Hero Engine: why?

[Sunsoar]

Again do people have to be this Snarky?

 

But yeah the quote is in there about how the engine is Modified.....

 

PCGH: We know you utilized Simutronics Corporation “Hero”-Engine. Did you rework or enhance this engine for SWTOR?

 

Bioware: HeroEngine provides an excellent platform upon which to prototype our game. During the course of development we have modified HeroEngine as required to support the broad feature set of the game we have undertaken, and to scale to the level of usage we hope to achieve.

 

That means nothing to me. It's a whole lot of information that reveals nothing. I only post from my galaxy nexus so honestly I dont do much searching off the forums/site.

[Goretzu]

In the interviews posted in this thread the representative from the company that created hero engine states quite clearly that bioware has a license to modify the source code as they see fit - And that bioware modified the engine to fit their needs because at the time the engine was purchased it was incomplete.

 

Bioware basically built their own engine based off of the hero engine that existed at that time. Since then the retail hero engine has been upgraded in one direction, and bioware has built their own way of doing things from their version.

 

 

 

Still 2 and 3 then.

 

Warhammer Online knows about this only too well (although ironically the now have the best PvP/RvR engine around for a zombie game).

[mcfabulous]

This just in, once someone makes a game engine, the code is locked forever and no one can change it.

 

oh wait..

 

If they have to, they will do whatever they need. They'll have the resources to do so after a mere 1-2 months of sub income

[daemian]

Nice unofficial quote.

 

What's unofficial about it?

 

"We are considering plans for DX11 in the future. That’s all we can say at this time."

 

http://www.pcgameshardware.com/aid,767634/Star-Wars-The-Old-Republic-Bioware-considering-Direct-X-11-in-the-future/News/

Edited January 5, 2012 by daemian

[WarheartZero]

So far on this thread all I see is people guessing, people that wanna hate the game so they blindly listening to OP w/no facts. Nothing really solid.

 

All I can say is from what I read the hero engine is quite scalable and customizable. Am I disappointed so far with it, sure. Do i believe it will remain this way, no. Do i think the fixes will be quick, no.

 

Heck, I'm still waiting for the high rez textures to get fixed. DOF effect while playing would be a nice option to be able to turn on/off. Priorities will be client stability and network fixes at first. Getting people in the game that paid for it will be their priority first. After that I expect better engine optimizations over time.

 

Hopefully the delay issue will be a priority. Cause of the issue idk, but it's definitely there.

 

With all good things comes patience. And don't say I'm paying for a beta, cause then be happy your in early lol. or stop playing, wait a year when the game has matured.

Edited January 5, 2012 by WarheartZero

[jHats]

They quit using the packaged "hero engine" like 2 years ago. They have heavily modified it and the content they have is pretty top notch, bugs not withstanding.

[Raice]

I think the general issue people are raising is, in most cases Bioware are restricted in what they can do with this game because they haven't made the engine themselves.

 

World of Warcraft uses a modified version of an existing Blizzard engine so they know the limitation and the ins and outs of it.

 

No... I think the general issue is people don't know what they are talking about. You get ONE guy that offers his highschool best guess concerning some hot topic current issue, and droves of people join the band-wagon. I swear, there have been 30 professional MMO Specific Programming and Game Design Gurus that have posted in this thread already.

 

Here's the reality - no one on these forums (at least not in this thread), regardless of any of your past programming experience, has ANY experience working with this Engine in any capacity. The point I'm making here is that everyone needs to just shut up about things they don't know anything about and stop spreading their ignorant theories around as any sort of authority on the matter. This thread is how rumors get started, and is doing nothing but spreading disinformation that ANYONE who doesn't know any better, will listen to.

 

My advice - stop worrying about it. Bioware's got this. Let them do their job.

[Vihazur]

A much bigger issue than the current performance of the game is all the features they must have had to scale back, because the engine couldn't handle it. So many things the game is lacking, a lot of the common complaints you see, come back to the limitations of the engine.

 

 

They had to make the game the way it is, to squeeze the best possible performance out of the engine, and it's still subpar.

 

 

Where did all that development money go? I have a theory - it didn't go into development, so much as advertising and hype. Bioware has probably had to scrape by like an indy company, while EA puts all their resources into selling the game, rather than making a game that would be good enough to sell itself.

[Granrick]

No... I think the general issue is people don't know what they are talking about. You get ONE guy that offers his highschool best guess concerning some hot topic current issue, and droves of people join the band-wagon. I swear, there have been 30 professional MMO Specific Programming and Game Design Gurus that have posted in this thread already.

 

Here's the reality - no one on these forums (at least not in this thread), regardless of any of your past programming experience, has ANY experience working with this Engine in any capacity. The point I'm making here is that everyone needs to just shut up about things they don't know anything about and stop spreading their ignorant theories around as any sort of authority on the matter. This thread is how rumors get started, and is doing nothing but spreading disinformation that ANYONE who doesn't know any better, will listen to.

