[Alexx]

i disagree

infact im pretty sure there are a ton of much anticipated games coming out right after xmas

also i remember cod4 and or BFBC1 was released just after christmas a few years back

[Sebastian]

Call of Duty 4 was released in November.

But yeah, there's great games coming Q1 2011. Dead Space 2, Portal 2, Bulletstorm, Killzone 3, Crysis 2, Dragon Age 2, Deus Ex: Human Revolution etc. and hopefully Duke Nukem Forever.

[canada4duke]

Honza, on Sep 28 2010, 08:13 AM, said:

the question is - is "good enough" enough for paying customers?

For the sake of the IP, I will buy a copy
Even if the game sucks, mostly to allow Gearbox to pull in some funds for a sequel.
I have a feeling DNF will suck and hope a sequel will be much better.

[Raziel]

Honza, on Sep 28 2010, 04:13 AM, said:

the question is - is "good enough" enough for paying customers?

Like I said, an overhaul is not possible at this point, so 'good enough' is the best we're gonna get. I can't see them getting the game up to the standard of current-gen games within the next 4-5 months. Take a look at the games shipping today, how are they going to bring the game up to the standards of Gears of War 2, Ninja Gaiden Sigma 2, Bayonetta, Final Fantasy XIII - and dare I mention that Rage will also be shipping in 2011? People need to be realistic and realize that the game will look dated when it ships...

With that out of the way, to answer your question, I do think it will be enough... does it really matter how bad this game looks? Even if they brought it out looking like their 2001 version, I bet it will still sell like hotcakes and still be just as fun to play. It's Duke Nukem Forever after all.

Alexx, on Sep 28 2010, 02:10 PM, said:

i disagree

infact im pretty sure there are a ton of much anticipated games coming out right after xmas

Why are you disagreeing, I didn't say the games shipping after xmas are bad or not 'much anticipated'. I said: "I just always thought games releasing in Feb are usually the ones that didn't make the XMAS bracket... either because too many other good stuff is coming out which would compete, or the game isn't ready yet." - In simple terms:
1) Publishers don't like releasing lots of similar products around the same time since they will end up competing with each. While good for the customers, it's not a good situation for publishers. See, chances are, a customer will end up picking up only one of those titles and will later pick up the others at bargain bin prices, second hand (where no money is made by the publishers) or not at all since they feel they already got the best game out of the bunch. So they actually end up maximizing their profits by spacing out the releases.
2) Release dates slip... some games originally intended for xmas simply end up not being ready for release, so they end up shipping just after xmas.

Having said all that, the February 2011 release date is still unconfirmed at the moment... though I do think we have pretty decent confirmation that it will ship somewhere in the first quarter of 2011, so it is looking accurate enough at this stage.

[Luther Blissett]

Raziel, on Sep 30 2010, 04:09 AM, said:

Like I said, an overhaul is not possible at this point, so 'good enough' is the best we're gonna get. I can't see them getting the game up to the standard of current-gen games within the next 4-5 months. Take a look at the games shipping today, how are they going to bring the game up to the standards of Gears of War 2, Ninja Gaiden Sigma 2, Bayonetta, Final Fantasy XIII - and dare I mention that Rage will also be shipping in 2011? People need to be realistic and realize that the game will look dated when it ships...

With that out of the way, to answer your question, I do think it will be enough... does it really matter how bad this game looks? Even if they brought it out looking like their 2001 version, I bet it will still sell like hotcakes and still be just as fun to play. It's Duke Nukem Forever after all.

Those 3 games have better graphics than DNF? Are you on crack? Nothing to say about GOW2 , even though it is a completely scripted binary ( so its easier to make it look beautiful ) it really has kick ass graphics.

Rage can be a pain too, but it won't be out until September. I think DNF will come out in February because in March we ll get Crysis 2, probably a graphics showcase like the first one, and a bunch of teens will be on this. In April there s GOW3 and even though i bet on Duke, teenagers won't, Marcus all the way. In September there s Rage and that's another pain in the ass. I don't know about oct - nov - dec but i can bet there will be announcements during 2011 to cover that period too.

February is just right. Right now there s COD. Let the kids burnout on COD and then supply them with fresh Duke as soon as February comes up.

[Honza]

Luther Blissett, on Sep 30 2010, 06:38 PM, said:

Those 3 games have better graphics than DNF? Are you on crack? Nothing to say about GOW2 , even though it is a completely scripted binary ( so its easier to make it look beautiful ) it really has kick ass graphics.

Rage can be a pain too, but it won't be out until September. I think DNF will come out in February because in March we ll get Crysis 2, probably a graphics showcase like the first one, and a bunch of teens will be on this. In April there s GOW3 and even though i bet on Duke, teenagers won't, Marcus all the way. In September there s Rage and that's another pain in the ass. I don't know about oct - nov - dec but i can bet there will be announcements during 2011 to cover that period too.

February is just right. Right now there s COD. Let the kids burnout on COD and then supply them with fresh Duke as soon as February comes up.

I can't agree more!

[Mr.Deviance]

Luther Blissett, on Sep 30 2010, 10:38 AM, said:

Those 3 games have better graphics than DNF? Are you on crack? Nothing to say about GOW2 , even though it is a completely scripted binary ( so its easier to make it look beautiful ) it really has kick ass graphics.

