quote: Original post by Tacit
I believe that NDL only makes the Netimmerse Engine, and doesn''t actually develop games for it. There was some good coverage of this engine in the last print issue of game developer magazine.

That is correct. They also have a prototype 3D engine for Windows CE PDA''s such as the Compaq iPAQ. (I saw a demo at SIGGRAPH this past August, showing a 2000 textured-triangle digital character dancing around onscreen at perhaps 10-15 frames per second. Talking to the prototype''s developer, they feel they can achieve 100,000 triangles/second on a current high-end Compaq iPAQ. That is superior to the performance of an SGI Personal IRIS 3D workstation I was using back in 1989.)



Graham Rhodes
Senior Scientist
Applied Research Associates, Inc.

Case in point to go with Tacit & Diragor, I loned out my engine a few weeks ago so a friend of mine could demo a building that he had designed for a class.

MMS Software

Edited by - Domini on December 12, 2001 12:54:34 PM

quote: Original post by DavidRM
To make it worse, most teams aren''t interested in a "general purpose" engine. They have a particular type of game they are producing, and that is best served by a particular type of engine. And so the niche gets even smaller.

In fact, it looks pretty dismal.

So, to make money from selling an engine, you have to charge a fairly stiff licensing fee. But to actually get paid that stiff fee, you have to demonstrate the superiority of your solution versus one they could whip up in-house.

Your thoughts seem pretty accurate to me. But, at least for now, the cost of the engine can be small compared to the cost of developing equivalent functionality inhouse. Which makes a licensed engine appealing to a good number of studios. (Did anyone play Munch''s Oddyssee on Xbox, which uses NetImmerse? I understand that Oddworld did have some hurdles to overcome dealing with object occlusion culling to maximize rendering performance, but they did produce a good looking, finely crafted game.)

In NDL''s case, they are profitable (which says a lot), and have been for some time selling just licenses of their NetImmerse engine to game studios (plus annual support fees). So it is possible to succeed as a company in the general purpose 3D game engine market. But as you say, it is a niche market. And the nature of the industry (right now) combined with the license pricing strategy NDL (in particular) has chosen may lead to their market drying up eventually. Once every studio has bought an unlimited use, all platforms license to NetImmerse then NDL will only be selling annual support, which will not provide enough revenue to continue to be profitable. They rely on new studios becoming successful. Some engine companies (well, engine + game) have a royalty-based pricing strategy (Epic) and this would seem to be the best way to assure a long-term revenue stream.

NDL is working to expand their horizons into the Vis-Sim industry, and have developed an impressive prototype for a PDA 3D engine. They''re not the only ones with a PDA 3D engine. Another is FatHammer, www.fathammer.com. I haven''t seen the FatHammer engine in action, but the NDL demo I saw was quite impressive. If you have an iPAQ, then you may be interested to download and try both the FatHammer and NDL PDA engine demos from their respective websites (NDL is www.ndl.com).

(We evaluated NetImmerse, LithTech, Intrinsic Alchemy, and consider the Quake III and Unreal engines for a project. We decided on, AND PURCHASED, a license for NetImmerse. The project that paid for NetImmerse is not a game development project---its a Vis-Sim project---but we''ve been working on a game demo using NetImmerse.)



Graham Rhodes
Senior Scientist
Applied Research Associates, Inc.

quote: Original post by Tacit
Game engines are often used in non-entertainment applications as well, for example military, scientific modelling, architectural/engineering, etc.

See my other posts. We purchased a NetImmerse license for a vis-sim project unrelated to the game industry. (Although we are trying to grow a game studio, and use the NetImmerse license to develop our game demo.)

Graham Rhodes
Senior Scientist
Applied Research Associates, Inc.

quote: Original post by Oluseyi
Those aren''t game engines. Point to a notable architectural/engineering application that uses a game engine. Go on, I dare you.

I realize your comment was with respect to architectural/engineering applications, and as Diragor said there are many many different types of applications (including game-engine walkthroughs) used for architecture/engineering.

I''d like to provide some information on other non-game uses of game engines and game technology. Its a bit sketchy, but you might find it interesting.

Unfortunately, I can''t show *our* Vis-Sim application that uses NetImmerse. (Its still in development and hasn''t been really announced yet. There will probably be a web site at some point.) Its a bit of a niche product, but it is an example.

