Can someone explain to me why it would be a big deal if MS bought Epic? Wouldn't they just keep making games for PC and 360 like they always do?
Um, because Epic owns the most popular middleware game engine of this generation? A good chunk of games out their on the PS3 and the 360 run on the Unreal 3 engine. If Microsoft aquires this engine, it means PS3 games will no longer use the Unreal 3 engine or will receive less support or the game industry will drop the Unreal Engine altogether(ala Renderware last gen).
Can someone explain to me why it would be a big deal if MS bought Epic? Wouldn't they just keep making games for PC and 360 like they always do?
It's bogus because of the amount they offered for a company that a) is not suffering, b) is growing steadily and c) is worth far more than that considering the impact they have on gaming future. Epic has no reason to sell now. Basically, Epic would have every right to reject that offer and ask for $5 Billion.
DNF might actually come out
Jack Thompson avoid a anti-games bandwagon
Spore Release date
Mario & Sonic together in two separate games.
StarCraft II announced
And probably other unlikely events I have forgotten about have also happened.
A note on that: he's already been on FOX blaming the latest shooting on counter-strike, so he didn't avoid it long - it was just that particular case was so wrong even thompson worked out to stay away.
Can someone explain to me why it would be a big deal if MS bought Epic? Wouldn't they just keep making games for PC and 360 like they always do?
They have ported UTIII to the PS3.
Plus Microsoft would then own the rights to Unreal Engine 3, used on every game out there. And you can bet your ass they would say no to any developer wanting to make a PS3 game with it.
It would be bad for Sony, but bad for the industry.
But this is all semantics because it's not going to happen.
A billion dollars? Somehow I doubt that Epic is worth that much, although I could quite easily be wrong.
EA bought Bioware/Pandermic for $800 million, and mass effect didn't shift 4.5 million like gears did. Seems to me to be smart news if it's true what with Bungie leaving.
Why settle for billions when you can have... millions..
Can someone explain to me why it would be a big deal if MS bought Epic? Wouldn't they just keep making games for PC and 360 like they always do?
They have ported UTIII to the PS3.
Plus Microsoft would then own the rights to Unreal Engine 3, used on every game out there. And you can bet your ass they would say no to any developer wanting to make a PS3 game with it.
It would be bad for Sony, but bad for the industry.
But this is all semantics because it's not going to happen.
And you'd lose your ass on that bet.
You want your engine to become the defacto standard. that's the whole point of selling your engine to other developers. limiting the platforms that it works on is more than just bad business sense, it's shitty internet armchair quarterback business sense.
If ANYTHING, they can tailor the engine for the 360 and make it easier to port games, but disable it on other platforms? that's tin foil hat speak right there.
Can someone explain to me why it would be a big deal if MS bought Epic? Wouldn't they just keep making games for PC and 360 like they always do?
They have ported UTIII to the PS3.
Plus Microsoft would then own the rights to Unreal Engine 3, used on every game out there. And you can bet your ass they would say no to any developer wanting to make a PS3 game with it.
It would be bad for Sony, but bad for the industry.
But this is all semantics because it's not going to happen.
I hope thats true. It would be a huge blow to the industry. A large percentage of games on all the consoles use a version of the Unreal Engine. 360/PS3/PC all use Unreal 3 and the Wii uses Unreal 2 in a lot of its games. I'm not sure exactly how the licenses work if its for a per game basis or not. If its per game than you can forget about a multi-platform games. Also they would basically destroy Epic's worth as a middleware company as companies would find other engines. You'd start seeing a lot more Source and Quake or whatever id is using these days in games.
I'll throw my hat into the bogus ring. Microsoft is already getting ready to drop several billion to buy Yahoo, and I fail to see a significant bonus to stopping PS3 games from using the UT3 engine, the 360 is already killing the PS3 and hardly any UT3 engine exclusives will come out for the PS3.
Can someone explain to me why it would be a big deal if MS bought Epic? Wouldn't they just keep making games for PC and 360 like they always do?