Rage can be a pain too, but it won't be out until September. I think DNF will come out in February because in March we ll get Crysis 2, probably a graphics showcase like the first one, and a bunch of teens will be on this. In April there s GOW3 and even though i bet on Duke, teenagers won't, Marcus all the way. In September there s Rage and that's another pain in the ass. I don't know about oct - nov - dec but i can bet there will be announcements during 2011 to cover that period too.

February is just right. Right now there s COD. Let the kids burnout on COD and then supply them with fresh Duke as soon as February comes up.

I also think DNF is going to look dated when it comes out and it won't be on par with today's standards but I'm also not as blind or ignorant to think that today's games are actually a modern standard.
The graphics standard in games has been reached in 2006 with crysis and every other game released since then looks very dated when compared with crysis.
I am pretty sure that not even crysis 2 will manage to come close to crysis's graphics, not even the pc version.
As long as games are made with current gen console hardware limitations in mind, there won't be another game like crysis simply because that would require a rich studio and a rich publisher, to invest lots of millions in a pc only fps game! That never happens anymore, because no western studio or publisher, dares to risk millions just for a pc only game that will get pirated in 90% of cases.
The only PC exclusive FPS games that come out these days are the ones developed by eastern european or russian studios.
If you want to hope for games that look AT least as good as crysis, you can always stay in line and wait for crysis total conversion mods on moddb that aim to make new games that push the cryengine 2, even more than crysis did.
Cyengine 2 has so much unexploited potential in it, that if you want you could make games that llag even on 2011's best gaming hardware.
Hopefully, the next gen of consoles will not only be capable of running cryengine 2 with crysis perfectly but they will also have support for something much higher so that we can finally start seeing revolutionary games with cool graphics again.

[Metalwolf]

Mr.Deviance, on Sep 30 2010, 07:08 PM, said:

I also think DNF is going to look dated when it comes out and it won't be on par with today's standards but I'm also not as blind or ignorant to think that today's games are actually a modern standard.

---

The graphics standard in games has been reached in 2006 with crysis and every other game released since then looks very dated when compared with crysis.

I am glad that not every game is like Crysis. I'd hate to have something that I couldn't play unless I went out and spent several hundred dollars on new hardware. I don't mind doing that when the pay's good, but not when it's not so good now. So I'm glad Duke is how it is.

I am happy that it comes out in early February, it's a little before my birthday

[Mr.Deviance]

Metalwolf, on Sep 30 2010, 06:16 PM, said:

I'd hate to have something that I couldn't play unless I went out and spent several hundred dollars on new hardware.

Any decent gaming rig can play crysis maxed out since 2 years now so no need to spend too much on it.
When it first came out, I could play it on high settings but a few months later I upgraded my rig and I could run it on max settings, which is how I played it and finished it.

Metalwolf, on Sep 30 2010, 06:16 PM, said:

I don't mind doing that when the pay's good, but not when it's not so good now.

When the game came out, I thought that it was phenomenal in how the physics and effects worked with the graphics, sounds and gameplay.
The game is a very cinematic experience and imo it is the most movie like fps game i've ever played.
The crysis number in the hundreds of thousands, and they all got there because they couldn't play the game maxed out or because they've heard others that couldn't play it at all.
Who has been fortunate enough to be able to play the game maxed out, without any problems, has found crysis to be a very well done fps game.
To me, the game still has replay value. I've finished it twice since it came out, and just now talking about it, I feel like playing it again.

[Raziel]

Luther Blissett, on Sep 30 2010, 10:38 AM, said:

Those 3 games have better graphics than DNF? Are you on crack?

Well actually, I completely disagree with DNF having better graphics and technology when compared to Bayonetta or Final Fantasy XIII. And no, I don't smoke crack... I've just seen the screenshots, video leaks, and PAX gameplay footage. Also, I am a graphics programmer so I tend to analyse game engines better than the average gamer does. On that note, I am about to point out some really ugly facts about the DNF engine so I suggest you stop reading now if you don't want the illusion killed for you.

So anyway, the actual engine seems very dated regardless of what you are led to believe... while some people (Broussard included) say it's running on Unreal 2's tech, I have to say I have a really hard time believing that. Even though there are levels which would have benefited from a real terrain engine (such as the one readily available in Unreal 2), they have still opted to use a more or less flat (unreal 1 style) terrain for mountainous areas with some polygon boulders and mountains on it to make things look more detailed than they actually are. Just look at the PAX footage carefully and you'll see what I mean. Here's a link so you won't have to search too far - skip 20 seconds into the video and have a look: http://www.youtube.c...h?v=7TR_Vzu6MSY

Now I don't care which planet you're from, the terrain looks like something you'd crank out in Unreal 1's engine, it's more or less a flat brush for the ground with some polygon boulders and mountains on it to add detail... Sure, the polygonal models they've added are quite detailed, it also has pixel shaders, shadows and full framebuffer effects added to it, but at the end of the day, this tech looks dated whichever way you look at it. So I don't think it matches the the graphics in games like Bayonetta and FF13. They are basically using a few modern techniques to simulate a next-gen look rather than actually being a true next-gen game.

