• Half Life 2 in the Unreal Engine
    158 replies, posted
[QUOTE=ralle105;44477890]This is very pretty but the style looks nothing like hl2.[/QUOTE] Have you seen the beta concept art? This looks exactly like how HL2 would look if they had the tech back then.
[QUOTE=BLOODGA$M;44475932]what the fuck, the OP image is a screenshot? it looked like a concept painting to me.[/QUOTE] [t]http://static.giantbomb.com/uploads/original/1/13692/1386568-ijhbm.jpg[/t]
I really wish they'd go back and fix some little bits of HL2, every time they update the engine, they break a whole bunch of stuff and never bother to fix it. It isn't a lot, but it is not the same product they released back in 04.
[QUOTE=Mkt778;44478123]While we're in this topic. [IMG]http://i.imgur.com/BvQf7q5.png[/IMG] Does anybody else think subscription models aren't a very good idea? I'm not really a big fan of pretty much every professional applications/game dev kits/creative suites moving to a subscription model. I know there's going to be somebody who's going to chop my head off for not liking them, but I feel they're a very money grubbing thing to do. It's essentially cutting out the middle man of people not upgrading to newer software. They're all probably never going to go back to the former, outright purchase method. And frankly, I hate the idea that I now no longer fully "own" the product. It's rented to me and I pay for it like my monthly rent. That said, I think I have enough monthly expenses and having to pay for a fucking Dev kit monthly, REAAALLY sucks when you also have to pay very expensive licensing fees to get your game out there, in order to pay the rest of your expenses... Sure, in most cases this works out cheaper. (Only a few, if I recall) I just miss the day where you could purchase software outright and could use it forever, only upgrading if it was totally necessary. You felt safe with your purchase. You felt safe knowing you could spend as much time as you wanted working on a project in these programs without the fear of your license running out, forcing you to stress and continue the project when you could potentially not be in a very creative mindset. It's majorly the reason I've stuck with Source engine modding for so long. I trust Valve are going to keep them free forever. I can work on my projects for as long as I wish. The tools might be very outdated, and the industry has moved well beyond Source, but the community of enthusiasts remain and if I ever need help, I can simply ask them for assistance. Also, you have 4 or so games worth of assets to begin with. This greatly speeds up your project if you can recycle a few loose textures and models such as traffic cones. Lastly, I have to admit that's a pretty fancy screenshot. I too was fooled that it was concept art, at first. -Edit- "Are U.S Marines trained on Doom?"[/QUOTE] you do kinda own it though, if you cancel your subscription you get to keep the source code and the UDK just not without any further updates. my only issue with it being so cheap and easy to get into is combined with greenlight. I'm afraid the steam store will just get more saturated (than it already is) now that the barrier of entry is so low. good games will be far apart
[QUOTE=Commando1234;44474441]Bet we can get a half life 2 remake in the Unreal Engine before half life 3 comes out.[/QUOTE] As long as it's not made by the guys who made Black Mesa Source.... Then it would take as long and it would not be finished
I hated it when they updated HL2's lighting stuff and broke SMod Redux. Sure, there's SMod 40a, but Redux was fuckin' amazing.
[QUOTE=Alxnotorious;44474605]I heard they're going to announce it during Nintendo Direct.[/QUOTE] "Pic of the day! In a special preview to our Nintendo Direct reveal, here's the foot of our newest third party character, who's new game is only on Wii U and 3DS!"
[QUOTE=Zakkin;44478285]I hated it when they updated HL2's lighting stuff and broke SMod Redux. Sure, there's SMod 40a, but Redux was fuckin' amazing.[/QUOTE] You can still fix it though. If you use this fix method [url]http://bsnooch.com/forums/index.php?topic=1088.0[/url] And take the maps and scenes from the fixed smod40a it will work no problem. I did this with smod tactical 5.56 and it works perfectly.
