How Dreams Allows Everyone to Make a Game (CeaveGaming) - Videos for the 97.4%

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WtWHkxh4uxg

shame it's a PS4 exclusive, would kill to have this on PC

So as good as this is, I can't really see it as much more than a gimmick. The reason why is due to what I'll politely call "The Unity Dilemma" Unity is a powerful engine. Unfortunetly, it also has a bit of a reputation due to people using it to make games that are kinda… shit, little more than purchased assets and the like. Dreams looks like it may fall into a similar vain - not with purchased assets (because everythings free) but more in how everything may just eventually just meld together and feel very samie due to people using very similar templates and the like. I remember Microsoft/Rare doing something very similar what feels like Forever ago with something called Project Acorn? From what I've seen, it has this exact problem, although with this said it looks like Dreams handles it better with stuff like node-based programming so you can do more then tweak properties of stuff.

I mean yeah any “Game Maker” is going to have a reputation for having shitty games. Even Unreal has that trend of people making UBER REALISTIC ZELDA. But we’ll definitely see a ton of unique awesome gems come out of it. For me, it’s just easier to focus on 3D modeling as a skill than use whatever they use to model in this game.

The modeler looks like it's great for creating stuff, however anything even moderately advanced it looks like it'll fall apart in. No idea how whoever made that cool deagle passed by in the showcase though. Anything cool made by this will probably be isolated only to Dreams. I really, really don't think you can sell your junk made in this and you need to have a PS4 anyways (I'm assuming Dreams is free). Great for hobbiest projects and maybe proof of concepts but otherwise ehhhh...

I think what this video misses, is that I don't personally think that Dreams is a game making tool. I would liken it more to a performance tool. You make short Art installations, music, animations, or interactive game like pieces which can either be created be just you or as a collaboration. It can feel a bit reductive to call Dreams a "game engine" for that reason. For a long time they didn't really market it as a game making tool, but more of a play area, where you can do whatever you want. And the game totally hits that mark. I have spent the last week totally enamored with this bloody bit of software, because it feels so fresh and creative in comparison to the logical processes needed in game engines like Unity, or even other games Media Molecule have made like Little Big Planet. The biggest disappointment is this has taken so long to come out. It was announced at the same event the PS4 was announced, over 6 years ago. And we're coming up to the PS5 now, which having backwards compatability could be this things saving grace.

Dreams kind of reminds me of the early days of 3D animation in the 90s when people made all kinds of weird animated shorts, and stuff. It's nice how you can just turn on an autoplay mode and seamlessly move through different dreams people have made.

I'm looking forward to seeing what people make/remake with this game. I expect to see a lot of classic game levels be remade.

Project Spark

The modeler is probably far more finely tuned for VR as there are plenty of sculpting sizes and options.

Was Little Big Planet a gimmick too? This is basically a massively extended LBP - It's a ridiculously easy-to-use toolset with immense potential. Unity is way harder to use, comparatively. It requires you to understand a lot of systems, and in most cases you'll be needing to deal with dependencies and external programs to make your stuff. Furthermore, Unity does not have a universeal content aggregation system (i.e. ratings, editors' picks, etc) that lets you easily sort the good from the bad, unlike Dreams. They are two very different things. Compare it to Spark and LBP if you will. But Spark was basically a failure, and just isn't anywhere near as capable. LittleBigPlanet had endless content, and even though Dreams hasn't been out for very long, there's TONS of stuff already that people have made. Some of it is extraordinarily good! Dreams will always look sort of Dreams-like due to its non-polygonal render engine, but you can make hardsurface and softer looking artsy shit, basically you can replicate most visual styles. This means the game will eventually have enormous amounts of extremely different looking assets that can be used.

I'm excited, I want the game because it seems like a great way to test a bunch of tabletop stuff.

Kindof. Yeah, the content was endless technically, but in practice a lot of it feels really samie or limited after a while. Not to say the game's not fun (I bought a PS3 back in the day to play it) but while it's content is near-limitless, a lot of the content tends to be just... eh? If that makes any sense

From my experience with LBP2, the fact that the vast majority of the levels made were quite crap wasnt really ever a problem, since there was this section with 'selected community levels' chosen as the best examples of what was posible, that was quite sizable and updated frequently. Now, if they have spent some time to develop better algorithms for finding really good levels, maybe they dont even need to have a manual selection process anymore.

This game is going to be a modern marvel. Like I know I will probably never play it, and if I do, will probably not enjoy it, but the fact that it exists is just so phenomenal to me. Pretty big props to Sony for funding this with seemingly no expense spared, and no pressure on Media Molecule.