Compare that to something like Bayonetta where you have a completely dynamic environment with collapsing structures and boulders flying around with debris all around you while your character runs on top of the boulders, meanwhile the engine has no trouble keeping up with all this wonderful stuff that's happening. Heck, I remember half the level falling away at some point in the game with me looking over the edge thinking, 'where the hell did the level just go?' And there were a few portals where you'd walk through and the entire environment (music included) would instantly change without a single frame being dropped. Things like this is not all that hard to do given todays technology, but it's still impressive, the kind of dynamics I would expect to see in games shipping these days. Well, usually it's not that hard to do, unless you're running on old tech that just wasn't built to support that kind of thing, and I'm starting to think that's what happened to DNF.

So far everything I've seen has been very static in DNF, again, very much like something cranked out using Unreal 1 tech. Just about the only things actually moving is the animated characters and objects wired up to the physics engine. Meanwhile, I can see them using scripted events extensively in the game... all enemy ambushes, some explosions + flying soldiers while walking through hallways, appearances of enemy UFOs, etc. Scripted events is definitely not something unseen in most modern games, but come on, scripting it to this degree? It's basically as scripted as DooM III was and that was really scripted!!! There is more stuff I can comment on, but they're just hunches rather than things I can back up until the game ships, so I intend to drop the topic at this point.

Anyway, I'm not criticizing the team behind the game, I think they did a wonderful job given the technology they were using. But the game engine is very dated, I didn't see it before because the 3D Realms team did such a good job of hiding the engine's limitations. But I've been noticing it recently while rewatching some of the footage of the game. I hate to say it, but I think this thing is running on tech much closer to Unreal 1's engine than most people think it is.

I didn't want to say anything, but people keep thinking DNF is going to be the ultimate game running on the best tech with the best graphics, and unfortunately I just don't think that's the case. I do think the game will look good and be fun as hell to play though, so I don't think any of this really matters a hell of a lot. But I do think it is important to note that it is indeed quite dated tech, even if it is Unreal 2's engine driving it (which, as I've stated before, I have serious doubts about).


Raz.

[themaniacboy]

Raziel, on Oct 1 2010, 02:30 PM, said:

I didn't want to say anything, but people keep thinking DNF is going to be the ultimate game running on the best tech with the best graphics, and unfortunately I just don't think that's the case. I do think the game will look good and be fun as hell to play though, so I don't think any of this really matters a hell of a lot. But I do think it is important to note that it is indeed quite dated tech, even if it is Unreal 2's engine driving it (which, as I've stated before, I have serious doubts about).


Raz.

As far as i know, nobody said it has the best graphics ever seen

[Raziel]

themaniacboy, on Oct 1 2010, 06:51 AM, said:

As far as i know, nobody said it has the best graphics ever seen

It was an exaggeration... I'm just saying people are already thinking its tech and graphics is better than it is, which is very dangerous. Usually if people walk in with high expectations and things just don't happen to measure up, even if it is a really good game they will end up being really disappointed.

[Luther Blissett]

Raziel, on Oct 1 2010, 06:30 AM, said:

Well actually, I completely disagree with DNF having better graphics and technology when compared to Bayonetta or Final Fantasy XIII. And no, I don't smoke crack... I've just seen the screenshots, video leaks, and PAX gameplay footage. Also, I am a graphics programmer so I tend to analyse game engines better than the average gamer does. On that note, I am about to point out some really ugly facts about the DNF engine so I suggest you stop reading now if you don't want the illusion killed for you.

So anyway, the actual engine seems very dated regardless of what you are led to believe... while some people (Broussard included) say it's running on Unreal 2's tech, I have to say I have a really hard time believing that. Even though there are levels which would have benefited from a real terrain engine (such as the one readily available in Unreal 2), they have still opted to use a more or less flat (unreal 1 style) terrain for mountainous areas with some polygon boulders and mountains on it to make things look more detailed than they actually are. Just look at the PAX footage carefully and you'll see what I mean. Here's a link so you won't have to search too far - skip 20 seconds into the video and have a look: http://www.youtube.c...h?v=7TR_Vzu6MSY

Now I don't care which planet you're from, the terrain looks like something you'd crank out in Unreal 1's engine, it's more or less a flat brush for the ground with some polygon boulders and mountains on it to add detail... Sure, the polygonal models they've added are quite detailed, it also has pixel shaders, shadows and full framebuffer effects added to it, but at the end of the day, this tech looks dated whichever way you look at it. So I don't think it matches the the graphics in games like Bayonetta and FF13. They are basically using a few modern techniques to simulate a next-gen look rather than actually being a true next-gen game.

Compare that to something like Bayonetta where you have a completely dynamic environment with collapsing structures and boulders flying around with debris all around you while your character runs on top of the boulders, meanwhile the engine has no trouble keeping up with all this wonderful stuff that's happening. Heck, I remember half the level falling away at some point in the game with me looking over the edge thinking, 'where the hell did the level just go?' And there were a few portals where you'd walk through and the entire environment (music included) would instantly change without a single frame being dropped. Things like this is not all that hard to do given todays technology, but it's still impressive, the kind of dynamics I would expect to see in games shipping these days. Well, usually it's not that hard to do, unless you're running on old tech that just wasn't built to support that kind of thing, and I'm starting to think that's what happened to DNF.

So far everything I've seen has been very static in DNF, again, very much like something cranked out using Unreal 1 tech. Just about the only things actually moving is the animated characters and objects wired up to the physics engine. Meanwhile, I can see them using scripted events extensively in the game... all enemy ambushes, some explosions + flying soldiers while walking through hallways, appearances of enemy UFOs, etc. Scripted events is definitely not something unseen in most modern games, but come on, scripting it to this degree? It's basically as scripted as DooM III was and that was really scripted!!! There is more stuff I can comment on, but they're just hunches rather than things I can back up until the game ships, so I intend to drop the topic at this point.

