Another video game engine has entered the world, this time from Amazon. It is basically a fork of CryEngine that they purchased the rights to sub-license. Amazon states that their engine will diverge over time, as they modify it in-house for licensees and their internal game studio, Amazon Game Studios. It is licensed for free, with full source access, but it has a few restrictions.
The market is currently dominated with a variety of offerings with different business models. Unreal Engine 4 is free to use, but takes a portion of revenue after some grace amount. CryEngine is available on a relatively cheap subscription, but has no royalty requirements. Unigine offers a few lump-sum options, starting at almost a grand-and-a-half. Unity has a few options, from a cut down free version, to a relatively expensive subscription, to lump-sum payments. Finally, at least for this list, Source 2 is completely free, with the only requirement that published games must be available on Steam at launch.
That last one, Source 2, is basically the business model that Amazon chose with their new Lumberyard engine. The difference is that, instead of requiring games to be published at a certain retailer, they require that games use Amazon Web Services for online interactions, like multiplayer and cloud, unless the developer maintains their own servers. I'm not exactly sure what that distinction ("If you own and operate your own private servers") allows, but I'd assume that Microsoft Azure and Google Cloud are big no-nos. On the other hand, single-player experiences and games with local multiplayer, assuming neither has “cloud” features, are completely free to make.
While it would be nice to have a purely open source offering that can compete with these proprietary engines, developers should be able to find a suitable option. Each seems to ask for something slightly different, and they are very permissive otherwise.
Just take a look at the
Just take a look at the ToS:
https://aws.amazon.com/service-terms
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.
This is common. It’s even in
This is common. It's even in Unreal Engine's terms of service (albeit in a less humourous way). Their software is not certified to be stable for mission-critical devices.
https://www.unrealengine.com/eula
You may not engage in any activity with respect to the Licensed Technology, including as incorporated into a Product, (1) for any gambling-related activities or Products (as defined by law in the jurisdiction of use); (2) for operation of nuclear facilities, aircraft navigation, aircraft communication systems or air traffic control machines, or for military use in connection with live combat; (3) in violation of any applicable law or regulation; (4) in which the Licensed Technology is rented or leased; (5) that misappropriates any of Epic's other products or services; (6) in support of a claim by you or any third party that the Licensed Technology infringes a patent. You also may not sell or grant a security interest in the Licensed Technology.
You’re ruining a good zombie
You’re ruining a good zombie joke #funatparties
Hahaha
That’s some weird kitchen
That’s some weird kitchen sink boilerplate(it’s Joking),But the real EULA parts are not, and it just goes to show what a boob-tube like appliance the big interests have in store for computing, with TV supplanted by the online services, and the ad industry wishing to get its undead claws into as many eyeballs as possible!
I’m hoping that there will be more mini/micro form factor devices that the users themselves can purchase as individual CPU/SOC/APU/GPU parts for some user assembled mini/micro PC builds, I have lost interest in ever getting a new laptop that’s not gimped down by the laptop OEMs, and that includes the OS choice also. Sounds like Amazon has baked into the gaming engine’s API all the very same things that M$ wants to bake into windows 10, with all the OS meant to do is serve M$’s monetization needs! So Amazon, Google, Apple, and M$ can just stuff it, I’m hoping for a line of mini/micro boxes that can be attached to keyboards, and portable USB displays, and allow users to run a good full Linux distro without all the spyware baked into the OS, and gaming engine API, to turn the gaming experience into a TV like experience with all the unavoidable and intrusive ad content!
I like the Raspberry Pi’s Pi top laptop kit, too bad there are not more Build your own laptop kits where users could get a motherboard with 2 full memory channels for their Carrizo based APUs, or Zen when that comes to market! I’m really tired of all of the Micro/Mini PCs only coming with Intel SOCs that are soldered to the motherboard, and would love to see some real choices in the marketplace for APU based Micro/Mini PCs with socked motherboards and OS choices other than Windows, Android, and any attachments to the ad pushers!
These online/cloud technology Zombies are after our Brains and Wallets, and will stop at nothing to turn our computers likewise into slobbering and drooling POS terminals!
I read something somewhere
I read something somewhere that Amazon holds the right to host third party servers for your game? I’m in no way interested in their “free” product so I really don’t care about reading through their ToS myself.
It makes me think, why would anyone use this over something like Unreal Engine 4? Which is free, extremely robust, has an asset store, a visual scripting system (blueprints) for those of whom who aren’t familiar with programming, and it’s open source.
Not only that but they’ve been working on Linux support as well.
I’m just wondering why anyone would choose something like this over other engines that have much wider support and are already well established?
I should start this statement
I should start this statement by declaring that I use Unreal Engine 4 for my projects. Still, there's a few issues with your question.
First, Unreal Engine 4 is not free. If you sell your game, you give up some percentage of revenue each quarter (after some grace amount). Amazon Lumberyard is completely free, although they tie your game to their services if your game needs a service like theirs. A popular single-player game would be cheaper with Lumberyard than Unreal Engine 4.
Second, Unreal Engine 4 is not open source. You are provided with full source code access, but it is not open source. You cannot modify and redistribute as you please. That said, neither is Lumberyard or any other (popular) engine at this point. Closest might be Blender? Torque?
Third, Lumberyard started as a fork of CryEngine, so saying it doesn't have wider support is not really honest. I'm not sure how far apart they are at the moment, and Lumberyard is still classified as beta software by Amazon, but it's not a wholly new technology.
But yes, I am sticking with Unreal Engine 4 for my projects.
BUt.. but those facts don’t
BUt.. but those facts don’t line up with my feelings!