[QUOTE=Trekintosh;44475460]The reason we think HL2 aged so well is because the last time we all played it was long after it was updated with the Episode 2 engine. The original HL2 looked far more primitive than it does now.[/QUOTE] True, many of us probably played it many times. I wish I could hit a toggle to run it like it looked on launch just for the sake of it. I originally played it on a Radeon 9600XT at 1024x768 on medium I think. It looks great, but certainly not as good as it could, now I can play it in 4k with supersampling and it looks so much better, even though it hasn't changed significantly.
[QUOTE=FpShepard;44476984]Not a fair comparison at all, xbox was a lot weaker than a computer needed to run HL2 at high settings. Half life 2 looks like shit for xbox, miles worse than halo 2 on the same system. [img]http://cdn0.spong.com/screen-shot/h/a/halflife2176675l/_-Half-Life-2-Xbox-_.jpg[/img] [img]http://assets2.ignimgs.com/2005/08/29/half-life-2-20050829035447476-1232834_640w.jpg[/img][/QUOTE] And the frame rate still was prone to dropping.
[QUOTE=PredGD;44478238]my only issue with it being so cheap and easy to get into is combined with greenlight. I'm afraid the steam store will just get more saturated (than it already is) now that the barrier of entry is so low. good games will be far apart[/QUOTE] so you think we should arbitrarily make game engines more expensive and difficult to use than is necessary so that we create some sort of barrier of entry, only allowing the special big boys club to make video games? sounds shitty one of the reasons the music industry is so diverse and interesting, and why ideas like punk are even able to exist, is because literally almost [i]anyone[/i] can create, record, and publish music and get it to anyone in the world. yeh there's a lot of dumb awful shit out there but overall it's entirely beneficial to the industry. i can't wait to see that happen to games
[QUOTE=ChestyMcGee;44479264]so you think we should arbitrarily make game engines more expensive and difficult to use than is necessary so that we create some sort of barrier of entry, only allowing the special big boys club to make video games? sounds shitty one of the reasons the music industry is so diverse and interesting, and why ideas like punk are even able to exist, is because literally almost [i]anyone[/i] can create, record, and publish music and get it to anyone in the world. yeh there's a lot of dumb awful shit out there but overall it's entirely beneficial to the industry. i can't wait to see that happen to games[/QUOTE] not necessarily what I meant by that, I'm more concerned about it when combined with the current greenlight system. I'm all for letting people create, publish, etc etc, but I don't feel that Steam is the place this should happen. feel a platform like Steam should have a higher barrier of entry so that we get more quality content on the platform compared to now. that's an entirely different topic though, so won't dwell much further into that
So like half the comments on Polycount on this are "pfft this is easy as hell to make, it doesn't take any real skill and anyone with enough time can do this" God damnit
[QUOTE=BlackPhoenix;44477229]My biggest personal problem with Source and why I wouldn't use it for a certain project is really poor support of dynamic lighting, it seems to be a given that a modern game engine would have proper dynamic lighting. And the outdated BSP for making maps/limited map size.[/QUOTE] And since Halo 2 was mentioned a few times. I'd like to say there was dynamic shadow casting lights everywhere in Halo 2. In places they made no sense. Like on street lamps in the middle of the day that you don't even notice. They were just small so they don't stand out much. Actually. Bungie wanted to do a stencil-shadow-lightmapped hybrid. But ran into technical issues ( Xbox was too weak). Edit: it also had BSP streaming. So maps could be waaayy longer. Trust me. I've modded it enough to know. ( Not cheating mods. Mods like what we do in Source. )
The source engine has that "thing" that makes it still feel and look good. If you grab Doom 3 and look at those graphics they are -after you have newer games- kinda play doh/very artificial. Whereas Source is just....damn, Source bro. Can't get any better. So those fucks at Valve will bring the damn Apocalypse when they release Source 2. Our souls won't be prepared for the shock.