They have ported UTIII to the PS3.
Plus Microsoft would then own the rights to Unreal Engine 3, used on every game out there. And you can bet your ass they would say no to any developer wanting to make a PS3 game with it.
It would be bad for Sony, but bad for the industry.
But this is all semantics because it's not going to happen.
It could arguably be good for the industry because we'd get more, possibly better, engines. Just about every developer who has used Unreal has bitched about it. With the stranglehold it had on the next gen market from the very start there wasn't much incentive for another company to come up with a different engine to market out. If MS does buy Epic, and does say "Unreal Engine - Only on PC & 360 from now on" that would be one hell of a good reason for some other company to introduce their own engine into the market.
Can someone explain to me why it would be a big deal if MS bought Epic? Wouldn't they just keep making games for PC and 360 like they always do?
They have ported UTIII to the PS3.
Plus Microsoft would then own the rights to Unreal Engine 3, used on every game out there. And you can bet your ass they would say no to any developer wanting to make a PS3 game with it.
It would be bad for Sony, but bad for the industry.
But this is all semantics because it's not going to happen.
And you'd lose your ass on that bet.
You want your engine to become the defacto standard. that's the whole point of selling your engine to other developers. limiting the platforms that it works on is more than just bad business sense, it's shitty internet armchair quarterback business sense.
If ANYTHING, they can tailor the engine for the 360 and make it easier to port games, but disable it on other platforms? that's tin foil hat speak right there.
Why isn't there a PS3 version of Halo 3 then? It'll make more money.
Your logic is incredibly flawed or you don't know how business competition works.
Can someone explain to me why it would be a big deal if MS bought Epic? Wouldn't they just keep making games for PC and 360 like they always do?
They have ported UTIII to the PS3.
Plus Microsoft would then own the rights to Unreal Engine 3, used on every game out there. And you can bet your ass they would say no to any developer wanting to make a PS3 game with it.
It would be bad for Sony, but bad for the industry.
But this is all semantics because it's not going to happen.
It could arguably be good for the industry because we'd get more, possibly better, engines. Just about every developer who has used Unreal has bitched about it. With the stranglehold it had on the next gen market from the very start there wasn't much incentive for another company to come up with a different engine to market out. If MS does buy Epic, and does say "Unreal Engine - Only on PC & 360 from now on" that would be one hell of a good reason for some other company to introduce their own engine into the market.
Wouldn't they logically just let everyone continue to use it and reap the billions and billions of dollars in licensing fees?
Can someone explain to me why it would be a big deal if MS bought Epic? Wouldn't they just keep making games for PC and 360 like they always do?
They have ported UTIII to the PS3.
Plus Microsoft would then own the rights to Unreal Engine 3, used on every game out there. And you can bet your ass they would say no to any developer wanting to make a PS3 game with it.
It would be bad for Sony, but bad for the industry.
But this is all semantics because it's not going to happen.
It could arguably be good for the industry because we'd get more, possibly better, engines. Just about every developer who has used Unreal has bitched about it. With the stranglehold it had on the next gen market from the very start there wasn't much incentive for another company to come up with a different engine to market out. If MS does buy Epic, and does say "Unreal Engine - Only on PC & 360 from now on" that would be one hell of a good reason for some other company to introduce their own engine into the market.
Wouldn't they logically just let everyone continue to use it and reap the billions and billions of dollars in licensing fees?
Thats why this is so unlikely. Epic has a very stable revenue stream thanks to their engine licensing. Why sell? It makes no sense at all.
I dont think licensing UE3 is as retardely profitable as people think. I mean, its extremely good business for Epic, which is a tiny developer compared to some other less successful ones out there.
If you buy Epic you buy UE3. HAlf the games in development now are using it. You almost defacto tie up nearly all third party support for your console, and simultaneously piss off the entire development community.
If MS did buy Epic, there is no way they would let UE3 be licensed for Ps3 titles. Just no way. Thats the way that company works. They arent ever friendly friendly with the competition. They go for the jugular.
