Treyarch: Black Ops II Doesn't Need a New Engine

[Baresark]

I would agree with this assessment. Blops 2 doesn't need a new engine. I hate COD at this point, but there is no reason they can't make enhancements and have it look and play just fine. It's actually a pretty good engine, it runs well and seems easy enough to optimize....

All that said, they wouldn't make a new engine because the current consoles couldn't support a better engine. It's rather impressive they have it run at 60FPS (not that you would see a difference between 60 and 30 FPS on a console since TV's only actually display 30 frames of information per 60 draw cycles anyway (so it's like having a PC game run at 120FPS on a 60Hz monitor, you only see 60 frames of information so there is no difference)). That of course comes in the form of muddy/blurry textures with tiny little maps with nowhere to go but forward, but still, impressive.

 

[ToastiestZombie]

Some of the things may not be the exact truth, since I just got this out of memory. But there's a kotaku article somewhere, wait a sec. http://kotaku.com/5906808/48-things-that-you-should-know-about-call-of-duty-black-ops-ii

Things I wasn't entirely right about: The zombies campaign (they are adding new zombies modes, just haven't said what they are yet).
The choices and stuff are in a new game mode that links directly to the campaign, they aren't really in the campaign. Which is fine really, since I can imagine the campaign follows one or two major characters whereas this mode follows the larger battles and how they affect what happens to the characters in the campaign.

I looked and saw nothing about jets, there is at least one horse section IN THE SINGLE PLAYER, I see nothing about "choice systems" (though this will be bullshit no matter what they say), "futuristic helicopter" call-ins are still just helicopter call-ins, and I don't care about zombie modes since I have played l4d, killing floor and a bunch of other BETTER zombie games to death.

Again. What does this game bring to the table except for another flashy hollywood singleplayer? If they used the horses for the multiplayer that could be really awesome. But for a couple of parts in the singleplayer? Might be cool I guess.

Well you're not going to buy it anyway, so I'm not even going to bother arguing with you. It's changing a LOT of stuff, it's not changing it's style because that is stupid.

 

[hermes]

Understandable. If the options are "nicer graphics" or "maintain 60 fps", I will go with the framerate...

 

[FallenTraveler]

like many others I understand this point. You don't need a brand new engine for each game, and you wouldn't completely replace the foundation of a house if you were remodeling.

But this isn't a house.

No one wants an antique game on their current gen system. I think that they should upgrade to a new, prettier, more efficient engine that is built from the ground up for current hardware. These people are making games based off of an engine released 13 years ago! that's like 200 years in tech time. That's the difference between dial-up and 4g on your phone! That's VHS to Blu-Ray

Dafuq...

 

[jawakiller]

I definitely like the feel of the engine they use but I don't want them to pull another MW3. I mean, if Blops 2 just winds up being Blops 1 with slightly different guns, I'm going to be very disappointed. So please Treyarch, don't be like Infinity Ward. Change shit, don't just rehash your last success and expect people to love it.

 

[XDravond]

Well seems like a lot of people are "nah we don't need a new engine" well I don't think you need a new engine for every game but did you know the latest CoD games are built on Id Tech 3.
Games made with the same engine are for example original CoD (2003) and Quake III arena from 1999..... (The most current Id Tech engine is 5 from 2011 for g*d-sake and 4 is from 2004..)

And even though modified and improved it's still not as good looking tech as Source since Source has added so many features and improved it's not even close to Source "1"... whilst Id tech 3 is not too different
(and yea I know about it's harder to develop on source than Id's engines)
It might be a great engine but I believe that you should consider a new engine when you have a brand selling millions of copies for 60$ each... And whilst the Frostbite 2 engine is far from perfect and very demanding it is however far better and so much more fun since it's driving technology forward not bolting it down with standard argument "it's good enough"....

But then again I don't find CoD Multiplayer any fun nowdays, I do however when feeling brain dead the singelplayer is ok.. Linear shooter with some minor story but really simple to just shoot a lot.
CoD looks like s!hit on max details compared to BF 3 on min detail anyway...

 

[porpoise hork]

If you stop and think about it, why should they use a new engine. It's not like they are coding for newer hardware than the 360 and ps3, but hey if they want their games to look like ass then that is their prerogative. They just reuse the same material again and again, coffee stains and all while adding some particle effects and some new map skins. When they are at the deadline they slap a CoD title on it and make millions.



On a separate note his mention that Valve is still releasing games on the source engine while this is true, the games Valve puts out look infinitely better than anything TreyArch has ever shit out.

 

[SL33TBL1ND]

If you have a car, and you've replaced every piece of it at some point along the line, is it still the same car?

Something to think about.

If the engine still has most of the original parts, then yes, it's still more or less the same car.

If I change my hard drive, memory, case and clean the fans, it's still the same PC.

I said every piece. What you described is not every piece.

 

[SpAc3man]

I would like to point out that the engine that was used for Call of Duty 1 was also built on the same iD Tech 3 (Quake 3) engine base as all iterations of the IW Engine used since CoD2. In other words the same engine has been used for ALL CoD iterations since 2003 except for CoD3. IW have already shown they are capable of huge improvement of the tech they have (as shown from Cod1 to CoD2) but they and the other CoD developers refuse to put in the effort for a game that will be limited by the outdated console hardware that everything is barely running on these days.

 

[Frotality]

does that remodeling analogy count as an admission they are just making tweaks to the same god-damn game and these alleged sequels are better classified as expansion packs?

they are right though. you dont a need a new graphics engine; you need a new everything else. it looks fine, its the incredibly dull and played out bare-bones FPS gameplay i have a problem with.

 

[ElPatron]

I would have to agree that a new game doesn't always need a new engine. If they think it works fine then go with it. Modify what you need to and work with the rest.

I agree with there not being a need for a new engine, but I can still question art direction. A lot of the Call of Duty textures just look ugly to me. If they could make a game look pretty without looking like someone threw coffee over every surface, I'd be fine.

fully agree. not every game needs to look awesome.

The problem isn't that CoD actually looks like shit, it's the fact that it runs like shit.

I have noticed that the IW engine takes a lot more power than it requires (for the level of graphics it runs).

I don't know what's the point of having a machine that runs Crysis smoothly if a game that isn't as demanding (when it comes to both graphics and physics) has FPS drops and stutters a lot of times, even on low settings and resolutions.

Oh, right. Because my combination of hardware isn't the one they intended. Call of Duty has been running on an engine that doesn't run well on all PCs (it kind of reminds me of the poor optimization on F.E.A.R., it was a nightmare to make it run smoothly) and still has a lot of problems that come back every year.

The network code could use some polishing, too.

 

[Kakashi on crack]

*ahem*

You tear down the foundation, or at least FIX it when the foundation is an ancient piece of shit that can't support the weight of the house going on top of it.


Why isn't the same true for your laggy, outdated, POS that you call a game engine might I ask?

 

[triggrhappy94]

I think critics are just trying to find something new and technical to complain about, instead of just claiming it's just the same game as before--a valid point none-the-less.

 

[OldDirtyCrusty]

I wonder how many dated looking cods will be made after BO2. Oh and sure consoles are to blame for cods outdated graphics. Since when did developers make a deal out of this. They just put out a way better looking pc version with more details, better physics and high-res textures if it isn`t cod.
Cod looks this way because the funny little house theory doesn`t work anymore and it crumbles since world at war.
While i like that they want to keep a high framerate it sounds more like "We still use our old build and implement shit because we couldn`t keep up our release schedule otherwise", but i`m no programmer so what do i know. I still like Treyarch for their sp campaigns.

I stop ranting now. Cod is my favorite rental franchise for boring evenings.