At the very minimum, it's going to be an excellent source of quality net/graphics code samples for UE4 developers. If it's wildly successful, we may see some neat ripples around the industry.
Also, this thing is going to get Occulus'd, Hydra'd, and everything else. That's going to be fun.
-We could see an FPS rise in eSports prominence again
-Mods built on top of one game create tons of variety accessible to one player base
-Mod developers have an easy way to become recognized game developers
Also, not related to the old Quake / UT / Half-Life scenes, but the marketplace for assets will be on top of a game that isn't Team Fortress 2, so there's much more creative latitude once mods are released (disclaimer: I love TF2).
I wish it would come back.
If it has that, that game has a player.
Arguably CS:GO has been picking up steam lately hitting the #2 spot on Twitch.tv fairly constantly and spiking greatly during big tournaments.
This announcement couldn't have come at a better time as FPS is once again gaining competitive traction.
TLDR: This is non-free. It is not open source, its not free software, and it is unlikely to ever exist in distributions like Debian and Ubuntu.
https://www.unrealengine.com/faq , Ctrl-F for "copyleft".
Previous discussion on Unreal Engine 4.
It's still a highly daring development model, all things considered. The concept itself is hardly new, but it's the first time an AAA developer has adopted it. Correct me if I'm wrong.
Looks like they are doing the Team Fortress 2 free to play model, even though they say it is free and not free to play, the vanity store/content is the Valve F2P model used in TF2, DotA, probably CS etc. These games are huge because of the community content, Epic is seeing that.
This is such a cool thing to do and only wish they did it many years ago.
> We’ll eventually create a marketplace where developers, modders, artists and gamers can give away, buy and sell mods and content. Earnings from the marketplace will be split between the mod/content developer, and Epic. That’s how we plan to pay for the game.
What distinction are they trying to make between "free to play" and "free"? To my understanding, "free to play" means the game is largely free, but with the implication that there is additional content that can optionally be purchased. "Free" means the game is free, with no implication either way of whether optional purchases exist.
You're definitely right that the distinction they are making isn't very clear, and they could message that part better.
I think the distinction is that Android Platform is "free". The Unreal Tournament Platform is "free".
Both give you usable functionality out of the box, and free. Both give you the opportunity to purchase additional functionality in a "store".
"Free to play" generally means the developer will add more content, or cheats, or whatever to purchase, whereas "free" in this case means they will offer a platform and a store where they will take a cut.
1) Free to play. 2) Free accounts. 3) Free access to the source code.
This will end magnificently =)
They will be providing a marketplace where other people can sell their own content that they create, which is optional and not (necessarily?) integrated into the main game.
The implication of 'free to play' is that the game itself is full of opportunities to monetize players, or that progression can be sped with currency which you can earn/buy, etc, and that the developer will be splitting their time between bugfixes/features and producing new content to sell to people (at varying levels of balance between the two).
The difference here is that the developers are producing two separate things: one, a 3D tournament-style FPS; and two, a shop where people can sell game content that they've created, and make money from it (or presumably give it away for free).
For example, free to play in a FPS could be purchasing weapons that cannot be accessed in other ways. On the other hand, free + mod marketplace could say... imagine for some reason UT4 ships without a certain game mode... say CTF with Vehicles. Some enterprising fellow can now make a mod with CTF with Vehicles, and sell it on the marketplace. Or maybe a game mode where everyone has bow and arrow and a knife. The point is that there is now a 'different' game that you pay to get access to.
Fundamentally, it would be like say... if Half Life multiplayer was free on release, but someone still went and sold Counter Strike anyways.
It's very hard to predict how this will shake out right now, though.
Still, this is super-exciting and I hope the best for them. The classic FPS genre has needed this for years.
I know what you mean about the split, but as someone who loves both series I think either way will lead to a great game. I personally think the faster-style would be more successful because the series as a whole has always leaned more towards a arcadey/tactical style than a simulation/strategy style.
It's interesting that you say that, because I think the biggest achievement of UT to date is the Onslaught mode, which fluidly mixed strategic and tactical, vehicular and on-foot gameplay. And as onslaught showed (on some maps - not all), you don't have to sacrifice speed or pace of close-in combat to enable strategic gameplay of CTF/ONS type.
This model is brilliant!! It could keep people playing for years just by trying out new mods, new content, and more. Really excited to see what happens.
It's a potentially smart business move, will be interesting to see how it works out for them.
Yet without it being a dick move. Even if it's good for them, it's also good for us :)
I'm very exited to see what this will bring us, although I don't know what I think about the idea of payed mods...
In fact mods used to be the norm. I played more nodded Quake 2 15 years ago than I did Quake 2.
And selling them is not particularly new, Valve experimented with it back with CS1.6 and all those other mods that came out in the pack.
http://www.theverge.com/2014/5/5/5684236/oculus-wants-to-bui...
With that said, I'm really happy to see that there's going to be a UT4, and I'm looking forward to following the development. It's been a while since the last great arena shooter, and I hope we'll be seeing a resurgence sometime soon!
http://steamcommunity.com/market/search?q=appid%3A730#p1_pri...
It's not really their fault people want to pay $400 for a hat.
That said, this is an awesome move by Epic!
Wouldn't that be a great move? Not sure how they would make the money on it then, but I think it would quickly beat most other engines out there in popularity.
I don't know if that's Valve even wants, but it could be if say that would get most game developers out there to create OpenGL/Linux-compatible games by default, and since Source 2 will only support OpenGL (I think), that could be one way to do it.
I doubt they would dump DirectX completely. They've reworked the engine for linux to not care if it's running DirectX or OpenGL. Leaving this intact could provide a way to eventually port to Android/iOS and other mobile platforms? Valve has stated they want to get into the mobile space but have seemed to fail thus far. I recall them mentioning Linux was a natural step to go from Win Desktop -> Mac -> Linux to Mobile running Linux (Android)
They would make money if Source 2 was designed to make Linux a premier development and gaming environment. Valve wants everyone on Linux, eventually. It's the only refuge they have from the walled garden lockdown future of Windows.
To be blunt, if you always wanted to break into the game industry, this couldn't be a better opportunity for you to pick up related experience and build relationships with potential employers.
This is my most loved favourite Game, yeahhh! This is so awesome, I'm gonna buy a new PC and smash Gentoo, or NixOS onto it! Hope I find out which Graphics-card and which Mainboard is supported well enough to play the game at max resolution.
I doubt it'll be included with the new UT (since that's going to be free), but it's a pretty impressive toolset.
I wonder what the license is?
I like it.
