Autodesk Stingray.

EDIT: The big review from GamesFromScratch is now up (also edited the title since it’s not exactly brand new anymore).
http://www.gamefromscratch.com/post/2016/04/13/A-Closer-Look-at-The-Stingray-Engine.aspx

In short, the node-based editing, state-of-the-art visuals, and ultra-tight interop with their 3D applications is more or less what the BGE wanted to become, but instead fell flat.

Some people right now though have doubts that it could catch up to and surpass Unity and Unreal 4, but others are not so certain about just writing it off just because of it being a ‘new kid on the block’.

Now it’s also possible that it may not be near as much use to Blender users as it could be, though it really depends on whether or not the GPL gets in the way of good integration (again). It really depends on whether Autodesk still has an interest in trying to box Blender away to a FOSS sandbox by making all their tech as GPL-incompatible as possible.

So about Autodesk’s first major foray into actual game creation, will this application ultimately become a powerhouse like Maya or will it wind up in the graveyard with XSI?

HAHAHAHA unity theme black hahahahaha

Uh it is consistent with their other products? – i think maya switched in 2011 (their 2012 version – http://forums.autodesk.com/autodesk/attachments/autodesk/54/14020/1/maya%202012.jpg )

What an annoying way to “announce” something: Show it off, but omit any information as to pricing or availability. Apparently, that information you have to get through the press:

“Autodesk has clarified that Stingray will be offered for $30 per month by itself starting on August 19th. Separately, though, Maya LT will include a free copy of Stingray for $30 per month as well a bit later in the summer.”

I wonder how many “indie” game developers are looking to be more dependent on Autodesk, rather than less.

Unless that subscription fee goes (paying a royalty makes much more sense) they’re not going to get that small studio audience they’re looking for. It already looks better than Unity 5, but no way is it anywhere near UE4.

Uses the only langauge I know, LUA
I think the next game I make will use this engine, if it’s free.

why do people make Unreal Engine 4 as some sort of god engine?
I have it installed in my computer,
Yes it looks good and it operates well,
but I can’t really point out anything that it has that other engines don’t.

The templates are nice in UE4, But truthfully I just like how its viewport navigation is comparable to its play navigation. As someone who has done more then their fair share of construction products it has a sense of “rightness” Building a building from a first person view.

What “small studios” are able to develop games, but aren’t able to afford 30$/seat/month for their game engine? Just the accounting overhead for royalties is a good reason to prefer a monthly fee.

beer the guy that made flappy birds did it on his lunch hour. there are alot of kids out theere that dont have the $30 a month or $360 a year. his game took off to the extent it scared him and he stopped selling it. you can make 5k before you have to pay epic anything so for most people unreal is free. hobbiests dont usually make 5k on their games. if they do make 5k then they are probably more than happy to make even more minus the fee. yes pro studios could afford it easily, but they could also afford unreal which has a proven track record.

you have to remember alot of kids come up with a name and call themselves a studio, developer, or indi. they are actually hobbyists, and there are some hobbyists as good as pro developers if you look at game mods. those small “studios”. online stores charge 30% so you would need sales of about $420 to not lose money. with unreal you are garented not to take a loss other than your time. kids tend to have more spare time than spare money. look at the game forums here. everybody has an idea to be the next minecraft. the vast majority fail to even finish their projects. for those people ue4 is much more profitable since they dont take a financial loss.

I’m with RDo on this one, beer
plus it’s like selling a pencil for 90$,

A lot of engines are free and are arguably superior

That’s fine, but these are not the people I am talking about. These “kids” are not that “that small studio audience” Autodesk is supposedly looking for. If you can’t make money off these kids with or without subscription, then why bother targeting them at all?

That doesn’t mean everyone has to follow that business model. UE4 or Unity are not really free. UE4 has royalties, Unity has a professional version. They still have to make money somehow, every user that never pays for anything is just in for the free ride.

autodesks product regardless of what it is, is comfort, Comfort in knowing your toy will have the latest and greatest features. I would like to see what they do with their game engine,

@Joseph

also the kind of comfort that you can be sure that they will only last for 4 years before autodesk stops making any significant updates because they bought out the competition.

beer because kids grow up. the same reason auto desk is free for students. free now so they can earn enough later with your products to afford them. we’ll see in a few years how many retail games are made with autodesks products as opposed to unreal. i think the autodesk engine will flop. “I wonder how many “indie” game developers are looking to be more dependent on Autodesk, rather than less.” makes me think we agree much more than disagree.

