures and stuff that's barely noticiable but in sheer jaw dropping prettiness. It also seems really easy for devs to use ala UE3.

I think Square doesn't wanna share it with external peeps because they might make bad games with it and taint the engine's popularity.

And before idiots fanboys jump and say FF13- shut up.

I seriously doubt Square will beat Crytek in the graphics department but they will probably beat them in the games department. Both have some of the best artists in the industry and so it will all come down to what kind of games you enjoy more. Some of the Cryengine 3 features already look on par with some of the stuff on the Luminous Engine without even needing the same amount of power that their engine will require. The advanced tessellation and volume/lighting effects that are in Crysis 3 already look just as good as some of the stuff in the Luminous Demo. Lets not forget that we have yet to even see real in game footage of this engine in action so who knows what they will have to sacrifice in order to make it run in real time.

 

[ASnogarD]

Why dont console game developers show off these types of demos on consoles ?

Its pointless showing off all this abilities when they will never be used in a game, the consoles (even the next gen ones) wont be able to run this technology and Square Enix are not PC developers (though by many accounts a few of their recent titles are good PC ports).

Want to impress me ? Run that demo on the target market machine then I'll be impressed.
I say its not that hard (relative) to make a demo on a above average PC that looks impressive (Epic showed off that impressive demo of theirs quiet a while ago, though the rig to run it was unusual).

The message I am getting here is : We can make a game that could look like this but the only machine capable of doing this is not part of our target market and so we wont make this game, but dont you wish we would ?
(same when they did that FF VII tech demo - we could do this, but we wont , you mad ? )

 

[Kopikatsu]

(same when they did that FF VII tech demo - we could do this, but we wont , you mad ? )

They can't, actually. There are three reasons why FF7 won't be remade.

1. Square has said that they want to surpass FF7 with another game before bringing it back.

2. Kitase, the current director of the FF series, has said that it would take ~15 years to reproduce FF7 with similar fidelity as FF13 (So now you know why it's mostly corridors)

3. It's prohibitively expensive to redo all the assets, hire voice actors, etc.

4. They don't want to rehash the game, so they would have to put in new features/modes/additional gameplay/etc, which increases the cost and time concerns.

 

[grigjd3]

Too bad. All that technology wasted on non-games.

 

[FFP2]

Calling it now- Square will beat Crytek by far in terms of graphics in next gen consoles. Maybe not in terms of super high res textures and stuff that's barely noticiable but in sheer jaw dropping prettiness. It also seems really easy for devs to use ala UE3.

I think Square doesn't wanna share it with external peeps because they might make bad games with it and taint the engine's popularity.

And before idiots fanboys jump and say FF13- shut up.

I seriously doubt Square will beat Crytek in the graphics department but they will probably beat them in the games department. Both have some of the best artists in the industry and so it will all come down to what kind of games you enjoy more. Some of the Cryengine 3 features already look on par with some of the stuff on the Luminous Engine without even needing the same amount of power that their engine will require. The advanced tessellation and volume/lighting effects that are in Crysis 3 already look just as good as some of the stuff in the Luminous Demo. Lets not forget that we have yet to even see real in game footage of this engine in action so who knows what they will have to sacrifice in order to make it run in real time.

I meant stuff like tesselation doesn't matter, I don't really notice things like that. Crytek seems to focus on being hyper-realistic which doesn't really require much imagination. Just Youtube the final level of ff13, purple high speed platform shit was popping off from all sides.

 

[JarinArenos]

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.

Gods, ain't that the truth...

 

[ASnogarD]

(same when they did that FF VII tech demo - we could do this, but we wont , you mad ? )

They can't, actually. There are three reasons why FF7 won't be remade.

1. Square has said that they want to surpass FF7 with another game before bringing it back.

2. Kitase, the current director of the FF series, has said that it would take ~15 years to reproduce FF7 with similar fidelity as FF13 (So now you know why it's mostly corridors)

3. It's prohibitively expensive to redo all the assets, hire voice actors, etc.

4. They don't want to rehash the game, so they would have to put in new features/modes/additional gameplay/etc, which increases the cost and time concerns.

1 + 4 - Rubbish of course , they re-released a version of the PC copy that only updated enough to run on modern OS's and added silly achievements... so they ain't worried about doing it right... just for the right price. The old PC version modded by fans looks better than the new updated official version... just the old version doesnt run properly on modern OS's.