 

My advice - stop worrying about it. Bioware's got this. Let them do their job.

 

*claps*

[OSUNightfall]

Why did you choose an Engine that wasn't developed to your exact specifications? I mean, EA and BW make enough, you could have outsourced your Engine development and made the engine fit your game.

 

Instead, you chose the lazy way and are trying to make a game fit an engine. Not only that, you picked a terrible single-threaded engine that can't even process commands before animations finish, hence all of the ability delay rage you're seeing.

 

 

Seriously. Blizzard built an engine to fit their game, they're billions (trillions yet?) richer. You didn't, and you're missing out on Billions in part due to this decision.

Why?

 

Translation: I know nothing about software or game construction, but I certainly still have an opinion on it!

[Shadezilla]

No... I think the general issue is people don't know what they are talking about. You get ONE guy that offers his highschool best guess concerning some hot topic current issue, and droves of people join the band-wagon. I swear, there have been 30 professional MMO Specific Programming and Game Design Gurus that have posted in this thread already.

 

Here's the reality - no one on these forums (at least not in this thread), regardless of any of your past programming experience, has ANY experience working with this Engine in any capacity. The point I'm making here is that everyone needs to just shut up about things they don't know anything about and stop spreading their ignorant theories around as any sort of authority on the matter. This thread is how rumors get started, and is doing nothing but spreading disinformation that ANYONE who doesn't know any better, will listen to.

 

My advice - stop worrying about it. Bioware's got this. Let them do their job.

 

This!

[Thankyjack]

Is there anyone in this thread (or forum) who has actually worked with the HeroEngine?

 

Or maybe the version that BioWare is working with?

 

No?

 

Didn't think so.

 

Just more FUD spread about by no-nothings who just love to ***** and moan.

 

I work with it everytime I play the game. It is awful.

[Astron_]

I work with it everytime I play the game. It is awful.

 

Exactly the point.

/thread

[BluePlatypus]

Is there anyone in this thread (or forum) who has actually worked with the HeroEngine?

 

Or maybe the version that BioWare is working with?

 

No?

 

Didn't think so.

 

Just more FUD spread about by no-nothings who just love to ***** and moan.

Hi there.

 

I do have a bit of familiarity with HSL, yeah. A colleague of mine's company used HSL for a bit before changing to Unity due various concerns, not limited to just the clunkiness of HeroBlade. So i have worked with it a bit, mostly just tire kicking and shoulder-surfing, but I think I can have a meaningful conversation about it. I would not overestimate the ability to modify Hero though, I cant imagine the "version" that Bioware is working with is terribly different than what is available to anyone else.

 

Was there something you needed to discuss about it specifically?

Edited January 5, 2012 by BluePlatypus

[zerobounds]

I've worked with it.

 

Lot's of small inde devs use it. It has pro's and con's like any other engine.

[Israel]

The Hero Engine is pretty terrible.

[wifeaggro]

The Hero Engine is pretty terrible.

 

Lol maybe they should lease trions new engine and remake tor. Trion is winning awards right and left for their two engines they made them selves. Bioware made some very serious fundemental mistakes. Its disturbing how good the game is whith a crappy engine. It is gonna kill their retention in the long term mmo players demand more these days not a instanced static world with good story and medicore gameplay

[SickSwag]

Sir please start a developing company, your knowledge of the gaming industry is too much for these peasant forum dwellers.

 

You can't criticize the titanic if you haven't built your own ship.

[Trucane]

Yea I can't believe they went for this engine either. I mean most of the problems people have with the game stems from the engine

[Xerda]

You can't criticize the titanic if you haven't built your own ship.

 

LOL Excellent post

 

I do love that somehow you're not allowed to criticise something if you haven't done it yourself.

[BluePlatypus]

Lol maybe they should lease trions new engine and remake tor. Trion is winning awards right and left for their two engines they made them selves. Bioware made some very serious fundemental mistakes. Its disturbing how good the game is whith a crappy engine. It is gonna kill their retention in the long term mmo players demand more these days not a instanced static world with good story and medicore gameplay

Trion's MMO, Rift, uses the Gamebryo engine. They may have modified it, but it is not homegrown.

[Perfik]

alot of programmers here woa!! you guys MUST apply to work to a gaming company and do not "spend" your "madprogskillz" in forum crawling. You can make money you know with that madskillz

 

if you guys are so pro why do not start your own gaming company and use your own in-house engine that you will make.

 

as for the OP

 

you do not know what are the variables that they choose to work with Heroe engine and making assumptions that they are lazy (lol) is .....you know.

 

you can keep your opinion for yourself and do not try to turn it to facts.