Anyway, I'm not criticizing the team behind the game, I think they did a wonderful job given the technology they were using. But the game engine is very dated, I didn't see it before because the 3D Realms team did such a good job of hiding the engine's limitations. But I've been noticing it recently while rewatching some of the footage of the game. I hate to say it, but I think this thing is running on tech much closer to Unreal 1's engine than most people think it is.

I didn't want to say anything, but people keep thinking DNF is going to be the ultimate game running on the best tech with the best graphics, and unfortunately I just don't think that's the case. I do think the game will look good and be fun as hell to play though, so I don't think any of this really matters a hell of a lot. But I do think it is important to note that it is indeed quite dated tech, even if it is Unreal 2's engine driving it (which, as I've stated before, I have serious doubts about).


Raz.

Not going to buy ANY of that shit you just spouted out. Unreal 1 tech . Blabla. Bunch of shit you just thought up in your head and want us to believe.

Especially when you put ffxiii and bayonetta in there. Hell, those two games had horrible graphics. They were just really shiny and polished.

But their engines sucked ass. Especially the White Engine.

I don't care if you are a programmer. I read your entire post and you wrote a bunch of BS. I am not a graphic programmer but you just seem to knock down silly things ( scripted...while citing BAYONETTA , FFXIII and fucking GOW 2 which all scream SCRIPT from the top of their lungs) and try to make it look like its knowledge , while it actually is just some serious case of butthurt.

Static game =| bad engine.

It depends on the designer vision. If they want you to explore and blow shit up, you ll be able to. If they want you to experience something they ll put you onto a binary track and get the steam rolling.

Funny how you mention Bayonetta having a great engine. Those things collapse because they WANT you to make them fall. They re gimmicks, mr programmer.

How the hell do you know DNF won't have those gimmicky shit? Yeah , right , you don't. You re pulling shit out of your ass.

To the random lurker it could look like i am hyping up DNF for no reason. I m just annoyed at the blatant resident trolls.

You re a troll when you bring in EFFIN bayonetta into the matter.

Where the fuck are we? Kindergarten?

At least bring in some tough shit like Crysis. Now that is a great engine all around. AAA movie experience right there. And with smart scripting too.

From what i saw of DNF i really liked the impact actions have on your HUD. When you fall down you get up and see your legs movement while getting up.
Duke puts his hands ahead of him when he falls on the ground , rolls and so on, all in first person . That made me fucking wet.

I m gonna get a vacation from this forum until DNF comes out.

Then i expect you trolls to be squirting like schoolgirls getting DP'd by black monster cocks.

[Raziel]

Luther Blissett, on Oct 1 2010, 07:37 AM, said:

Funny how you mention Bayonetta having a great engine. Those things collapse because they WANT you to make them fall. They re gimmicks, mr programmer.

Your statement shows you clearly haven't had much actual experience playing Bayonetta since they don't 'WANT' you to make them fall, they just do. And as I've pointed out in my post, those things are not exactly hard to do with todays technology unless your engine impairs you from doing so, and yes, I know they're gimmicks - but that does not change the fact that they are really neat little things you can do. And this brings me to my point: DNF does not do anything of that sort! Nothing! For the most part, it's totally static. It is clear you are living in total denial, DNF's engine really isn't that great. That does not mean the game will suck, in fact I think it will be a great game, but to say it has a really good engine is a joke.

Luther Blissett, on Oct 1 2010, 07:37 AM, said:

Unreal 1 tech . Blabla. Bunch of shit you just thought up in your head and want us to believe.

Actually, it's a fact that the game was running on Unreal 1's tech until the last few years at the very least. I'm just challenging the following statement from Broussard -> "I believe we branched off somewhere around the Unreal 2 time when they added static meshes"

I'm saying, if they are really using Unreal 2's engine now, how come don't I see many of it's features being utilized? Though I must admit I didn't see the last part of that statement saying "when they added static meshes"... so it's possible that the Terrain engine wasn't in Unreal 2 at the time they branched off, which would really mean DNF is using something between Unreal 1 and 2's engine.

But anyways, please do your research before saying people are talking crap, it is a fact that DNF is running on a heavily modified version of either Unreal 1 or Unreal 2, what we don't know is exactly which of those. I suspect it is closer to Unreal 1 than Unreal 2. Also, you have not actually been able to give ANY evidence to suggest I'm wrong, all you've been doing is whining about how full of crap I am. If you think I'm wrong, where is the evidence? You seeing duke's body when he falls and gets up is really cool, I agree, but it does not disprove that it is running on Unreal 1's engine...

Luther Blissett, on Oct 1 2010, 07:37 AM, said:

They re gimmicks, mr programmer ... You re pulling shit out of your ass ... You re a troll ... Where the fuck are we? Kindergarten?

If you don't mind, I don't like being mocked and called names like mr programmer and being told everything I just said is BS or that I'm trolling, read the forum rules, more specifically -> "Respect other members". I don't think it is unreasonable to expect people to do that even if it wasn't a rule in the forum.

[Striker]

I don't care who or what you are, or where you're from, but this doesn't look anything like Unreal 1:

[Sebastian]

Calm the hell down, Luther Blissett, or shut the hell up.

