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[NoPiece]

Seems like a pretty big investment in the hope that people will build some games to use their services but I guess Amazon is all about leveraging their services and playing the long game. Seems like it wasn't too long ago I was reading about the licensing deal so they turned that around pretty quickly.

In just Q4 2015, AWS revenue was $2.4 billion, so this is a relatively small expense for Amazon.


http://www.statista.com/statistics/250520/forecast-of-amazon-web-services-revenue/

 

[FyreWulff]

Seems like all games on Bone would have to communicate with Azure for profile related things and cloud saves. Guess that stuff is probably given a pass though.

You can email them for alternative licensing options. All the free* engines have "out of band" custom licensing agreements available, they just never publicize the terms.

 

[JigglesBunny]

Whatever is wired into Lumberyard is hopefully easier to use than Cryengine, games like Homefront: The Revolution prove that for those unfamiliar with the engine's basic framework to a tee have trouble squeezing out good results, at least on console.

Hopefully this is a more flexible and easy to use engine and developers can use it effectively.

Oh, and that AWS bit was a bit concerning but if I'm understanding correctly, you can run and operate your own serves independent and not be forced to use it? If you absolutely need AWS no matter what for any online connectivity, this engine is DOA for AAA development.

 

[Gormenghast]

Must be telling how no one actually cares how these engines actually perform.

"Only" the end user cares about that.

 

[desu]

I'd guess it'll take years and years before this thing becomes a tool that can challenge Unity. Just being able to produce sexy graphics isn't enough, it needs to be super easy to use, the documentation needs to be great, it needs to be super extensible and it needs to run on any and all systems for this thing to become viable.

While I somewhat agree, sexy graphics are a thing, and they are one of the reasons I would take UE4 over Unity any day (strickly talking about 3D games). It's been years and I yet have to see Unity games that blow me away compared to its competitors, that combined with the apparently really bad console performance is a reason I would not go with Unity. And looking at the adoption rate of UE4 in the Indie/AAA space just seems to support that. But to each their own, obviously.

 

[hobblygobbly]

While I somewhat agree, sexy graphics are a thing, and they are one of the reasons I would take UE4 over Unity any day (strickly talking about 3D games). It's been years and I yet have to see Unity games that blow me away compared to its competitors, that combined with the apparently really bad console performance is a reason I would not go with Unity. And looking at the adoption rate of UE4 in the Indie/AAA space just seems to support that. But to each their own, obviously.

That's true enough, Unity does have a good PBR pipeline now but UE can outshine it but Unity can still produce good results when leveraged by talented artists, for example Escape from Tarkov uses Unity 5. It's probably the best looking Unity game I've seen? Well besides Ori and the Blind Forest but that's 2D I guess. There's a nice write up for how the devs behind Ori and the Blind Forest used Unity and what it liked about it.

Unity does seem to take a general purpose approach, it can be leveraged to produce a lot of different types of games and as such still still requires you to program a lot of your tools to design a game like general level building tools for example unlike UE which has some out of the box stuff for constructing levels/maps. It would be nice if Unity did have some that comes with it though. Nonetheless, Unity is a flexible engine which one of the reasons it's very popular and the fact that people really like C# since it uses that as its scripting layer (engine itself is C++).

Hilariously neither engine can match the level/map building tools from id Software even back in the 90s that was used for Quake, etc. UE does have a BSP editor but it's very bad compared to Quake's BSP editor for example. Blows my mind that neither engine has BSP editor that even comes close to that.

Any ways I've been perusing the docs for Lumberjack and it's very lackluster so far, not a good sign to come out when you announce it. Unity itself is so popular as well because of docs + community, UE 4 isn't too bad either but not as near as good as Unity's. It seems like Lumberjack has inherited the terrible documentation that CryEngine itself had, hopefully they're putting it still together but it should've been available from announcement.

 

[Peltz]

Wild news. Can't wait to see how this impacts the next 3-5 years.

 

[Sky Interloper]

Smart move from Amazon. Now they get an attractive reason for developers to use AWS when making a cloud-connected game.
I wonder if MS would be able to strike a similar deal for UE4 and their Azure services.