It could arguably be good for the industry because we'd get more, possibly better, engines. Just about every developer who has used Unreal has bitched about it. With the stranglehold it had on the next gen market from the very start there wasn't much incentive for another company to come up with a different engine to market out. If MS does buy Epic, and does say "Unreal Engine - Only on PC & 360 from now on" that would be one hell of a good reason for some other company to introduce their own engine into the market.
Why aren't we seeing much engine competition over the Wii, DS, and I guess the PSP then? I might have missed it, but I haven't seen much game engine competition on those platforms.
Couscous on
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EvilBadmanDO NOT TRUST THIS MANRegistered Userregular
edited February 2008
Have I missed the "X to buy Y, Z is Doomed!!!!" joke yet?
Well, I guess with the Halo series dead and buried, Microsoft needs a new franchise to spend $texas marketing dollars on to break sales records.
That's about the only reason I could see this rumor being legit. Gears of War was an early system seller for the 360, I can see them wanting to maintain that momentum.
Exclusively making games for Microsoft's Windows and 360 platforms, and possibly limiting the licenses to these platforms..
..or making games for whatever platforms they please, and licensing the engine to as many other developers that are out there, that want to license it?
$1B is no chump change. And certainly there are other factors concerning a decision like this.
But I don't quite see Epic taking this turn..
Also, it seems at least slightly contrary to how the company has been about things in the past. Although they do seem to be taking a liking to the consoles these days, thanks mostly to the fact that console gamers tend to buy these expensive-to-develop games.
my money is on this news story being fake, reason being that I highly doubt Epic is worth $1B. I would have guessed it would be worth one or two orders of magnitude less money than that.
IIRC, it costs somewhere from 50-100 million to license the UE3 engine, so if the company isn't worth that much, ownership of the Unreal Engine most likely is. Though I'd bet if the offer is valid, that Gamepro doesn't know shit about how much was actually offered.
As for the story; I have no problem believing MS offered to buy Epic. (After all, they DID just try to buy Yahoo), but whether Epic will go for it is anyone's guess. They're still privately owned, so the decision rests with them. Considering they're rich as pigs, money isn't going to be that big of an issue for them. However, if MS throws the full force of their development devision at Epic, Epic might go for it. Epics biggest problem is they live in a region where NOBODY wants to live; they can't hire enough qualified people to expand their ranks enough to do even simple stuff like clan system for GoW. (Or so they said). Having big 'ol MS have 30-50 people at MS HQ hammer that shit out and send it via the intertubes to Epic HQ could be extremely tempting for Epic. Probably not enough to go for this offer, but I wouldn't casually dismiss it either. Especially since MS can easily, and continually ramp up their offer.
As for engine licenses; any game already licensed probably wouldn't be affected, as Epic already has a contract with them and even if they got bought out, the contract would still be in operation. Afterwards, however, all bets are off.
I dont think licensing UE3 is as retardely profitable as people think. I mean, its extremely good business for Epic, which is a tiny developer compared to some other less successful ones out there.
If you buy Epic you buy UE3. HAlf the games in development now are using it. You almost defacto tie up nearly all third party support for your console, and simultaneously piss off the entire development community.
If MS did buy Epic, there is no way they would let UE3 be licensed for Ps3 titles. Just no way. Thats the way that company works. They arent ever friendly friendly with the competition. They go for the jugular.
Just because Microsoft buys Epic (assuming this is real) doesn't mean that they can just cancel contracts with 3rd parties who've licensed the UE3 engine. They'd get their ass sued left and right.
ChewyWaffles on
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RoshinMy backlog can be seen from spaceSwedenRegistered Userregular
If MS did buy Epic, there is no way they would let UE3 be licensed for Ps3 titles. Just no way. Thats the way that company works. They arent ever friendly friendly with the competition. They go for the jugular.
There's no fucking way that, if MS bought epic, they wouldn't license out the UT3 engine. "Wow, this company is making a ton of money, lets buy them and stop them from making any!"