[Raziel]

StrikerMan780, on Oct 1 2010, 08:17 AM, said:

I don't care who or what you are, or where you're from, but this doesn't look anything like Unreal 1

Actually, if you look past the static meshes, shaders and framebuffer effects, it actually does. Other than a few detailed static meshes, the main playing field is quite basic, flat ground, despite it being mountainy terrain etc.

What you would have done if you were running Unreal 2 or 3's engine is simple, you would have built those levels using its terrain engine since it is easier to make content with (as in, you literally paint on mountains), and it scales dynamically based on distance to the terrain so it always looks good and runs well. Static meshes can only take you so far, so long story short, if they are using Unreal 2's engine, why aren't they using its terrain engine in areas where they should be using it? Only possibility I can think of... they don't actually run Unreal 2's engine, at least not a build that had the terrain stuff in it, and that's going back a while. Even if that is technically considered Unreal 2's engine, it would be such an early build it is basically still Unreal 1.

Like I said though, the team did a good job of hiding that fact and the rewritten graphics pipeline makes it look much better than it did before. But that doesn't bypass the fact that it's still Unreal 1 or 2's engine.

[Master Fibbles]

StrikerMan, your fist picture actually demonstrates the point of Raz: the terrain is a flat plain with polygon boulders. If you take the gun and characters away, you get a very similar looking scene as the one you posted from Unreal1. Pay attention.

[Mr.Deviance]

Rusty Nails, on Oct 1 2010, 07:19 AM, said:

Calm the hell down, Luther Blissett, or shut the hell up.

No, you shut the hell up. Luther might be pissed off during his post, but he manages to underline his points very well.
I agree with everything he said above.
I am not a graphics programmer like Raziel claims to be (judging by his inability to describe things with the proper terms and depth, he isn't even close to being one but w/e) but I did work at some mods and in general I like to research sdks of modern engines. I am familiarized with BRender( carmageddon engine), gold source(hl1 engine), the source engine, with idtech 4, cryengine, cryengine 2, unreal engines all of them and a few others and I have a very good eye at spotting the basic capabilities of an engine just by seeing a small gameplay teaser of a new game using a new engine.
I can also spot the engine used in a game by just watching a trailer and what I can say for certain, is that there's no way DNF is using unreal engine 1.
It's very plausible that it's a modified unreal engine 2 because the pure unreal engine 2 is capable of much less than what's seen in DNF.
They don't need to update unreal engine 1 because unreal engine 2 was already dated enough.
Just look at a comparison between pure unreal engine 2 game which is unreal tournament 2003 an older heavily modified unreal engine 2 game which is Deus
Ex Invisible war and a newer heavily modified unreal engine 2 game which is Bioshock
This is the pure version of unreal engine 2 at it's best

Deus Ex Invisible War also uses a modified unreal 2 engine and look how dated it looks.


Bioshock has a completely new render which makes the engine very different and much closer to unreal engine 3

It's obvious to me that 3D Realms has rewritten the rendering engine among other things, in order to get the modern features that provide decent visuals.
Bump maps, shaders, hdr, a decent physics engine, a new lighting and shadowing implementation, support for higher poly models and higher res textures.
Some people take engine versions too much for granted and think that just because a certain engine was used to develop games many years ago, a company with lots of money and determination can't rewrite key parts of that engine and turn it into something new.
To me it's obvious that 3D Realms found themselves dated with unreal engine 2 and they decided to just rewrite it and turn it into an unreal engine 3 look a like, to cut their expenses. It's very probable that they wanted to turn unreal engine 2 into an engine of their own, where they can just update it in a modular way like valve updates source since 2004, instead of just building a new engine from scratch.
It's definitely not using a modified unreal engine 1, It would be very counter productive for them to do that because unreal engine 2 is already cheap as hell to acquire and provides a shitload of things that don't need to be rewritten.

But I agree with everybody that is under the impression that this whole situation smells like shit.
Instead of debating here if DNF is using unreal engine 3 or unreal engine 3.5, our debate is being carried at a much lower level, which is a bit sad indeed.
After 13 years, and so many engine changes, the least they could have done right is to AT LEAST get a modern engine out.
Wasn't the engine the main problem that haunted DNF and got it postponed all of these years? I can't fucking believe that even after 13 years of postponing this game because of engine problems, the main problem debated with this game is still related to it's engine

[Raziel]

Mr.Deviance, on Oct 1 2010, 08:01 AM, said:

I can also spot the engine used in a game by just watching a trailer and what I can say for certain, is that there's no way DNF is using unreal engine 1.
It's very plausible that it's a modified unreal engine 2 because the pure unreal engine 2 is capable of much less than what's seen in DNF.

Oh, Unreal 2 is capable of much less? You mean like lacking a proper terrain engine like the one we're seeing in Duke Nukem Forever. *please note the sarcasm*

Mr.Deviance, on Oct 1 2010, 08:01 AM, said:

It's obvious that they have rewritten the rendering engine among other things, in order to get the modern features that provide decent visuals.
Bump maps, shaders, hdr, a decent pysics engine, a new lighting and shadowing implementation, support for higher poly models and higher res textures.

