Unreal engine 3 for consumers? WTF ?

[Hourences]

Its like modding. You get engine/editor/Unrealscript. But you can't recompile the whole engine and have source code access. Just like a mod. Just like Unity.

You can however build a stand alone build, including installer, for your game, and distribute that. That copy would require nothing. Not even the UDK installed.

[Defrag]

Thanks for clearing it up I doubted they'd go the whole nine yards, but it's still a nice thing to see.

[Psy]

To what degree is UE3 modable? For example, would creating a new weapon (model, animations, code, all that jazz) require some access to the source code of the engine or can it be done purely through scripting?

[Hourences]

Scripting. Look at all mods that exist for any UT game. All of that was done with scripting.

Look at the example games on the UDK page. Those too are just scripting.

[robert.briscoe]

How difficult would you say it is for a non-coder to pick up the scripting in unreal?

[Hourences]

It is not really scripting IMO. It is really close to proper programming. At least for me, from artist POV. So the question is, can you program? Math and all that.

It is comparable to java (not javascript - real java)

[Pericolos0]

Yeah I've been looking at unrealscript today, because I was worried about it's capabilities. But it's very close to java, actionscript, c++ etc. Object oriented and everything =), really neat! Definitely going to play around with this.

[AlexM]

wow this is awesome for modding, not having to buy anything to play is a huge plus!

it's been long time since I've used the unreal engine, do I still want to download that 3rd party unrealscript IDE or is the editor decent now?

EDIT: additive brushwork? it HAS been a long time

[Jetsetlemming]

This is brilliant news. I'm a bit annoyed that they've done this now when I only purchased UT3 the other week to gain access to the tools.

I did the same thing, but last christmas.

[Jetsetlemming]

How difficult would you say it is for a non-coder to pick up the scripting in unreal?

The extent of my ability to program in a real coding language is making a command prompt-based random number generator, but I have absolutely no problem reading and editing existing Uscripts to get what I want. It's really pretty clearly laid out when you read a script, so long as you know the entity names and can keep track of basic syntax.

[madgernader]

do I still want to download that 3rd party unrealscript IDE or is the editor decent now?

I don't think it has a built in IDE anymore, at least I haven't come across it yet...

[Minos]

Just tested this version and I must say I'm impressed with lightmass. It's a huge improvement from previous versions! I still think UE3 should have better real time lighting support though, I hate screwing around with lightmaps

[2d-chris]

Trust me lightmaps have their charm ;P Real time is awesome but you often miss the control lightmaps give you over a scene.

[-HP-]

I miss lightmaps actually... They're more work, but they look better in a way.

Anyways, what's this lightmass thing everyone's been talking about?

[Minos]

":263um8r8]I miss lightmaps actually... They're more work, but they look better in a way.

Anyways, what's this lightmass thing everyone's been talking about?

http://udn.epicgames.com/Three/Lightmass.html