Just thought i'd see peoples opinions on which of the "next breed" of games (doom3,ut2k4,hl2 etc.) will be best for modding.
From what i've seen so far, UT2k4 seems to be the most flexible, and provides a very nice interface through UScript. It has nice tools (UEd) and they provide a decent amount of info through the VTM's and the UDN site. However, it has the lowest-end graphics abilities of the 3 games i've listed. Also, there may be some worries over how large the community of ut2k4 mod players will be compared to the others.
HL2 looks like it will have great graphics, but there may be some mean restraints on level sizes. It may require some funky tools (SoftImage?) to develop with. No idea what the development is like as far as coding goes. Will probably have the largest mod community if it lives up to the hype, and especially if counter-strike2 is a free mod! HL2 also provides Steam, which may be a large help to modders (particularly if they want to commercialise a product?).
Doom3...no idea, but it will sure look pretty :) The lack of decent multiplayer game modes in Doom3 may reduce the number of people who will buy the game to play online, and therefore also reduce the number of people who will play mods.
Personally, i'm looking at both HL2 and UT2k4...but very much starting to lean towards UT2k4, at least it's been released!!
What do the rest of you think, is it worth waiting for HL2? :)
CYer, Blitz
i think UT2k4 might hold the greatest potential for first timers with the special pack DVDs (assuming their good and easy to follow), im so happy someones finally making something like this. I did a bit of mod work on GTA Vice ctiy and to find out how i had to browse over all these forums constantly asking questions, its great that were actually getting taught by the makers.
My personal take on the best to mod (FPS engines only).
1:halflife 2, ooh my poor heart.
2:stalker, Dont even know if its possible to mod but I'd love to use their engine.
3:far cry, Ingame editor! sweeeeeeet. If it works as well as the demo suggests then wow.
4:Doom 3, normal map goodness.
5:meh UTK4, great for those wanting to learn but no where near the power of the others.
UT2k4 definitely has the advantage at the moment. Seeing as it is just a slightly better UT2k3 engine, people will already be fairly comfortable with it. We have seen twice now what it can and can't do. Even if total mods aren't made for it, it still does have it's Mutators up it's sleave. It is nice to see that they are supporting the modding community a bit more than other devs have in the past. UT2k3 had both GMax and Maya PLE included, so that opened up posibilities to even more people (as opposed to games that only have Max support). The SE of UT2k4 does have the DVDs as well. Let's just hope that they are worth while. While it's engine may not be as cutting edge as the others, it does have the time behind it.
HL2 sounds a little odd. They released dev kits and SDKs for it a while back so that modders could get to grips with it, but I haven't read much on what it is actually like. They (Valve) keep hyping the crap out of it, but I remain dubious. Keep in mind that there are a lot of Fanboys who love Half-Life, so they will probably try to make mods for it based purely on the franchise. Half-Life did come up from nowhere and really hit the modding community hard though. CS is still one of the biggest 'games', and that was four years ago (give or take). I really do like their character abilities though (decent facial expressions :) )
Doom3 looks and moves very nicely. It's lighting is it's big selling point, and for good reason. Like HL2, there are a lot of id purists out there (I am one), and they will like the engine based around that. id pretty much started the modding community and has supported it somewhat well over the years. Although it's netcode may seem somewhat weak, it may have the ability to be improved on. Maybe it is just locked to four people at the moment due to speed issues with the graphics. Do you really want to run Doom3 with 32 Normal Mapped Marines slogging it out? :) Maybe when systems can handle it a little better, they will release a patch with more player support. Keep in mind that there was Quake Rally. Who would have thought it was posible to change an FPS into a Racing Game? And please don't say Impact :p
I really like the Farcry Engine. It looks cool, and has really bright colours. It just doesn't look like a standard FPS. The level rendering is amasing. Sure there is noticable popup and lodding, but I think it is worth it for the vast landscapes. That and the water is gorgeous. I don't know what the modding abilities of it are like, but the engine sounds quite nice.
Stalker is a mixed bag for me. It has some features that really do look nice (weather effects), and then some that don't look as nice. Then again, that was a while back that they showed it. I will wait on this one before saying yay, or nay.
Max has always been the biggest tool for game dev in the past, but there are now more and more people starting to shift to alternatives (Maya, XSI). Therefore, I think that what exporters and support there will be available, will make a big difference. I would love to have made characters for NWN, but it only has Max support. It will be interesting though, game devs and modders have never been so spoilt for choice with high quality engines. It has always been and id engine or a Unreal engine. Not anymore :)
Aven:
Have seen some of what half life is capable of and its nothing short of amazing, normal maps, amazing shaders, cameras, full facial animation, havok of course and much more.