No kidding, I never argued with that and can say I agree with this, in fact, I've said in several instances that this is the case. eg.
"if you look past the static meshes, shaders and framebuffer effects"
"it is a fact that DNF is running on a heavily modified version of either Unreal 1 or Unreal 2"

Also, you clearly aren't that great at spotting the engine being used in games because I'm pointing out fundamental features from the Unreal 2 engine that are clearly missing in DNF... Unreal 2's main two features was its terrain engine... it's second biggest feature was its ability to dynamically reduce the number of polygons in meshes, so close-up items are high-detail, further away the quality is reduced... both of those are relatively easy to spot, yet, I haven't seen either of them in any of the DNF videos I've watched.

And no, there is no reason why you wouldn't build your mountain level with a proper terrain engine like the one present in Unreal 2 if you had that engine as a base instead of Unreal 1.

[ferran275]

Luther Blissett, on Oct 1 2010, 06:37 AM, said:

Not going to buy ANY of that shit you just spouted out. Unreal 1 tech . Blabla. Bunch of shit you just thought up in your head and want us to believe.

Especially when you put ffxiii and bayonetta in there. Hell, those two games had horrible graphics. They were just really shiny and polished.

But their engines sucked ass. Especially the White Engine.

I don't care if you are a programmer. I read your entire post and you wrote a bunch of BS. I am not a graphic programmer but you just seem to knock down silly things ( scripted...while citing BAYONETTA , FFXIII and fucking GOW 2 which all scream SCRIPT from the top of their lungs) and try to make it look like its knowledge , while it actually is just some serious case of butthurt.

Static game =| bad engine.

It depends on the designer vision. If they want you to explore and blow shit up, you ll be able to. If they want you to experience something they ll put you onto a binary track and get the steam rolling.

Funny how you mention Bayonetta having a great engine. Those things collapse because they WANT you to make them fall. They re gimmicks, mr programmer.

How the hell do you know DNF won't have those gimmicky shit? Yeah , right , you don't. You re pulling shit out of your ass.

To the random lurker it could look like i am hyping up DNF for no reason. I m just annoyed at the blatant resident trolls.

You re a troll when you bring in EFFIN bayonetta into the matter.

Where the fuck are we? Kindergarten?

At least bring in some tough shit like Crysis. Now that is a great engine all around. AAA movie experience right there. And with smart scripting too.

From what i saw of DNF i really liked the impact actions have on your HUD. When you fall down you get up and see your legs movement while getting up.
Duke puts his hands ahead of him when he falls on the ground , rolls and so on, all in first person . That made me fucking wet.

I m gonna get a vacation from this forum until DNF comes out.

Then i expect you trolls to be squirting like schoolgirls getting DP'd by black monster cocks.

i like turtles

[Sebastian]

Mr.Deviance, on Oct 1 2010, 09:01 AM, said:

No, you shut the hell up. Luther might be pissed off during his post, but he manages to underline his points very well.

Really? By spouting insults to Raziel every two words in his sentences?

Luther Blissett, on Oct 1 2010, 07:37 AM, said:

Where the fuck are we? Kindergarten?

QFT.

[Gurty]

Raziel, on Oct 1 2010, 08:22 AM, said:

Oh, Unreal 2 is capable of much less? You mean like lacking a proper terrain engine like the one we're seeing in Duke Nukem Forever. *please note the sarcasm*


No kidding, I never argued with that and can say I agree with this, in fact, I've said in several instances that this is the case. eg.
"if you look past the static meshes, shaders and framebuffer effects"
"it is a fact that DNF is running on a heavily modified version of either Unreal 1 or Unreal 2"

Also, you clearly aren't that great at spotting the engine being used in games because I'm pointing out fundamental features from the Unreal 2 engine that are clearly missing in DNF... Unreal 2's main two features was its terrain engine... it's second biggest feature was its ability to dynamically reduce the number of polygons in meshes, so close-up items are high-detail, further away the quality is reduced... both of those are relatively easy to spot, yet, I haven't seen either of them in any of the DNF videos I've watched.

And no, there is no reason why you wouldn't build your mountain level with a proper terrain engine like the one present in Unreal 2 if you had that engine as a base instead of Unreal 1.

I get your point, but isn't the gameplay that counts instead of graphics? Many Final Fantasy games look like crap but people still play because of the gameplay.
Sorry to say, but for me Halo 3/ ODST/ Reach are all the same and i enjoy playing those games and i don't really see any graphical updates.
I have played Crysis 2 on a Xbox 360 & PC at Gamescom but i didn't really notice much difference between Cryengine 3 and Cryengine 1/2.

Graphics isn't a big deal after 10 years of development, its the gameplay that counts

[Sebastian]

Gurty, on Oct 1 2010, 09:38 AM, said:

I get your point, but isn't the gameplay that counts instead of graphics?

I don't think anyone is arguing that.

[Mr.Deviance]

Raziel, on Oct 1 2010, 08:22 AM, said:

Oh, Unreal 2 is capable of much less? You mean like lacking a proper terrain engine like the one we're seeing in Duke Nukem Forever. *please note the sarcasm*

Oh please, save your "sarcastic" jokes for somebody that thinks you're actually great enough to be amusing too...

Raziel, on Oct 1 2010, 08:22 AM, said:

you clearly aren't that great at spotting the engine being used in games because I'm pointing out fundamental features from the Unreal 2 engine that are clearly missing in DNF...