 

[Jessie.Bristol]

Looks like a competitor to Unreal Engine 4 and Unity. Great for Indies too, as it doesn't look like Amazon takes a cut of their profits (not anywhere that I was able to read) and they're not required to use Amazon's Servers.

 

[Timeaisis]

A very multiplayer focused version of CryEngine, it seems. With some extra bells and whistles. This will be the new engine for midrange FPS MOBAs, I can just feel it.

Very interesting move by Amazon. I'm going to mess around with it today, but I doubt it'll pick up many indies at the moment. UE4 is just too good with blueprint, and Unity has the asset store. Haven't checked out Lumeryard's scripting system yet. 3D engines live and die by that in the indie space.

 

[Neuromancer]

I imagine there will be a strong VR component to this engine. I know CryEngine has been putting a lot of effort into VR. I believe they said recently that they have 7 different VR projects internally.

 

[Sulik2]

Are there any rumors circulating that Amazon is making a console for 2018 release? Their own engine, all the studios they bought, it just seems like they want to get into gaming in a big way. Joining the next-gen in 2018 would be the way to do it.

 

[JordanN]

Are there any rumors circulating that Amazon is making a console for 2018 release? Their own engine, all the studios they bought, it just seems like they want to get into gaming in a big way. Joining the next-gen in 2018 would be the way to do it.

4 consoles on the market never works.

 

[soepje]

Downloaded it already, can`t wait to mess with it.

 

[Nirolak]

Are there any rumors circulating that Amazon is making a console for 2018 release? Their own engine, all the studios they bought, it just seems like they want to get into gaming in a big way. Joining the next-gen in 2018 would be the way to do it.

Their big press release statement from a while back was that they view themselves as a PC company now who makes online games for Twitch and utilizing AWS.

 

[desu]

That's true enough, Unity does have a good PBR pipeline now but UE can outshine it but Unity can still produce good results when leveraged by talented artists, for example Escape from Tarkov uses Unity 5. It's probably the best looking Unity game I've seen? Well besides Ori and the Blind Forest but that's 2D I guess. There's a nice write up for how the devs behind Ori and the Blind Forest used Unity and what it liked about it.

That looks ok for Unity! As for Ori and so on, as I said stricly talking about 3D games. If I wanted to make a 2D game there is nothing I would consider over Unity, it's the best imho.

Any ways I've been perusing the docs for Lumberjack and it's very lackluster so far, not a good sign to come out when you announce it. Unity itself is so popular as well because of docs + community, UE 4 isn't too bad either but not as near as good as Unity's. It seems like Lumberjack has inherited the terrible documentation that CryEngine itself had, hopefully they're putting it still together but it should've been available from announcement.

I doubt this will really change and imho its too late anyway (I would be very glad to be wrong on this). Crytek had so many years to actively get people on board for CE but I think they never truely put any thought/money into it. Which is said because CE can absolutely produce some amazing looking games.

 

[stolin]

Phyre is an engine in the more basic sense. These are full fledge (renderer, tools, importers, platform executables) in a single package. Phyre isn't that AFAIK.

Phyre is a full suite from asset creation pipeline, editors, run-time, etc... Phyre has been full Licensed Dev Open Source since inception a decade ago. It's good to see all the other engine package on board.

What is PhyreEngine™?

PhyreEngine™ is a complete high performance multi-platform game engine, offering quick and easy development for both rapid prototyping and full production.
The entire engine is provided as source making it easily customisable to meet your needs.
It’s completely free to registered developers and licensed for usage on any platform.

Used in over 200+ titles across a number of different of platforms, PhyreEngine™ has been successfully adopted by dozens of game studios around the world.​

http://develop.scee.net/research-technology/phyreengine/

 

[Purple Cheeto]

So now they just need to announce that VR platform that they are working.

Are there any rumors circulating that Amazon is making a console for 2018 release? Their own engine, all the studios they bought, it just seems like they want to get into gaming in a big way. Joining the next-gen in 2018 would be the way to do it.

