History Of The Unreal Engine

[Administrator]

Big thanks to the VE3D guys for linking to a new article at IGN chronicling the evolution of the Unreal Engine. Beginning with the days of Tim Sweeney writing code in his parents' house, the lengthy article winds down at the state of the engine today and looks forward.

Geremy Mustard of Chair Entertainment (Epic subsidiary) and Sjoerd "Hourences" de Jong (Toltec Studios/The Ball) contribute:

Chair Entertainment found all the new features in UE3 made it easier for them to transition to small team development after going all out with Advent Rising. "UE2 required programmer support for most gameplay tasks, whereas UE3 moved most of that power into the hands of level designers and artists," Mustard said. "This allowed us to make Undertow with only one full-time programmer in a very short period of time."

de Jong had a similar experience working with UE3. "It allowed us to get going on the game right away," he said. "We got a one-level-long prototype up in two and a half months, with three people on a part time-basis back in Spring 2008. A lot of the tools allow you to quickly see the end result, without touching a line of code."

After having worked with UE3, Mustard said it would be hard to imagine moving back again to UE2. "With [Matinee and Kismet] level designers can prototype almost any scenario in the game without the assistance of a programmer, which allows so much freedom and creativity," he told me. "I would cry if I had to make a game without these tools."

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