look at the lack of adoption of bge, and it is free. students get autodesk free because people aren’t going to afford to learn it. free is how autodesk keeps making the big bucks in the long run. without people that can use the soft ware businesses would quit buying those expensive licenses. schools would teach blender not autodesk. schools would write the text books themselves and keep that money too. there are no autodesk engine pros yet, everybody is in the learning stage for new products. i dont think they could have been successful charging a fee even before ue4 went free. now i think its game over for a monthly fee for the engine.

they are now in an even worse position than blender is vs autodesk. the autodesk engine is an unproven product. unreal is the industries leading engine. you can get ue4 for free while ad wants you to buy a license every month. it would be like autodek being free and blender charging a monthly fee. blender would fold. and i dont think autodesk engine can do any better. i’m suprised autodesk didn’t buy developer that already makes engines. buying the competition seems to be their business plan not innovating or creating on their own. maybe buy id or poach carmak from face book. i have no faith in autodesk to create themselves. those days seem to have ended multiple gens of employees ago for autodesk.

Firstly, on the OP, you do know it is possible to make an announcement about something AD does without unnecessarily tying it to Blender & the GPL, right? The success of Stingray is going to be as independent of Blender as the success of every single other engine out there bar the BGE.

That to one side, to address the Blender integration meme before it goes too far - it’s not going to happen. There isn’t really a need or call for it. Studios that are willing to pony up $30/mth for an engine without clear overriding benefits over the “free” engines are generally happy to pay for the software that works best with it (i.e. pay the subscription for Maya, Maya LT, or 3DS Max as well). Studios that would balk at paying $45/mth for the AD editing software will similarly balk at paying the Stingray subscription.

Let’s face it, one of the biggest draw cards for Blender is price. We may like Feature X or Ideology Y, but in the end the reason most indies will push through the (very steep) learning curve is because they don’t have to pay a fee for the same or similar feature-set offered by the alternatives. By throwing a $30/mth fee on the engine - AD is explicitly targeting a segment of the market that tends to exclude Blender by default. UE4 & Unity have a free option, which means that the same penny-pinchers* who reach for Blender so they don’t have to pay the “AD tax” on their efforts are going to reach for those engines before Stingray.

FWIW, I think the engine looks interesting. Reasonable graphics, the integration with editing software seems efficient, and the combination of nodes & Lua for scripting comes with low memory footprint & high speed, and the libraries it comes integrated with seem reasonably powerful. I think they’ll need to drop the subscription fee to get at the sweet, sweet “asset store” monies but I see nothing wrong with this particular entrant to the market.


[SUP][SUB]* Not an insult. I am one![/SUB][/SUP]

Looks like you get the Maya LT subscription free with the game engine subscription (i.e. both for $30/mth). That might drive some adoption.

I’m assuming they will have a similar offer for student use, like they do for all of their other software. That doesn’t mean it’s a good business strategy to provide some “free” version that can also be used professionally.

i’m suprised autodesk didn’t buy developer that already makes engines. buying the competition seems to be their business plan not innovating or creating on their own.

They actually did buy the engine. It used to be called “Bitsquid” and you probably haven’t heard of it, because it wasn’t marketed to “everyone” before.

I do agree that there is some value in having a large amount of people trained in your engine. On the other hand, there’s also value in not having that. Unity has a worse reputation than it needs to, just due to the sheer amount of crap that has been produced with it by inexperienced developers. UE4 still has that AAA aura due to its past glory, but who is shipping actual AAA games with it? Nobody (yet). Meanwhile, all the real AAA games of this generation are created with in-house engines that nobody outside the company gets to use.

I think Bullet physics engine + a scripting language is at the core of many high end games right? like gta 5 right?

same goes for PhysX?

what physics does this use?
it’s own?

Yea, Autodesk has its golden children who can do no wrong, and its kids who get all of the crap, Autodesk is kind of like a BPD parent come to think about it, But yea, IF you buy autodesks golden products you will get that experience. Their other products I think more about as a form of a back alley transplant donor that is kept on life support just long enough for them to be sucked dry of all of their vital essence and have all of their useful parts broken up and sold on the black market,
But I would still like to see what they can do with a game engine but that being said,