Speaking at Gamefest in Seattle, Epic's Mike Capps has been discussing Unreal Engine 4, suggesting the next version of the dominant game engine is in production and will debut "...in the next console generation - our rough guess is 2012 - 2018."
Specifically, Epic president Capps - who introduced a Gamasutra-attended Gamefest panel that included notable Unreal Engine 3-using creators such as Gearbox's Randy Pitchford, mentioned that the Unreal Engine tools had a markedly "console focus" going forward, and then noted:
"We've got Unreal [Engine] 4 in production right now... it's going to be in the next console generation - our rough guess is 2012 [to] 2018."
This ties up with recent comments made by Epic's Tim Sweeney about plans for the next version of the dominant middleware engine, with the Unreal engine franchise's technical mastermind commenting in a March interview with TGDaily:
"Version 4 will exclusively target the next console generation, Microsoft's successor for the Xbox 360, Sony's successor for the Playstation 3 - and if Nintendo ships a machine with similar hardware specs, then that also. PCs will follow after that."
Gamasutra will have more details from the Unreal Engine 3 panel - which included postmortems of development experiences from several UE3 licensees - in the near future.
I doubt Nintendo's next machine will be similarly spec'd to the Xbox 720 or the PS4. There is not room in the market for 3 Major guns blazing hardcore machines. The demise of Sega proved that (that and Sega's consoles where also a bit ill-timed).
Saying that Nintendo's next machine will probably bee good enough for a true Unreal 3 engine port.
Well I don't anticipate the Wii's successor to be very comparable to the Sony and Microsoft next consoles, but I am surprised (though I also feel I probably shouldn't be) at the comment about the engine being developed with the primary focus on consoles.
...yeah, the more I think about it, the more I shouldn't be surprised. The sheer number of console-focused licensees is reason enough.
but I believe that DRM does indeed prevent only legitimate buyers from playing the game unhindered; pirates are pirates because they will, sooner or later, hack whatever protective measures you have put in place to keep illegitimate copies of your game from being played, and distribute it to the masses.
Saying that Nintendo's next machine will probably bee good enough for a true Unreal 3 engine port.
My guess is that Nintendo will eventually just move to portable devices.
- Deathbliss
...yeah, the more I think about it, the more I shouldn't be surprised. The sheer number of console-focused licensees is reason enough.