Lol, now this^ THIS^^ made me laugh! And how did you come to the conclusion that I'm not that great at spotting the engines being used in games?
What you're saying, doesn't even make sense. Bring some arguments about why you think I can't spot engines, don't tell me what you can do, tell me what I can't do, in order to prove your point, if there is a point(but I can assure you there isn't one)

Raziel, on Oct 1 2010, 08:22 AM, said:

Unreal 2's main two features was its terrain engine... it's second biggest feature was its ability to dynamically reduce the number of polygons in meshes, so close-up items are high-detail, further away the quality is reduced... both of those are relatively easy to spot, yet, I haven't seen either of them in any of the DNF videos I've watched.

If you would read the release notes for unreal engine 2, you would see that it didn't feature two main features when it came it as it had multiple main features that departed it from the first version.
If those two features are your most favorite ones, then say that but don't make them seem like they are widely accepted as the main two revolutionary features, because I can list other features that were much more important than those 2.
As a matter of fact, I've heard numerous mappers that the terrain tool from unreal engine 2 is very limited and in many cases you just have to use 3d models manually modeled or generate din other terrain height mappers and converted to props outside and then end up implemented in the levels.
That's where the famous floating mountain bug first appeared.
So don't be telling me about the features of the terrain tool in unreal engine 2, like it's the cryengine 2 terrain tool, because I know exactly how limited that tool is.
That tool was useful back in 2004 games but today, it's simply useless and most, likely 3D Realms opted for a prop based art design, because it allowed them to have more control on how things look in the terrain sector of a map.

Raziel, on Oct 1 2010, 08:22 AM, said:

And no, there is no reason why you wouldn't build your mountain level with a proper terrain engine like the one present in Unreal 2 if you had that engine as a base instead of Unreal 1.

Read above. There are LOTS of reasons why you wouldn't build a mountain level with the terrain tool from unreal engine 2.
It's just too damn limited and it would provide sub par levels of quality by today's graphical standards.
When unreal engine 2 came out with this tool it was awesome and between 2003-2005 it managed to be cool, but it got dated very fast after other new engines brought better terrain editors that were able to create much more awesome stuff.

[LeoD]

Raziel you should give up arguing with guys who refuse to understand what you have written even when they quote it. Based on that observation I take it you are right about the DNF engine.

[Raziel]

You can make an old engine look really good with a new renderer... Look at the DarkPlaces engine - this is a screenshot of that engine which is based on the Quake 1 engine but running with a new renderer:
http://offload2.icculus.org:9090/twilight/...uiz_pretty4.jpg

I'm saying that 3DRealms did something similar with an engine which was very close to the Unreal 1 engine. Now all I've gotten so far from the people that disagree is very vague statements to try and prove their point and abusive comments saying I don't know what I'm talking about. I'm quite reasonable and not unwilling to change my opinion here, but where is the evidence to support your arguments? I'm talking about real Unreal 2 engine features being utilised in DNF... So far, I have not seen a single one of its features other than static meshes (which is actually an Unreal 1 feature which just happened to be advertised with the release of Unreal 2's engine).

Mr.Deviance, on Oct 1 2010, 09:01 AM, said:

It's very plausible that it's a modified unreal engine 2 because the pure unreal engine 2 is capable of much less than what's seen in DNF.

This is probably the best attempt I've seen to try and justify that it is indeed using Unreal Engine 2... However, it doesn't actually mean anything since you can change all the 2s to 1s and that statement definitely holds true. On the other hand, as the statement stands, I think it is questionable and doesn't give evidence to back itself up. Where are all the Unreal 2 features in DNF then if the DNF engine is a superset of Unreal 2's engine instead of Unreal 1's? By that logic, they consciously chose only to use Unreal 1 engine features, which wouldn't make any sense...

Mr.Deviance, on Oct 1 2010, 09:01 AM, said:

It's definitely not using a modified unreal engine 1, It would be very counter productive for them to do that because unreal engine 2 is already cheap as hell to acquire and provides a shitload of things that don't need to be rewritten.

This statement proves you know very little about game development. Doing an engine switch is not as trivial as just buying the engine, bunging in all of your existing content and away we go! Yes, it 'provides a shitload of things that don't need to be rewritten' - but you have forgotten about all of the changes they've already made to the Unreal 1 engine to get it to where it was in 2001. You can't just 'upgrade' that.

So they're not going to switch to Unreal Engine 2 just because it's cheap, the entire game would require massive rework... and if that logic was correct, they would have just switched to Unreal Engine 3 instead of putting their own rendering engine on top of what they had. It would have been much more cost effective for them by your logic since writing your own rendering engine would cost a lot more than the license for Unreal Engine 3.

They chose to stick to what they were running and wrote their own renderer because they couldn't upgrade, it's that simple. It would have required too much work to get all of their changes worked into the Unreal 2 or Unreal 3 branch.
------------------
So with all that crap out of the way... I was planning to refer back to good old BeyondUnreal (a site that is pretty much the authority on the topic of Unreal Engine builds) to get a history of the various builds so I can attempt to date the DNF engine myself based on what I knew. However, I found something interesting, they actually have a complete rundown of DNF's engine build history already and that confirms what I have been saying all this time.

To quote BeyondUnreal (http://wiki.beyondun...gine_Versions/1): "Duke Nukem Forever is NOT using Unreal Engine 2. It's still a based on heavily modified Unreal Engine 1 build 613, which supports Hardware Brush with Static Meshes, Height Field Terrain etc."

