MCV/DEVELOP News, events, research and jobs from the games industry
The top 10 game engines as selected by Develop continues today with Gamebryo Lightspeed. We will be revealing a new entrant to the list every day until this tomorrow, so keep checking back to see which other tech providers you should be looking at for your next project…
Gamebryo Lightspeed
Developer: Emergent Game Technologies
Platforms: Xbox 360, PS3, Wii, PC
Browser support: No
Cost: Available on request
Published titles: Fallout 3 (Bethesda), Civilization Revolution (Firaxis), Warhammer Online (EA Mythic)
Titles in development: Unannounced titles from Square Enix, Disney, Tencent, Sidhe and Tose
Middleware integrations: Nvidia PhysX and APEX, Scaleform GFx, Wwise, Speedtree, Illuminate Labs, NaturalMotion, Lightsprint, Aristen, Umbra, xaitment, memoraze, Allegorithmic, RAD
Although the new name might fool you into thinking it a new entry in Emergent’s middleware line-up, the company is clear on one thing: Gamebryo Lightspeed is very much the future for the global firm.
Having succeeded on its previous aims – to bring enterprise-level engineering to game middleware and to simplify multi-core development with Floodgate – Emergent is now pushing firmly into designer territory. “It’s the first offering from Emergent that is focused not only on engineers but also the needs of game designers,” says CEO Geoffrey Selzer. “It’s an all-in-one system that offers rapid prototyping, rapid iteration, and real-time, on-target updates.”
As such, Lightspeed adds a data-driven framework to the existing Gamebryo tech base, enabling designers to iterate mechanics and ideas within hours rather than weeks. In fact, given that it features the entire Gamebryo feature set under the hood – the same feature set that’s powered genre-diverse games as big as Fallout 3 and Warhammer Online – it’s being placed as a solution that not only gets you rapidly prototyping, but can then follow with the development cycle all the way up to mastering up.
The new toolset includes an Entity Modelling Tool to control the new entity and behaviour system; a brand-new World Builder that ties into the entity system; an Asset Controller that automatically monitors for changes in assets, hotloading them into the tools and onto target platforms in real-time without recompliation; and a script integration system that allows you to use the scripting language of your choice.
Add to that the work it is doing in supporting small start-up developers – the number of small studios it hosted on its GDC stand was impressive – and Emergent’s market share is only set to grow.
Contact: 5016 N. Parkway Calabasas, Suite 210, Calabasas, CA 91302, United States
Tel: (818) 222-5355
E-mail:info@emergent.net
Web:www.emergent.net