Here''s a couple of links that may be interesting to you.

http://dailynews.yahoo.com/h/nm/20011120/tc/tech_wargames_dc_1.html

This next one in particular gives an example of the Rogue Spear engine being used to train soldiers:

http://corp.ubisoft.com/pr_release_010829a.htm

Also, check out this site:

www.armygame.com

That is a game studio run by the Naval Postgraduate school.

Admittedly, these military training uses of game technology really aren''t any different than games like Rogue Spear and Half Life, but it is an interesting migration of the uses of games.

I can also tell you that the folks we have worked with for several years at NASA Langley Research Center are interested in game engine (graphics and physics) technology. In fact, one of the people that managed some of our contract tasks attended the GDC conference last year, specifically to talk to game technology providers. I can also tell you that NASA Ames used the Critical-Mass physics engine for Mars Rover simulations. Critical Mass Labs is a spinoff of MathEngine, and in fact the Critical Mass engine is derived from MathEngine''s Karma game physics engine. See www.cm-labs.com for some info on this. And what other things does NASA want to use game technology for? Visualization of, interaction with, and real-time simulation of prototype designs of spacecraft and space telescopes in large scale virtual environments such as CAVES (www.fakespace.com), Vision Domes (www.elumens.com), etc. (Our NASA project involved doing nonlinear real-time animation of Next Generation Space Telescope vibrations, and we developed a CAVE application for this.)

As for other architecture/engineering applications, well I''ll just say that conventional CAD/CAM stuff isn''t really ever going to be a good place for game engines because those applications don''t really need fancy texturing, animations, etc. Eventually, virtual-reality visual simulations may use technology developed originally by the game industry (this is where the NASA projects want to go), but things like AutoCAD, SolidWorks, MSC.Patran, IronCAD, Vellum, CADKey, will never need to use a game engine unless their human computer interface is radically changed. They could certainly benefit from game geometry technologies such as subdivision surfaces, and it is likely that they will (some may already) use these technologies.

Graham Rhodes
Senior Scientist
Applied Research Associates, Inc.

Yes, there are some very interesting uses for this technology. I am assuming (because I don''t know of any projects off-hand) that the MIT Media Lab is using some game engines for visualization and some of their interactivity/communications research.

Graham, perhaps NDL isn''t shooting themselves in the foot with their licensing structure, since I would think most game developers would opt for the single game license if given the choice. Tying yourself financially to one license seems risky, even one as versatile as NetImmerse. But you could be right.

R.

quote: Original post by Tacit
Yes, there are some very interesting uses for this technology. I am assuming (because I don''t know of any projects off-hand) that the MIT Media Lab is using some game engines for visualization and some of their interactivity/communications research.

Possibly, though the visualizations I''ve seen at SIGGRAPH for the past 4 years out of MIT Media Lab have been only mediocre and nothing implied they were using (or needed to be using) game engines. I had thought that they were using something inhouse or perhaps the SGI Iris Performer library. That doesn''t mean they''re not using game tech., just possibly that their artists are not the cream of the crop.

quote: Original post by Tacit
Graham, perhaps NDL isn''t shooting themselves in the foot with their licensing structure, since I would think most game developers would opt for the single game license if given the choice. Tying yourself financially to one license seems risky, even one as versatile as NetImmerse. But you could be right.

Actually, that is a really good point. We actually bought a single-use license. NDL did encourage us ( ) to upgrade to the unlimited use license at double the cost. But perhaps they''re wise. Perhaps they''ve found that companies have tended to use their engine for only one project (for whatever reason). And the unlimited use licenses would certainly lead to more revenue than they would have gotten.


Graham Rhodes
Senior Scientist
Applied Research Associates, Inc.

On the topic of middleware, it''s interesting to see the trend towards an increased use of middleware in game development. The growing amount of pre-built tools for AI, physics, and graphics, save developers a lot of time (assuming these tools don''t have to be customized too much on top of the functionality they natively provide) and allow teams to focus resources on creating content and refining gameplay. Some of these tools are even being marketed towards less technical development teams, ones who have solid teams in art and design, but are not experienced enough on the coding side to develop their own 3D engine, physics, or AI.

I find this an interesting shift. I see the same thing happening on the 3D side as well.

Sorry to go off topic there.

R.