2 - How long and how much did it cost to do that new tech demo ? The ability to animate and do CGI has accelerated to a degree its cheaper and easier to use CGI over hand drawn animation/anime, even at the time they did the demo for VII. They could do it in half the time it took to do the original game... quicker even.

3 - This is more closer to the truth, the bean counters did the math and didn't see a huge profit from the venture after all a large percentage of those clamoring for VII are old school PS1 pre - 360 era fan... very loud but not so many, not enough to rake in millions in profit.

Hey SE is a business, if it cant make lots of money why bother... just don't sugar coat it.

 

[TheComfyChair]

Why dont console game developers show off these types of demos on consoles ?

Its pointless showing off all this abilities when they will never be used in a game, the consoles (even the next gen ones) wont be able to run this technology and Square Enix are not PC developers (though by many accounts a few of their recent titles are good PC ports).

Want to impress me ? Run that demo on the target market machine then I'll be impressed.
I say its not that hard (relative) to make a demo on a above average PC that looks impressive (Epic showed off that impressive demo of theirs quiet a while ago, though the rig to run it was unusual).

The message I am getting here is : We can make a game that could look like this but the only machine capable of doing this is not part of our target market and so we wont make this game, but dont you wish we would ?
(same when they did that FF VII tech demo - we could do this, but we wont , you mad ? )

I agree, if they were commited to the idea that next gen consoles are 'where it's at' they would be focusing on next gen console level specs. Although industry grumblings seem to indicate that next gen consoles maybe aren't 'where it's at' anymore, and by the time 2015 rolls around gtx680 performance will be lower mid range.

If we cast our minds back to 2005/6 all the tech demoes were done on consoles, maybe this is just an indicator of the attitude of squeenix to the next gen?

Just a thought anyway. As for showing it on current consoles, just nope, consoles reached their limit around 2008 and have been cutting corners for tiny improvements since.

I'm interested to see what happens this year in gaming. A low performance console generation would be very interesting indeed (because they'll be competing with phones on like for like performance within 2 years).

 

[Twilight_guy]

My response: Meh. Companies make single use engines all the fucking time for games and in-house engines on a regular basis. A comapny isn't required to license its property or even so much as give enough of a damn to say they aren't licensing it. They can do what they want, they did, end of line.

Also, LOL at people finding a way to get angry over this. The programming department and the story writing department are separate groups stop conflating their resources. A company is free to make any decision it wants with its property even if it might not be financially the best (or do you want every developer to be forced to put in DRM since its a more 'profitable' way of doing things).

 

[Coreless]

Calling it now- Square will beat Crytek by far in terms of graphics in next gen consoles. Maybe not in terms of super high res textures and stuff that's barely noticiable but in sheer jaw dropping prettiness. It also seems really easy for devs to use ala UE3.

I think Square doesn't wanna share it with external peeps because they might make bad games with it and taint the engine's popularity.

And before idiots fanboys jump and say FF13- shut up.

I seriously doubt Square will beat Crytek in the graphics department but they will probably beat them in the games department. Both have some of the best artists in the industry and so it will all come down to what kind of games you enjoy more. Some of the Cryengine 3 features already look on par with some of the stuff on the Luminous Engine without even needing the same amount of power that their engine will require. The advanced tessellation and volume/lighting effects that are in Crysis 3 already look just as good as some of the stuff in the Luminous Demo. Lets not forget that we have yet to even see real in game footage of this engine in action so who knows what they will have to sacrifice in order to make it run in real time.

I meant stuff like tesselation doesn't matter, I don't really notice things like that. Crytek seems to focus on being hyper-realistic which doesn't really require much imagination. Just Youtube the final level of ff13, purple high speed platform shit was popping off from all sides.

Are we talking about graphics or personal taste in games because I really don't see how a game like Final Fantasy takes more "imagination" then realistic games. Final Fantasy is like a painting, there is absolutely no environment interactivity whatsoever in these games and require about as much engineering as a square house. I would argue its even harder to make a more realistic game because you have to create realistic AI, physics and graphics to match our expectation of what we see everyday. Its much easier making objects and creatures that don't exist in real life, because there is no reference whatsoever to judge it with so they can do whatever they want with it and not be held to any set standard.

 

[Sylveria]

so Square-Enix has two graphics engine? Luminous Engine and Unreal 4.0??

And the Crystal Engine they made FF13 and its malformed, bastard off-spring with.