Not to mention Microsoft has tried to license out stuff like this before. Don't you remember back when the next gen systems were being developed, microsoft wanted to license out XNA to sony and nintendo for the PS3 and Wii respectively? The idea being that any game made for those systems would be very easily ported to the 360, and often with better results on the 360. By purchasing the UT3 engine, they could essentially force this scenario into happening (since sony and nintendo declined to use XNA).
Just because Microsoft buys Epic (assuming this is real) doesn't mean that they can just cancel contracts with 3rd parties who've licensed the UE3 engine. They'd get their ass sued left and right.
Microsoft isn't stupid enough to try such a move. However developers won't trust Epic to stay impartial. Developers who want to put their games on multiple systems (pretty much all of them) won't license the Unreal engine anymore. This isn't a problem for Unreal Engine 3, because most of the deals are already done, but beyond that, their licensing business would pretty much die.
The questions to ask are:
1. How much money does Epic make from their licensing as opposed to their games.
2. To what use could MS put the Unreal Engine?
If Epic makes the majority of their money from licensing fees and MS doesn't have a special plan for the Unreal engine than acquiring Epic wouldn't make much sense for Microsoft.
I don't know if this is true or not, but the last time there was a crazy rumor regarding Microsoft from a less than reputable source it turned out to be true.
Bing Gordon, an EA executive, has stated that RenderWare didn't perform well enough for next-gen and that RenderWare didn't stand up to competition from Epic Games. He has also stated that the RenderWare team is "mostly a dev house" (as opposed to EA still using RenderWare).
RenderWare's biggest money was made being used to assist in developing for the Playstation 2, and as far as I know, EA quit selling Renderware a long time ago, so I dunno if people "stopped buying it" because of EA, or if EA simply stopped selling it.
Sheep on
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HenroidMexican kicked from Immigration ThreadCentrism is Racism :3Registered Userregular
edited February 2008
Did anyone else catch the "Protip" joke, intentional or not, when someone was pointing out the source?
The benefits of making it exclusive far outweigh the profits from letting anyone license it.
No they don't. It only matters in whatever fantasy world people who believe that "being in 1st place" is the driving factor being game production live in. Owning the engine which the majority of games out there use, on your console AND on other consoles, is like having your cake and eating it too.
UE3 is a valuable asset to a console if it is exclusive to that console.
The benefits of making it exclusive far outweigh the profits from letting anyone license it.
It's only valuable because a lot of people a using it...
Of course a free UE3 would be a huge boost to the XNA Initiative.
People a always willing to believe that MS is about to swallow up whatever game company is currently "hot" (at the time of Doom3 it was id, then for a while it was Bioware, now its Epic).
However, most of the studios MS bought had financial troubles. Microsoft doesn't doesn't seem to buy studios when they are at their peak, but rather when they are at their low (and probably much cheeper).
The benefits of making it exclusive far outweigh the profits from letting anyone license it.
No they don't. It only matters in whatever fantasy world people who believe that "being in 1st place" is the driving factor being game production live in. Owning the engine which the majority of games out there use, on your console AND on other consoles, is like having your cake and eating it too.
Its not.
Its like having your cake, slicing it in half and giving the other half to your main competitor.
Why not just keep the whole juicy moist cake for yourself?
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How many of those predictions have rung true?
Um, because Epic owns the most popular middleware game engine of this generation? A good chunk of games out their on the PS3 and the 360 run on the Unreal 3 engine. If Microsoft aquires this engine, it means PS3 games will no longer use the Unreal 3 engine or will receive less support or the game industry will drop the Unreal Engine altogether(ala Renderware last gen).
It's bogus because of the amount they offered for a company that a) is not suffering, b) is growing steadily and c) is worth far more than that considering the impact they have on gaming future. Epic has no reason to sell now. Basically, Epic would have every right to reject that offer and ask for $5 Billion.