For a complete rundown, this is the history (by BeyondUnreal) which is a lot more detailed than mine, but I wasn't far off in my original post:

DNF developed history:
	* early 1997: 3D Realms, started the DNF project with their own PREY engine.
	* summer 1997: changed to id Software's QUAKE 1 engine.
	* winter 1997: upgraded to id Software's QUAKE 2 engine.
	* E3 1998: Released on QUAKE 2 engine based DNF at E3.
	* summer 1998: changed to Epic Games' UNREAL engine.
	* autumn 1999: upgraded to the Epic Games' UNREAL TOURNAMENT engine.
	* summer 2001: they have written a tremendous amount of their own rendering system.
	* summer 2002: updated to the Unreal Engine 1 build 613 stuff such as HARDWARE BRUSH WITH STATIC MESHES, HEIGHT FIELD TERRAIN and more.
	* winter 2003: they have a 100% REWRITTEN RENDERING CODE and PHYSICS ENGINE, GAMEPLAY TRIGGER SYSTEM, AI SYSTEM, SOUND SYSTEM a.s.o.
	* spring 2005: included MEQON Physics Engine.
	* late 2005: once again 100% REWRITTEN RENDERING CODE.

Admittedly I did not know Unreal 1's engine ever supported terrain and apparently the DNF build does have this ability, so I can only guess that the Unreal 1 terrain was so bad that no one actually ended up using or improving on it.

But anyway, there you have it... Duke Nukem Forever is definitely based on Unreal Engine 1. At least they kept that up to date as they are running the last official build of Unreal Engine 1 (build 613). It would have been too difficult to actually switch to the Unreal 2 branch for obvious reasons so the best they could do was keep their engine up to date with the latest Unreal Engine 1 build available.

LeoD, on Oct 1 2010, 04:01 PM, said:

Raziel you should give up arguing with guys who refuse to understand what you have written even when they quote it. Based on that observation I take it you are right about the DNF engine.

Yeah, you're right... I'm going to stop now since I don't think this is actually going anywhere. I can provide as much evidence as people want and they'll still tell me I don't know what I'm talking about. I'm pretty much like Columbus, telling people the earth is round, just to have them tell me I'm stupid and don't know what I'm talking about. Bloody amateurs.

Raz.

[Raziel]

Mr.Deviance, on Oct 1 2010, 09:01 AM, said:

But I agree with everybody that is under the impression that this whole situation smells like shit.
Instead of debating here if DNF is using unreal engine 3 or unreal engine 3.5, our debate is being carried at a much lower level, which is a bit sad indeed.
After 13 years, and so many engine changes, the least they could have done right is to AT LEAST get a modern engine out.
Wasn't the engine the main problem that haunted DNF and got it postponed all of these years? I can't fucking believe that even after 13 years of postponing this game because of engine problems, the main problem debated with this game is still related to it's engine

I forgot to quote this comment... but I think at the very least we agree here.

[Tetsuo]

Darkplaces is a good example of retrofitting newer engine features onto an older engine and it's just as plausible that DNF is still running a highly modified UE1. The problem I find with retrofitting older engines is they just aren't as efficient with all these newer features grafted onto them as a newer engine that was optimized to run with those things. Darkplaces for example tends to run slower than newer engines. However I guess if you get someone good on the team you can retrofit and still optimize.... Bioshock performs very well compared to Darkplaces but again it's a newer engine and had a bigger budget and it still doesn't look as crisp as a typical proper UE3 game. Hell, even eDuke32 with Polymer shows that you can do quite a bit even with an engine even older than UE1.

I myself assumed at this point DNF was at least running on UE2 as the base that they have been modifying as was the case with Bioshock but since it's been in development so long I guess it wouldn't surprise me if it wasn't. The reason why Bioshock was on 2.5 was because of how long it was in development as well. Sometimes they are better off adapting what they have rather than switching to an entirely new engine.

They've probably done quite a bit of revision to the engine since 2005 as well.... and to be honest we haven't seen even a fraction of the game yet.

[Raziel]

Excellent post Tetsuo, I can't agree more.

I would also like to point out right now that Unreal Engine 1 is hardly the worst engine ever made. I can think of other games that shipped recently using engines so sh*t I'm surprised they managed to make it on store shelves! Look at Red Steel 2 - my goodness, the engine is entirely 2.5D (you'll even notice the stairs are solid underneath, also, rooms above rooms are a giant hack in pretty much the same way they were in Duke3D - in fact, it's rooms-above-rooms implementation is much worse than D3D's since you can't split the level horizontally, therefore you can't have two rooms-above-rooms on the same section of the wall, if that makes sense). Now to drop the big bomb - notice that the walls in Red Steel 2 are all axis-aligned (in simple terms, this means the walls are at right-angles to each other)!!! I mean seriously, this was released in 2009, not the 90s, this engine pretty much rates between the original Wolfenstein and Doom engine on a technical scale since Doom at least had a lot of walls not sitting at right-angles to each other. Incidentally, they also use a lot of static meshes in Red Steel 2 to add detail to the levels - which is probably why people haven't noticed these limitations. But if you want to look at an engine with real limitations, that one is a prime example right there .

Getting back to Duke Nukem Forever. Yes, it's not running on UE3, but all things considered, I actually think UE1 is a good fit for DNF. While it is not a next-gen engine capable of lots of those gimmicks I apparently love so much, I know for a fact the core engine works really well, and that puts me at ease. Also, with the new renderer in place + Meqon physics, I do think it is a better engine than what they would have produced had they built their own engine in-house.