They are almost 100% making their own VR hardware.

Full source code access already makes this better than Unity. Interesting that it has no announced scripting language that I can see. I wonder how hard it will be to roll LUA/JS bindings.

 

[ashecitism]

Hilariously neither engine can match the level/map building tools from id Software even back in the 90s that was used for Quake, etc. UE does have a BSP editor but it's very bad compared to Quake's BSP editor for example. Blows my mind that neither engine has BSP editor that even comes close to that.

Gaffer Turfster made a "Quake 1/2 MAP and Source VMF to Unreal Engine 4 plugin" called HammUEr: https://gumroad.com/l/jNucW#

It's hilarious though, because reading discussions about gamedev years ago Hammer and its id equivalent (can't remember the name) were always described as archaic and clunky, but then on other places not so long ago I found modders/mapper were discussing them rather fondly compared to newer stuff.

 

[Purple Cheeto]

Oh, just looked and it has LUA scripting. So Amazon clearly is trying to target professionals and not hobbyists.

 

[RiverBed]

Sounds like good news. I hope they tweek the hell out of Cryengine since it is notorious to be difficult to work with.

Are there any rumors circulating that Amazon is making a console for 2018 release? Their own engine, all the studios they bought, it just seems like they want to get into gaming in a big way. Joining the next-gen in 2018 would be the way to do it.

Create a platform/console? No, no, no. In addition to their services, they can (and will) make digital only games for PC/phones.

 

[KKRT00]

Lichdom came out a year or two ago.

I was counting only multiplatform releases. For PC releases there were much more games.

 

[Purple Cheeto]

Q. Can my game use an alternate web service instead of AWS?

No. If your game servers use a non-AWS alternate web service,
we obviously don’t make any money, and it’s more difficult for
us to support future development of Lumberyard. By “alternate
web service” we mean any non-AWS web service that is similar
to or can act as a replacement for Amazon EC2, Amazon Lambda,
Amazon DynamoDB, Amazon RDS, Amazon S3, Amazon EBS, Amazon EC2
Container Service, or Amazon GameLift. You can use hardware you
own and operate for your game servers.

Q. Is it okay for me to use my own servers?

Yes. You can use hardware you own and operate for your game.

Well that's gonna be a major turn off for a lot of people.

 

[jimforspeed]

Oh, just looked and it has LUA scripting. So Amazon clearly is trying to target professionals and not hobbyists.

Yes, I am taking a look through the Developer Guide and seems very classy (no pun intended) and professionaly oriented. Can't try it though because my potato PC will explode.

 

[lord]

Well that's gonna be a major turn off for a lot of people.

why? aws is bliss

 

[Neuromancer]

Well that's gonna be a major turn off for a lot of people.

Well the engine is completely free after all. What would developers expect?

 

[Sibylus]

Well the engine is completely free after all. What would developers expect?

Certainly not the free use of an engine without expenses somewhere.

 

[eyeball_kid]

Well the engine is completely free after all. What would developers expect?

I would expect that the ad revenue generated by additional Twitch content being sent from Lumberyard games to overshadow a handful (comparatively speaking to the amount of overall AWS usage) of game servers running on AWS. As a game developer I would not expect to be forced to use AWS. If this engine is open source, then Amazon will already benefit from community improvements, which will in turn help Amazon's internal games projects.

 

[Quadraphonic]

Valve is basically doing the same thing (Source 2 will be 100% free you just need to sell your game on Steam along with any other marketplace you choose to sell it on). I'm sure Amazon is doing it for similar reasons as Valve, which is hoping to make money with selling the games created via the engine on their marketplace (and for Amazon I'm guessing they will charge extra for their web server infrastructure).

And charge for SUPPORT.

 

[tearsintherain]

Definitely interesting for small game studios who want to integrate cloud base stuff into a state of the art engine. Also interesting that Nintendo is the odd man out here.

 

[scitek]

So, if I was making a single-player game, this would be the way to go?