Someone should have a running tally of how many people have had to eat their own genitalia here. Sort of like McDonald's xxx billions served.
But in recent times we've had -
DNF might actually come out
Jack Thompson avoid a anti-games bandwagon
Spore Release date
Mario & Sonic together in two separate games.
StarCraft II announced
And probably other unlikely events I have forgotten about have also happened.
Edit: Oh shits! Unjailed!
A note on that: he's already been on FOX blaming the latest shooting on counter-strike, so he didn't avoid it long - it was just that particular case was so wrong even thompson worked out to stay away.
Plus Microsoft would then own the rights to Unreal Engine 3, used on every game out there. And you can bet your ass they would say no to any developer wanting to make a PS3 game with it.
It would be bad for Sony, but bad for the industry.
But this is all semantics because it's not going to happen.
Why settle for billions when you can have... millions..
I never asked for this!
And you'd lose your ass on that bet.
You want your engine to become the defacto standard. that's the whole point of selling your engine to other developers. limiting the platforms that it works on is more than just bad business sense, it's shitty internet armchair quarterback business sense.
If ANYTHING, they can tailor the engine for the 360 and make it easier to port games, but disable it on other platforms? that's tin foil hat speak right there.
I hope thats true. It would be a huge blow to the industry. A large percentage of games on all the consoles use a version of the Unreal Engine. 360/PS3/PC all use Unreal 3 and the Wii uses Unreal 2 in a lot of its games. I'm not sure exactly how the licenses work if its for a per game basis or not. If its per game than you can forget about a multi-platform games. Also they would basically destroy Epic's worth as a middleware company as companies would find other engines. You'd start seeing a lot more Source and Quake or whatever id is using these days in games.
It could arguably be good for the industry because we'd get more, possibly better, engines. Just about every developer who has used Unreal has bitched about it. With the stranglehold it had on the next gen market from the very start there wasn't much incentive for another company to come up with a different engine to market out. If MS does buy Epic, and does say "Unreal Engine - Only on PC & 360 from now on" that would be one hell of a good reason for some other company to introduce their own engine into the market.
Why isn't there a PS3 version of Halo 3 then? It'll make more money.
Your logic is incredibly flawed or you don't know how business competition works.
Wouldn't they logically just let everyone continue to use it and reap the billions and billions of dollars in licensing fees?
I never asked for this!
Thats why this is so unlikely. Epic has a very stable revenue stream thanks to their engine licensing. Why sell? It makes no sense at all.
If you buy Epic you buy UE3. HAlf the games in development now are using it. You almost defacto tie up nearly all third party support for your console, and simultaneously piss off the entire development community.
If MS did buy Epic, there is no way they would let UE3 be licensed for Ps3 titles. Just no way. Thats the way that company works. They arent ever friendly friendly with the competition. They go for the jugular.
Nope, knock yourself out.
That's about the only reason I could see this rumor being legit. Gears of War was an early system seller for the 360, I can see them wanting to maintain that momentum.
HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA, no. Halo Wars is coming out, and Microsoft own the Halo IP. There will be a Halo 4.
what puts Epic in a better position..
Exclusively making games for Microsoft's Windows and 360 platforms, and possibly limiting the licenses to these platforms..
..or making games for whatever platforms they please, and licensing the engine to as many other developers that are out there, that want to license it?
$1B is no chump change. And certainly there are other factors concerning a decision like this.
But I don't quite see Epic taking this turn..
Also, it seems at least slightly contrary to how the company has been about things in the past. Although they do seem to be taking a liking to the consoles these days, thanks mostly to the fact that console gamers tend to buy these expensive-to-develop games.
Steam ID: slashx000______Twitter: @bill_at_zeboyd______ Facebook: Zeboyd Games
Based on that demo that came out a ways back, Halo Wars is gonna tank hard.
Not going to enjoy the same marketing blitz that Halo 2 or 3 got. Gears of War? I could see that happening.