Doom 3 while looking bloody cool hasn't released anything substantial for anyone to look at (except the leaked version) so I have nothing to go on except a few sreenshots and videos of well lit normal mapped characters (most of the engines I quoted have those abilites also). I'm also not much of an ID fanboy, I like there games but I think they make the technology and other companies (like valve) excel at using it to make better games.
Farcry has some interesting abilities, I touched on the editor, if you manage to get the video of how the ingame editor works you'll see why I'm intrigued. Now it also has decent shaders, normal maps and lighting but I still believe in Valves ability to make more of there engine. BTW, the colours are way to saturated for my taste but thats got nothing to do with the engine, thats a design issue.
Stalker is a strange one I agree, it looks amazing but I don't know if it will be moddable by the general public, I haven't heard of an editor in the pipeline. There are some obvious technologies in there videos that compare with the others, physics engine, shaders, cool lighting and possible normal maps etc. The engine looks pretty impressive.
Oh and UT2004 is most probalby going to be the most modded, its accessable to everyone and really isn't all that complicated. People new to modding can get something up and running pretty quickly and the more experienced modders still have some decent tools to make great mods, its just not one I'm all that interested in looking at.
I just want to clear up a couple of points raised here, I might post more of my own opinions later when I have time. Note these are just the way I understand things, don't take it as anything definate...
quote:HL2 looks like it will have great graphics, but there may be some mean restraints on level sizes. It may require some funky tools (SoftImage?) to develop with. No idea what the development is like as far as coding goes.
In Half-Life 2 most of the restrictions on map sizes, entity counts and so on that plagued modders of the original have been greatly improved. Of course, there will be restraints there, but I doubt they will be the issue they used to be. There is a FAQ floating around the major mod sites with more info.
Softimage is not something you must use, it's just what they are going to be supporting the most in their SDK and they will be providing a free version of it to the community (similar to the trial version already out?). So long as you can get an exporter for your favourite 3D app you should be able to use it, I expect that if Valve doesn't release them for the major apps (3DS etc) that someone in the community will chip in fairly quickly. Valve's move away from 3DS was for a number of rather good reasons though I haven't used Softimage myself so I can't comment.
Coding will be much the same as with Half-Life 1, C++ code compiled into a dll. Apparently if you are familiar with the original code you should have no problems adjusting to the new stuff. Many people think the original code was a terrible mess though apparently the new code is significantly improved. There is of course nothing stopping you compiling something like LUA into your dll to add your own scripting support...
Half Life 2, as it said in PC PowerPlay issue number 98, it will be easy to mod for it, and very easy to get the mods of Half Life now, into Half Life 2.
As for Doom 3, PC PowerPlay issue 97 said that it will be easy to make new things for it, as they are going to put the programs they used to make Doom 3, like the map making program. Pity the only play is only allowed 4 players, thoe modders will make it better, let us hope.
Regarding map sizes in HL2, i brought that up because of an article ir ead quite a while ago comaring HL2 engine to UT2k3, where the maximum map sizes (in units) of UT2k3 where IIRC about 64 times larger than HL2 (4 times larger in each of 3 dimensions).
In the leaked HL2 beta, it also seemed loading screens were not far apart either :(
Anyway, it's hard tor eally judge without playing a map of maximum size etc. I think one person in that article calculates that using HL/HL2 scale of 40 inches per unit (?) The max map size would still be a good couple kilometers or so in each direction, which will be fine for games played on foot :)
CYer, Blitz
Malus - Yeah, I have seen all the movies for HL2 as well. THe shaders are nice, but I don't think that much of it's water shader. It's nice that it has HDRI support (even though it is probably only LDRI), but it is a little wasted on games at the moment. I have only seen one example of it's normal mapping (that rock wall in the 25min demo), and I thought it was just a bump map. As for Havok, most games have that now, but yes, HL2 has the nicest implentation (except for the rag dolls).
I haven't said that the HL2 engine is bad. Hell none of them are bad. They are all strong engines. The only problem is that three of them don't really exist yet (Doom3, HL2 and Stalker). Yeah there have been movies and leaks for the three of them, but I refuse to judge them until they are in an offical form playing on a system in front of me. Come on, how many of us actually believe developer/publisher hype anymore? As for leaks. Well, they may give you a rough idea, but it is very rough.
Seeing as three of those games aren't substantial enough yet, that leaves Farcry and UT2k4. Both have had official demos released (Farcry has two SP demos and a third MP beta that you can't get :(). Which is my fav out of those two? Let's see... Engine wise, I would have to go with Farcry. Modding wise, UT2k4. UT2k4 gets the modding award just because we know what it is like to mod. Farcry doesn't have any tools out yet, so we don't know.