[QUOTE=Mkt778;44478123]While we're in this topic. [IMG]http://i.imgur.com/BvQf7q5.png[/IMG] Does anybody else think subscription models aren't a very good idea?[/QUOTE] Generally I agree, but with game engines it's different. I fucking hate the fact that Adobe has gone subscription only, but with Unreal I'm actually pretty excited. The difference is that although Adobe products have always been expensive, they've never been completely out of reach for consumers to buy (especially with student discounts). I'd much rather pay $250 for Photoshop once and get to use it forever than pay $20 a month and lose it the moment the money stops. Game engines like Unreal, on the other hand, have historically cost tens or even hundreds of thousands of dollars to license, which is completely out of the price range of most indie teams let alone individuals. Even with the mod tools being free for engines like Source and Unreal 3, you don't get full source code access, and actually selling the games you make isn't really an option. With the subscription model, instead of having to settle on a cheaper/free engine like Unity, you can get full access to Unreal 4 - one of the largest engines on the market - for twice the price of Spotify Premium. Plus since UDK is still available for free, you can learn how to use Unreal without paying a dime and then get the latest version once you're comfortable with making content for it. That's fucking amazing
[QUOTE=ChestyMcGee;44475442]was there even any mocapping for the faces? it was my understanding that they animated it all manually using which just makes it even more incredible really[/QUOTE] Basically, character models are created with a bunch of files that contain the positions of facial vertexes for things like the way your mouth looks when making various sounds like "oo" or "th", or various emotional expressions. Then when dialog has been recorded, they run it through a tool that places points to tell the model when and how to move the mouth. And then they blend in any expressions needed. [QUOTE=Mkt778;44478123]While we're in this topic. [IMG]http://i.imgur.com/BvQf7q5.png[/IMG] Does anybody else think subscription models aren't a very good idea? I'm not really a big fan of pretty much every professional applications/game dev kits/creative suites moving to a subscription model. I know there's going to be somebody who's going to chop my head off for not liking them, but I feel they're a very money grubbing thing to do. It's essentially cutting out the middle man of people not upgrading to newer software. They're all probably never going to go back to the former, outright purchase method. And frankly, I hate the idea that I now no longer fully "own" the product. It's rented to me and I pay for it like my monthly rent. That said, I think I have enough monthly expenses and having to pay for a fucking Dev kit monthly, REAAALLY sucks when you also have to pay very expensive licensing fees to get your game out there, in order to pay the rest of your expenses... Sure, in most cases this works out cheaper. (Only a few, if I recall) I just miss the day where you could purchase software outright and could use it forever, only upgrading if it was totally necessary. You felt safe with your purchase. You felt safe knowing you could spend as much time as you wanted working on a project in these programs without the fear of your license running out, forcing you to stress and continue the project when you could potentially not be in a very creative mindset. It's majorly the reason I've stuck with Source engine modding for so long. I trust Valve are going to keep them free forever. I can work on my projects for as long as I wish. The tools might be very outdated, and the industry has moved well beyond Source, but the community of enthusiasts remain and if I ever need help, I can simply ask them for assistance. Also, you have 4 or so games worth of assets to begin with. This greatly speeds up your project if you can recycle a few loose textures and models such as traffic cones. [/QUOTE] See the problem with the "I don't want to lose it when I stop paying the subscription" argument when it comes to Unreal 4 is that you can stop your subscription at any time you want and you can still use the most recent version of the engine you payed for, forever and commercially. Besides, even if it wasn't that way, it's still a good thing. A full blown engine license usually costs 5-6 digit figures, hardly affordable for someone other than a large company. With a subscription model it opens availability to almost everyone.
[QUOTE=STeel;44479656]So like half the comments on Polycount on this are "pfft this is easy as hell to make, it doesn't take any real skill and anyone with enough time can do this" God damnit[/QUOTE] Many people on polycount know what they're doing.