IIRC, it costs somewhere from 50-100 million to license the UE3 engine, so if the company isn't worth that much, ownership of the Unreal Engine most likely is. Though I'd bet if the offer is valid, that Gamepro doesn't know shit about how much was actually offered.
As for the story; I have no problem believing MS offered to buy Epic. (After all, they DID just try to buy Yahoo), but whether Epic will go for it is anyone's guess. They're still privately owned, so the decision rests with them. Considering they're rich as pigs, money isn't going to be that big of an issue for them. However, if MS throws the full force of their development devision at Epic, Epic might go for it. Epics biggest problem is they live in a region where NOBODY wants to live; they can't hire enough qualified people to expand their ranks enough to do even simple stuff like clan system for GoW. (Or so they said). Having big 'ol MS have 30-50 people at MS HQ hammer that shit out and send it via the intertubes to Epic HQ could be extremely tempting for Epic. Probably not enough to go for this offer, but I wouldn't casually dismiss it either. Especially since MS can easily, and continually ramp up their offer.
As for engine licenses; any game already licensed probably wouldn't be affected, as Epic already has a contract with them and even if they got bought out, the contract would still be in operation. Afterwards, however, all bets are off.
I love how their employment page advertises your chances of finding a date in their area.
I'd move there to work, if there was a snowball's chance in hell of them hiring me.
Just because Microsoft buys Epic (assuming this is real) doesn't mean that they can just cancel contracts with 3rd parties who've licensed the UE3 engine. They'd get their ass sued left and right.
Sounds about right.
Well if you were so interested you could have just asked.
White FC: 0819 3350 1787
There's no fucking way that, if MS bought epic, they wouldn't license out the UT3 engine. "Wow, this company is making a ton of money, lets buy them and stop them from making any!"
Not to mention Microsoft has tried to license out stuff like this before. Don't you remember back when the next gen systems were being developed, microsoft wanted to license out XNA to sony and nintendo for the PS3 and Wii respectively? The idea being that any game made for those systems would be very easily ported to the 360, and often with better results on the 360. By purchasing the UT3 engine, they could essentially force this scenario into happening (since sony and nintendo declined to use XNA).
Microsoft isn't stupid enough to try such a move. However developers won't trust Epic to stay impartial. Developers who want to put their games on multiple systems (pretty much all of them) won't license the Unreal engine anymore. This isn't a problem for Unreal Engine 3, because most of the deals are already done, but beyond that, their licensing business would pretty much die.
The questions to ask are:
1. How much money does Epic make from their licensing as opposed to their games.
2. To what use could MS put the Unreal Engine?
If Epic makes the majority of their money from licensing fees and MS doesn't have a special plan for the Unreal engine than acquiring Epic wouldn't make much sense for Microsoft.
The benefits of making it exclusive far outweigh the profits from letting anyone license it.
Why are we even discussing this anyways. It's all complete bullshit.
Steam ID: slashx000______Twitter: @bill_at_zeboyd______ Facebook: Zeboyd Games
RenderWare's biggest money was made being used to assist in developing for the Playstation 2, and as far as I know, EA quit selling Renderware a long time ago, so I dunno if people "stopped buying it" because of EA, or if EA simply stopped selling it.
Also this better not be true.
No they don't. It only matters in whatever fantasy world people who believe that "being in 1st place" is the driving factor being game production live in. Owning the engine which the majority of games out there use, on your console AND on other consoles, is like having your cake and eating it too.
It's only valuable because a lot of people a using it...
Of course a free UE3 would be a huge boost to the XNA Initiative.
People a always willing to believe that MS is about to swallow up whatever game company is currently "hot" (at the time of Doom3 it was id, then for a while it was Bioware, now its Epic).
However, most of the studios MS bought had financial troubles. Microsoft doesn't doesn't seem to buy studios when they are at their peak, but rather when they are at their low (and probably much cheeper).
Its not.
Its like having your cake, slicing it in half and giving the other half to your main competitor.
Why not just keep the whole juicy moist cake for yourself?