 

[NoPiece]

Create a platform/console? No, no, no. In addition to their services, they can (and will) make digital only games for PC/phones.

They already have a platform/console with FireTV. Not particularly successful so far, but I wouldn't be surprised to see them try at least another iteration or two.

 

[ferr]

This interests me both as a software engineer that appreciates game dev and an AMZN stockholder. Look forward to see if they can create a good developer community.

 

[_machine]

One thing that should be pointed out is that going by the interview (and the documentation, structure etc.) is that the engine is aimed at AAA-only, multiplayer productions. It's born out of requests by AAA developers and it even requires developers to implement a login/user system. Even with "improved" asset authoring tools, many of the common tools within the editor GUIs of other engines, are hidden away in xml and config files etc.

I do expect to see some titles from studios other than just Amazon Games Seattle, but at the same the CryEngine legacy can potentially be very off-putting to those few studios that still have the resources to develop a title the scale of which the engine is built for.

 

[falconxcrunner09]

I'm going to actually check this out. Hope to see more good things coming out of Amazon's game division.

 

[Elitist1945]

I'm definitely looking into this. Does CryEngine/will this engine have something similar to UE4's blueprint mode?

 

[StrategyFan]

It's a game engine that's both royalty free and free of upfront costs that can support AAA size game productions in terms of production tools and rendering technology. Not sure what's hard to understand there?

I must have missed the memo that lists the features which make an engine AAA

 

[zou]

57.10 Acceptable Use; Safety-Critical Systems. Your use of the Lumberyard Materials must comply with the AWS Acceptable Use Policy. The Lumberyard Materials are not intended for use with life-critical or safety-critical systems, such as use in operation of medical equipment, automated transportation systems, autonomous vehicles, aircraft or air traffic control, nuclear facilities, manned spacecraft, or military use in connection with live combat. However, this restriction will not apply in the event of the occurrence (certified by the United States Centers for Disease Control or successor body) of a widespread viral infection transmitted via bites or contact with bodily fluids that causes human corpses to reanimate and seek to consume living human flesh, blood, brain or nerve tissue and is likely to result in the fall of organized civilization.

https://aws.amazon.com/service-terms/

Lol

 

[darkinstinct]

4 consoles on the market never works.

I can see Amazon buying Xbox.

 

[benny_a]

I must have missed the memo that lists the features which make an engine AAA

You also didn't reply to the three people that offered an explanation or assistance with your understanding it.

 

[StrategyFan]

edit: ignore this
it's probably just a label

 

[falconxcrunner09]

Edit: nevermind

 

[mordecaii83]

https://aws.amazon.com/service-terms/

Lol

Now that's a pretty awesome exception to have!

 

[KKRT00]

I'm definitely looking into this. Does CryEngine/will this engine have something similar to UE4's blueprint mode?

It already has, its called Flowgraph, but its not as powerful as Blueprint.

 

[Elitist1945]

It already has, its called Flowgraph, but its not as powerful as Blueprint.

Awesome!

 

[Ushay]

Anyone know of Amazon is developing games too?

 

[ashecitism]

Anyone know of Amazon is developing games too?

Yes. They say so in the FAQ. And we know they're making a MOBA type game and some other stuff. Nirolak posted about it earlier.

 

[mckmas8808]

This was the deal that let them avoid bankruptcy and pay all the staff wages they were missing a year or two back.

Amazon took the opportunity to purchase ownership of their engine from them when they knew they couldn't refuse.



Essentially this gives them an engine for their own internal games while also letting them try to upsell game developers onto their cloud services and related solutions, yes.

This is amazing! Never realized what this was about.

 

[RiverBed]

https://aws.amazon.com/service-terms/

Lol

You think those are one of the things lawers slip in for the lols or to see if anyone reads that far?

 

[Parham]

A plug-in for Maya/Max is probably just as good as exporting in FBX technically, but that surely leaves a ton of practical problems.

Question: what happens if you want to work with Blender/Modo/Cinema4D/Houdini instead of Maya?

Yeah, that's more or less the problem. If you don't use Maya or Max, you're SOL.