[QUOTE=Mkt778;44478123]I just miss the day where you could purchase software outright and could use it forever, only upgrading if it was totally necessary. You felt safe with your purchase. You felt safe knowing you could spend as much time as you wanted working on a project in these programs without the fear of your license running out, forcing you to stress and continue the project when you could potentially not be in a very creative mindset. It's majorly the reason I've stuck with Source engine modding for so long. I trust Valve are going to keep them free forever. I can work on my projects for as long as I wish. The tools might be very outdated, and the industry has moved well beyond Source, but the community of enthusiasts remain and if I ever need help, I can simply ask them for assistance. Also, you have 4 or so games worth of assets to begin with. This greatly speeds up your project if you can recycle a few loose textures and models such as traffic cones. "[/QUOTE] its funny because unreal's license works exactly the way you described it as not working. you drop 20 bucks then can cancel the subscription immediately and keep it forever. it's source code, you can just compile it. also your reasons for using source doesn't apply to anyone actually trying to make a real game, just modders. and the community isn't really any better than the unreal or unity communities, other communities are just as helpful (duh) [editline]7th April 2014[/editline] [QUOTE=STeel;44479656]So like half the comments on Polycount on this are "pfft this is easy as hell to make, it doesn't take any real skill and anyone with enough time can do this" God damnit[/QUOTE] ? you're talking about professionals, of course they're going to talk about it critically rather than just bathe it in compliments. i wouldn't want or expect anything else.
[QUOTE=Mkt778;44480315]Bleh. You have a point. I just assumed that once the money stopped, you lost it. Just like Creative Cloud. I'd still much prefer it to be an outright thing. I like keeping my monthly expenses as low as I can possibly get. Times are tough. I'm not particularly good with money, either. I just feel so much safer knowing I 100% OWN the thing I forked money out for, y'know?[/QUOTE] you hit one button to cancel the subscription dude. by purchasing and immediately canceling you are buying it outright.
[QUOTE=Mkt778;44480410]But it's just what I would prefer to have instead of a subscription. Subscriptions ontop of rent, car payments, insurance, and whatever else just causes me more stress at the end of each month. Clearly they aren't going to change this method. They aren't going to listen to a pathetic little no-name developer's opinion. If they want to do subscription then by all means I hope they make money from it. I just won't use Unreal.[/QUOTE] But you [B]don't have[/B] to keep the payments up. Holy shit are you actually illiterate or something? Multiple people have explained this now. It looks like you pay your fee, and receive all the engine updates and toolset updates until you stop paying the fee. The tools don't lock down or anything. They just stop updating, after all, why should they continue to give you features if you aren't paying? Also you're never going to outright own any game engine unless you make it yourself. Ever. Well okay, maybe if you buy the trademarks and copyrights to said engine. But otherwise, never.
I bought UE4 Subscription, cancelled it right away and im still using the engine pretty much fine I have access to the full engine source code,forums,marketplace, Answer Hub etc now, if they release a update that adds a critical feature i need or someting that can speed up my workflow i just acquire it again, update, and cancell
[img]http://puu.sh/7ZVaP.png[/img] god damn m8 this is on the main page when you sign in. you see this immediately after subscribing. it even has when your next bill is estimated [I]twice on the same page[/I]. they also have this in their very simple and comprehensive FAQ [quote]Do I have to worry about a billing contract or penalties for cancelling my subscription? Your subscription payment automatically recurs, but you’re free to cancel at any time. There’s no penalty for cancellation. When you cancel your subscription, you won’t receive access to future releases of Unreal Engine 4, however your login will remain active, and you are free to continue using the versions of Unreal Engine 4 which you obtained as a subscriber under the terms of the EULA.