What is my fave engine out of them all? I would like a hybrid engine :D Take Doom's lighting, mix it with HL2's characters, dynamics, and shaders. Add in Farcry's vastness, water and AI. Add a spoon full of Stalker's weather effects and then speed it up to UT2k3/2k4's speed. If i can only pick one, then I'm screwed. HL2 and Farcry are the most impressive overall, but it depends on what type of game you want I guess. Both HL2 and Fracry would make awesome engines for something like Action Quake2/Half-Life. Doom3 would be great for anything that is meant to freak the crap out of anyone (AvP anyone :D). At the moment to me, Stalker would make a nice weather effects engine for the news, and UT2k4 would be great for a UT Rally game. So damn fast.
Considering that I am not into full on mods, it will depend on which ones come with Maya exporters. Farcry says it does. UT does. Doom3 should (as characters are animated in Maya). HL2 and Stalker are still up in the air. UT2k4 seems the best at the moment (as nearly any type of character with a gun could fit in), but I just don't like the game :/
Come on damn you, just release the games....
When it comes to creating mods, its a question of how far you bend the engine, and which limitations you will hit first.
I haven't been following many of these games, but i know from experience that developers build their engines around certain limitations. As an example, Doom 3 is almost guarenteed not to have big outdoor sections (or at least not with the same quality of lighting as the indoor ones). This is simply because they can optimise the living crap out of an engine built to handle indoor environments (read wolfenstein, doom and quake).
When it comes down to it, you want a specific feature that only one engine can provide, or you want an engine that can do it all (which it does by making other sacrifices).
Oh yeah, you also want an engine that doesn't exlude users with lower end machines. :D
cheers
Dont make the mistake that 95% of people make and confuse the game art with the game engine.
A large part of any complete game engine is the tool set. In that requard unrealis the best at the moment. Given the hl2 and doom3 editors have not been seen. But aren't we comparing whats on the market now and not will becoming out in the indefinite future?
i will be modding Unreal2k4 as soon as i get a new video card :( i have the tutes thanks to 3dbuzz but due to unrealed and mayaPLE running on direct3D (see max gives you the option of like openGL and stuff which is nifty if you ask me, but oh well) and my vid card being out of vid memory. So ill have something to show like.... i dunno probably by the end of the year :P
Yeh, I agree, Ut2k4 is visually the weakest out of the three (I wish they worked more on lighting just to make it look more realistic - I think Cliffy B did say they worked on it a little, but it looks the same to UT2k3 to me), but I reckon it has the most potential from a modding point of view too. It seems it could offer so much more different game styles. You can make a long list of games on the market that Ut2k4 can emulate, and another long list of new directions you can take it with scripting (especially seeing what they were able to do in that Assault map). I think this is the key to what will make Ut2k4 different to the others.
Some great netcode, so even dialup losers like me can have fun online. I think Epic have done the right thing by getting Ut2k4 out before the others from a sales point of view, which will mean more people to participate in mods.
However, looking back at the number of decent mods made with UT2k3, I'm not too hopeful on what actually gets done with UT2l4. Entry level to modding is just getting higher and higher with more detailed content required and time spent to do something reasonable. I think the Make Something Unreal competition really killed output a bit - instead of encouraging more people to create mods, current mod groups just stopped showing what they were working on and did things quietly for the competition instead. We still haven't seen any of their work over a year later (it's coming on the Special Edition of the Ut2k4 though).
I'll admit that my level of enthusiasm for Half Life 2 has decreased quite a bit. It's redeeming features are seeming old hat now (the use of physics and environment objects, smart A.I), epsecially when we've seen them to some extent in other games. I'll no doubt get it, but I'm looking forward to the single player experience and the art the most. Valve are doing some weird things with pricing (no online version, subcription version where you pay regularly to receive updates etc).
There are going to be some professional mods with Half Life 2, I'm certain of it (and a lot of crap ones too [;)]). Jump on over to http://www.incorporated-hl2.com/ to see how serious people are taking it. There was another project which absolutely blew me away (the concept art was incredible). The name escapes me at the moment but there were some really professional people working on it. All of them are hoping to get hitched by Valve like Counterstrike and Day of Defeat were, so they're putting some real effort in it. Modding for Half Life 2 (as a level designer and artist) should be a breeze if you're already used to the tools for Half Life. I'm not sure about HL2's potential of offering different, new or interesting sorts of games though. You have vehicles and Havoks to play with, along with a prettier engine, but what more can you do? I just have a feeling that we'll be playing the same kind of mods with Half Life 2.
Doom 3 is a strange one. Only capable of 4 players online, I'm not sure if as much people are willing to put the effort in a total conversion. I'm sure we'll see different maps here and there. I don't think Doom3 will offer that much in scripting to alter different playing styles. Modding and online seems like an afterthought to the single player experience. Editing for Doom will be awesome since you'll be able to preview it straight away, but I'm sure that's just a result of technology rather than pleasing the mod community. Having said that, I'm sure the single player experience is gonna kick ass [:)] Definatley looking forward to Doom 3.