I have read multiple articles and seen a number of different opinion as to whether Skyrim will be running on a new engine. From what I gathered some articles stated that there was an entirely new engine while others made it seem as though it was just a tweaked version of the old engine. So which one is it? If there is already a post on this, sorry, I'm just confused about the issue and need a bit of clarification. Please point me in the right direction.

It is a new engine.

They dropped their old engine, whether they made a new one from scratch or editted another engine, however is unknown.
Rest assured however that it is not NetImmerse.

Todd implied in some old Eurogamer interview that they built it from the Fallout 3 base. Has that changed, I've no idea.

I'm not saying I don't believe you, but where's the link that confirms this? I'd just like to read exactly what was said.

http://twitter.com/nickbreckon/status/14059634595729408

I really am hoping it's a new engine. I think it's a heavily, heavily revamped Gamebryo though.

Edit: Ah derp, wrong link...

Still, it's relevant.

http://www.eurogamer.net/articles/2010-08-16-bethesdas-todd-howard-interview

"inspired by"

I assumed after Bethesda recently said it was a brand new engine that this means they built it from scratch, based on what they learnt they'd need form their prevous games. Not sure anymore..

From http://www.eurogamer.net/articles/2010-08-16-bethesdas-todd-howard-interview


E - ...third time lucky...

That's what I suspect as well. What with all their modifications and additions and changes, it would very much qualify as a new engine, and it would allow them the same familiar interface and structure and compatibility that they are used to.

There is a quote from Gstaff somewhere saying is a brand new in house made engine. It is NOT gamebryo or a tweaked version of it. When someone finds that quite ima put it in my sig...

From our Community Manager:

yeah except todd "head of bethesda" howard said it IS gamebryo tweaked
so...

Aww i had jsut found it, you beat me to it, annndd siging it.

Nicks twitter post awhile back mentions that it was built internally. Its my understanding that NetImmerse and its friend GameBryo are not Bethesda and improving them wouldn't really count as "building internally".

Where did he say that? Give us a link.

I think he's referring to the quotes from the interview (above). In which case I think Todd was reluctant to say it was a new engine and because they have so much experience with Gamebryo they would have coded the new engine with that experience which is why he said "inspired."

its all over the place
its the most recent interview with todd howard
somebody already quoted it on this page

"It started with Morrowind, we went to Oblivion, we did a lot between Oblivion and Fallout 3 because now we had final hardware - with Oblivion we had six months on final hardware, so Fallout 3 technically does a lot more than Oblivion. The new stuff is an even bigger jump from that."

maybe im interpreting it wrong, but it sounds like its still the same tech- evolving though
what i cant give you is a quote from todd howard that says "screw the old engine we built a whole new one baby!"

(edit) which is what i would say if my company made a new game engine

Regarding the "new-ness" of the engine, it's all up to interpretation. If they make an engine using Gamebryo's structures and conventions as a foundation, and build entirely their own material from that foundation, the engine that results can be understood to be "new", as its potential can exceed anything that the actual Gamebryo can do. Note the distinction of using Gamebryo's structures and conventions versus using Gamebryo itself. The former merely uses its arbitrary familiarities to be the architecture for something completely different. The latter uses Gamebryo itself and relegates anything added on to almost a plugin status.

I just don't think it likely that they completely and totally started from scratch and built from the ground up; they've been using the Gamebryo conventions for years. Not that we'll know until more information is divulged.

You omitted the parts of the quote that explain everything to you:



He says the technology is theirs, and inspired by what they already had. GameBryo (The Oblivion/Fallout engine) is NOT Bethesda's technology, and thus he is not talking about GameBryo... and instead he is refering to something Bethesda has developed internal, which obviously would have to be a new engine.

The part you quoted I'm pretty sure is actually not talking about the game engine at all, but rather about system HARDWARE. I think hes refering to the fact that when developing Oblivion they didn't have the final current-gen system development kits (probably for the 360) until near the end of development so they were not able to use the full potential of the current generation of consoles. With Fallout 3 however, they were able to do a lot more... and now they are pushing even beyond that. That's my take on that, and I see absolutely no talk about the game engine in the part of the quote you posted.

Anyway, its a moot point because I CAN give you a link to a quote from someone at Bethesda that does in fact state they are using a new engine. http://twitter.com/nickbreckon/status/14015054991069184. Thats Nick Breckon, the Bethesda community manager. So its a new engine, period.

Edit: Here is a tweet from the Bethesda Blog twitter page as well... http://twitter.com/Bethblog/status/14010984884604929. Man, its amazing how easy stuff is to find on the internet when you, you know, actually want to find it.

The most important thing I care about with the new engine is the capabilities of a Construction Set. If it's a new engine, one would assume the editing tool would have changed as well. I hope it's not too different...

I'm guessing its a new engine, from the ground up, but with heavy Gamebryo influence.

Can't wait for screenies to see what the engine has done for the graphics department.

I doubt they could afford to use the gamebryo engine again, its showing its age and lack of real advancement. A new engine, a fresh approach if you will is needed and I think that is why they have gone with building a new engine. Lets just hope its a good one.

Yeah. A Gamebryo that's not Gamebryo, their own homebrew that utilizes the structures that Gamebryo just so happens to also use (the structures they're accustomed to), but does its own thing because they've built its functionality the way they want.

I don't know how these things work, but I think he means that what they built with Gamebryo tech (their inhouse version, not the same version that Divinity 2 uses for example) is theirs, but the Gamebryo licence is still Emergent Technologies' (or who ever owns it) - and that they've continued to build upon it, obviously, to the point that they call it "brand new".
[/poorly based speculation]

How many times does it need to be confirmed from the company that it's a new engine? Does nobody bother reading dates on things they're reading anymore? August was 4 months ago before they were ready to reveal the details. It's old news, things change, and the company that owned Gamebryo went belly up anyway.

They've said over and over now that it's a brand new, internally developed engine. What more do you want? A giant brick to fall from the sky with the words written on it?