Unreal vs Source.

Source has radiosity, lacks the control and manipulation that unreal has.

try both and decide for your self.

oh I have....oohhh...i have....

I couldn't say about UE, I'm owned by Source When I tried to make some landscapes I missed some major features there, I had to use 3rd party apps to import heightmaps. The vegetation system tools are almost inexistent, you have to edit some text file for almost everything. In fact one of the tools I use most in Source is the damned notepad

Does someone know something about next Hammer ( 5 or 4.x whatever is called) ?

I haven’t exactly researched this, but I hear of a lot of people buying the unreal engine, especially console games. Yet I haven’t heard of anyone but mod-teams-gone-professional using source for their product.

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Yet I haven’t heard of anyone but mod-teams-gone-professional using source for their product.

Red Orchestra UT2k4 mod --> Standalone commercial title :roll:

yeah, no source mods. as you asid, RO is a ut mod.

RO won a million in cash and a free UE license, isn't it? I could go professional with that too.

There was a CS clone mod in UE that also went as a commercial game, don't know if there are more examples like that.

counter-strike???

though valve didnt take any mod/levels developed on the source engine yet (except the hl2dm contest after they released the sdk in 2004) into the official product pool.

Garrymod?

The Ship?

Go with Source - it is harder to work with at some parts but you at least understand what it does. I don't know too much about the Unreal Engine it self and less i do know about UE3 but I know that it is a satisfying feeling to know every number you put in a vmt file yourself by name and can adjust everything as you need and wish, while some of the newer sdks seem to go into the direction of a "let's throw together some prefabs"-editor. It is the difference between writing html and a php backend your self or going to myspace and click on a template and make it extra uggly...

Sometimes it's good to have access to the lowest level. Once ago I had a bizarre situation where I needed to create 64 vmt's that were part of the same group. I made a script to automate that process. However, Valve should integrate material creation, model compile, soundscapes, etc. into Hammer. Both, low level and easy usage, should be possible.

So this is really new to me that you open Unrealed hit a button and have a map

It is not like you open the new Material Editor and can't edit anything (if you want to I'll make a screenshot of the MatEd). About the power of the new engine, I (Hourences was involved) was able to implement a technique that saves up to 12,5% (actually more due to DXT compression) of the texturesize on your hdd on the first day I started with UE3 (no, knowledge of UE2.5 doesn't help much with the new MatEd).

One thing that makes Source popular among mappers is imho the inability of most to do prefabs in programs like Max, Maya, ... If you want to make a decent map for UT2K4 you need custom models and textures. Tbh I think most things can be achieved with both engines, it is just the time you lose to things that are not important when you want to design a level.

At the end, take the number of sold licences...

Quote from e-freak

Go with Source - it is harder to work with at some parts but you at least understand what it does. I don't know too much about the Unreal Engine it self and less i do know about UE3 but I know that it is a satisfying feeling to know every number you put in a vmt file yourself by name and can adjust everything as you need and wish, while some of the newer sdks seem to go into the direction of a "let's throw together some prefabs"-editor. It is the difference between writing html and a php backend your self or going to myspace and click on a template and make it extra uggly...

You obviously don't understand completely the level of customization and editing that goes into anything you put into unreal. And why it is more superior than source is that even if source had the level of power Unreal has, its not wsiwyg. In unreal you see your changes immediately. Source you still have to save and exit out of separate files to see your changes. Unreal's package is simply put together better. Everything is accessible from the editor. Other then photoshop and a modeling program, the editor does it.

i remeber saving dds files put into some package and while somebody changes the package you didnt see a change in your max or maya editor. so its not that perfect. when i change a tga and just click 1 button my model is updated. without having to re-/unpack.

though i think we discussed WYSIWYG. technical limits due to technical decissions. and decissions means there people thinking of a problem evaluating all possibilities and then chosing the one that fits the best. unreal did take its fast all in one package while source takes its raytracing and radiosity features which results in a not 100% WYSIWYG

though i dont miss a lighting preview in my editor. i already know when a lightsetup works or not. though if something does not fit i can recompile. if you are a tweaking pussy and change things 100 times you wont be happy (of course) but as long as you are having experience you maybe need to compile 3 times to get a perfect/acceptable look of something. and even then: you can compile a single region if the overall process takes too long. copy paste stuff into a temp file and you are done.

reloading resources in hammer works not 100% smooth. reloading materials works fine but reloading models isnt supported at all. thats something valve could work on, but as i would possibliy agree with their management: as long as we can live with those handycaps and make a great game we dont change it and spend more time on the game itself.

maybe thats why unreal games are kind of lame (ctf, dm and thats all) while halflife has always been a freaking cool story.

Quote from hessi

maybe thats why unreal games are kind of lame (ctf, dm and thats all) while halflife has always been a freaking cool story.

Or maybe its because UT games are multiplayer focused, and HL games are single player focused? UT doesn't really need a story, as it isn't a story driven game. Besides, it's crazy to suggest that spending time on tool development is somehow going to be to the detriment of a game's story, I can't imagine the tool programmers are the ones penning the script.

How does an easy pipeline that allows you to quickly update and import models and materials hinder a story development? There are plenty of games that us Unreal tech that does a great job telling a story/driving singleplayer game mechanics. Look at gears. While the story is pretty generic, it did its singleplayer game enormously well. Its DM maps are amazing to boot.

i was talking of unreal tournaments and shizzle those games that provide the engine so ppl can use it for their mods.