 

the only facts in this thread are

 

a) BW uses Hero Engine

b) ANY engine can be modified to "work" for your game (even people with no programming experience can tell that) it requires FUNDS and since SWTOR is the POWERHORSE for EA's MMO Genre they will give them

 

The opinions are

 

A) Hero Engine is crapp etc. Wooa have you seen the engine's control and you know that? i am sure before you came to this thread you didnt' even know what engine is.

B) Hero engine used in XXXX game and is Crap. Flash news, it isnt' the ENGINE's fault that game SUX. The engine is the shell of a game, if a studio cant' work their a***s with the engine it isnt' the engines fault

c) SWTOR is dieingggggggg!!!!!22343523 . Well this is troll comment

d) SWTOR will Turn F2P. see c)

e)Game Sux cause it runs crap in my computer. Have you ever consider that the problem is your 5 years old computer??? i have ZERO dces, ZERO lag, ZERO Crash to Desktop cause of Memory leaks with my computer, i have NORMAL loading screens

 

people must learn to understand that opinion =/= fact

[zerobounds]

Creating an engine is a huge amount of work, Hero Engine already has a solid and reliable base for MMO games and that was likely a big driver in their choice. Most of the time when a big title is made on an existing engine base it will undergo massive changes to make the design priorities and engine capabilities work around each other to come to a good quality result under stress tests.

 

They likely bypassed a huge amount of work by choosing Hero Engine package which then allowed them to focus on the game rather than the engine and networking mechanics - not that those two weren't overhauled too. There's so many factors involved and 95 out of 100 people here don't care or simply take reliable game-play for granted and will whine about anything.

 

Budget is a completely different monster and plays a large role in choosing an engine.

[youwillburn]

alot of programmers here woa!! you guys MUST apply to work to a gaming company and do not "spend" your "madprogskillz" in forum crawling. You can make money you know with that madskillz

 

if you guys are so pro why do not start your own gaming company and use your own in-house engine that you will make.

 

as for the OP

 

you do not know what are the variables that they choose to work with Heroe engine and making assumptions that they are lazy (lol) is .....you know.

 

you can keep your opinion for yourself and do not try to turn it to facts.

 

the only facts in this thread are

 

a) BW uses Hero Engine

b) ANY engine can be modified to "work" for your game (even people with no programming experience can tell that) it requires FUNDS and since SWTOR is the POWERHORSE for EA's MMO Genre they will give them

 

The opinions are

 

A) Hero Engine is crapp etc. Wooa have you seen the engine's control and you know that? i am sure before you came to this thread you didnt' even know what engine is.

B) Hero engine used in XXXX game and is Crap. Flash news, it isnt' the ENGINE's fault that game SUX. The engine is the shell of a game, if a studio cant' work their a***s with the engine it isnt' the engines fault

c) SWTOR is dieingggggggg!!!!!22343523 . Well this is troll comment

d) SWTOR will Turn F2P. see c)

e)Game Sux cause it runs crap in my computer. Have you ever consider that the problem is your 5 years old computer??? i have ZERO dces, ZERO lag, ZERO Crash to Desktop cause of Memory leaks with my computer, i have NORMAL loading screens

 

people must learn to understand that opinion =/= fact

 

Actually the facts are

a)BW uses hero engine

b)Game has load of bugs and problems

c)Blizzard uses their own engine and has non of these problems

Edited January 5, 2012 by youwillburn

[PulseXXX]

No... I think the general issue is people don't know what they are talking about. You get ONE guy that offers his highschool best guess concerning some hot topic current issue, and droves of people join the band-wagon. I swear, there have been 30 professional MMO Specific Programming and Game Design Gurus that have posted in this thread already.

 

Here's the reality - no one on these forums (at least not in this thread), regardless of any of your past programming experience, has ANY experience working with this Engine in any capacity. The point I'm making here is that everyone needs to just shut up about things they don't know anything about and stop spreading their ignorant theories around as any sort of authority on the matter. This thread is how rumors get started, and is doing nothing but spreading disinformation that ANYONE who doesn't know any better, will listen to.

 

My advice - stop worrying about it. Bioware's got this. Let them do their job.

 

False. I have worked with this engine as a volunteer level designer for Simutronics. There are hundreds of others who were invited to “Design Hero’s Journey” which was really just code for, “Beta Test Hero Engine.” In fact, I’ll bet that on my old 20G Hard drive, I still have a copy of the Hero Engine GM client somewhere. Having worked on it, I can confirm that the engine is a resource hog that tends to slow down when your system doesn’t have the proper specs to run it. The engine is beautiful and the average polygon count is easily 3 times what you would find on WoW, far more when you take particle effects into account. This is the reason why so many people are having issues with their systems. Many PCs that run WoW flawlessly are ill prepared to run SWTOR.