[/quote] not to mention that their documentation which isn't even finished yet is far more comprehensive than even unity, because they give you 3 gigs of content that goes along with their documentation on their website AND all of that is presented in youtube videos as well. Then they have community forums on their site with a search feature that looks through community questions and documentation. On top of all of that they have like 4 or so example projects that show how to make a top down game, shooter game, sidescrollers, give you starter projects for each of those types of game both compiled and uncompiled so both programmers and artists can make a game all on their own. THEN they're steadily releasing even more content in their marketplace, most recently the realistic rendering demo which shows how it's viable for things beyond games. they're even releasing the ps3 Elemental demo. but lol ok keep using your terribly outdated engine because you cant manage to drop 20 dollars and then click a single button
about the datedness of the game, I just wanna go ahead and compare stalker: shadow of chernobyl's graphics to half-life 2's, hl2 was released in 2004 and stalker: soc in 2007 [t]http://www.cheats.ru/uploaded/s/stalkershadowofchernobyl/stalkershadowofchernobyl04410.jpg[/t][t]http://www.significant-bits.com/wp-content/uploads/2009/02/xr_screen_04_1280.jpg[/t] [t]http://img1.wikia.nocookie.net/__cb20121013150847/half-life/en/images/b/b7/Gravity-Gun-Half-Life-2.jpg[/t][t]http://pcmedia.ign.com/pc/image/article/566/566202/half-life-2-20041115111048369.jpg[/t] and then there's call of pripyat which does look a shitload better, although I still think it won't age as well as half life 2 did: [t]http://86bb71d19d3bcb79effc-d9e6924a0395cb1b5b9f03b7640d26eb.r91.cf1.rackcdn.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/04/STALKER-call-of-pripyat-walkthrough-screenshot.jpg[/t] though I guess the textures don't really do it justice because the lighting itself is pretty baller, though it has its quirks sometimes. I mean yeah it's made by a ukrainian company that gets nowhere near the size or budget of valve's, now please don't think I hate stalker or something because I love the game to death but what I mean is hl2 has aged very well compared to games released three years later.
[QUOTE=FpShepard;44476984]Not a fair comparison at all, xbox was a lot weaker than a computer needed to run HL2 at high settings. Half life 2 looks like shit for xbox, miles worse than halo 2 on the same system. [img]http://cdn0.spong.com/screen-shot/h/a/halflife2176675l/_-Half-Life-2-Xbox-_.jpg[/img] [img]http://assets2.ignimgs.com/2005/08/29/half-life-2-20050829035447476-1232834_640w.jpg[/img][/QUOTE] The comparison was more along the lines of a big AAA game that a lot of people played. It's not too different from comparing Crysis 3 on PC today to a game that came out at about the same time on consoles (PS3/360). It's completely unfair, but it just goes to show how far PCs can be ahead of consoles for their time, especially at the end of the generation.
[QUOTE=FpShepard;44476984]Not a fair comparison at all, xbox was a lot weaker than a computer needed to run HL2 at high settings. Half life 2 looks like shit for xbox, miles worse than halo 2 on the same system. [img]http://cdn0.spong.com/screen-shot/h/a/halflife2176675l/_-Half-Life-2-Xbox-_.jpg[/img] [img]http://assets2.ignimgs.com/2005/08/29/half-life-2-20050829035447476-1232834_640w.jpg[/img][/QUOTE] Not usually a graphics-centric person, but you owe me a new keyboard. I've just been sick all over mine.
[QUOTE=MaxOfS2D;44474843]good luck getting your source title running on mac/linux easily[/QUOTE] Of course, but I gotta be honest: Never has a Unity or Unreal game below UT99 run better than Half-Life 2 on my PC.
[QUOTE=gk99;44481634]Of course, but I gotta be honest: Never has a Unity or Unreal game below UT99 run better than Half-Life 2 on my PC.[/QUOTE] Unreal runs really well on my PC. Probably better than source. What are you talking about? [editline]7th April 2014[/editline] If Unreal (first) runs worse than HL2 then your PC is odd.
[QUOTE=Recurracy;44480679] I mean yeah it's made by a ukrainian company that gets nowhere near the size or budget of valve's, now please don't think I hate stalker or something because I love the game to death but what I mean is hl2 has aged very well compared to games released three years later.[/QUOTE] Stalker was intended to release in 2004 and most graphics were unupdated since then
I'd say it's aged fairly well compared to other 2004 releases. [img]http://screenshots.en.sftcdn.net/en/scrn/31000/31858/unreal-tournament-2004-2.jpg[/img]
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