What If The Creation Kit Is Completely Different Than GECK.. : V - Skyrim

» Sun Nov 21, 2010 7:37 am

Comparing Reach's forge to a fully fledged... well, creation kit is more accurate than editor, as it's just as capable of creation as it is modification is somewhat like comparing a unicycle made out of chocolate to a foundation battlecruiser. Sure, the unicycle might be easier to use, but I know which one I'd want to travel in.

Very true. One thing I would really like to see though, would be Bethesda adding multiple options for tweaking settings on the console version. I was really pleasantly surprised to find that ability through console commands in Two Worlds 2 n consoles. Being able to tweak motion blur, turn off fog, modify DOF, change vsynch and many other settings was a really great feature since most of those things made the game visually ugly and disorienting. I know it's just graphical options, but it would go a long way to giving a bit of modding "feel" to the console crowd.

» Sun Nov 21, 2010 2:47 am

That said....

If the CK is more like the Oblivion CS, it shouldn't be that difficult to adjust to. Even if it's closer to the GECK, not a big deal, but I found dialogue to be far more difficult to deal with in GECK than it was in the CS. So I'm hoping the CK won't be just as much of a pain.

Of course, one is going to have to assume that path gridding won't be like the CS. GECK navmeshes were something I never could wrap my head around. Doubtful Skyrim will be taking a step backward to path nodes.

I do hope they don't get rid of the navmesh.. I found it incredibly easy to use..
Think of it as spreading icing on a cake. the icing is where NPC's can walk.. you can color the icing to make the NPC's to use that more often..
Like say a sidewalk instead of the middle of the street.. NPC's can still walk on the street.. but they would rather walk on the sidewalk

» Sun Nov 21, 2010 2:18 pm

Modders gunna mod. :disguise:

» Sun Nov 21, 2010 12:31 pm

I doubt seriously modders are going to just abandon modding because the tool isn't identical to an older tool. We have all had to learn new tools from time to time - it's part of the game (pun intended)

That said, Bethesda uses the same tool to create the game. They have people who have been around since Daggerfall (but more importantly, Morrowind), and they are comfortable with a certain work environment. I seriously doubt that beyond tweaks to make game specific functionality accessible, it's going to be that different from the Oblivion CS or GECK.

I could be wrong, and if I am, I'll have to start in learning the new tool - but I would be amazed if it's very different.

What is a pain is adding NPC dialog. The voice acting thing is a real impediment to quest mods with lots of dialog.I know you can use silent sound files, but then it makes your stuff stand out like a sore thumb. I fully expect Skyrim to have the same issue.

There is a reason why the mods for Oblivion differed in type from the mods for Morrowind. Morrowind got a lot more large quest mods, while Oblivion seemed to get more weapons, armor, and body type mods. Hopefully, there will be enough generic voice dialog to make mods with...

» Sun Nov 21, 2010 9:24 am

Talking about the creation engine? Either post official confirmation or get out. Last thing this game needs is more false rumors flying around from baseless posts.

This post stinks of "Hurr durr the graphic style is the same so it must be the same game engine"

While not officially confirem, they technically only needed to take out the renderer (The only Gamebryo part in the entire engine) and they can call it a brand new engine. Which is more then likely what is the case because I highly doubt they bruild a next-gen engine from scratch in the time post Fallout 3. I would bet anything they resued a lot of code from their previous engine.

What they need to do—is have a creation kit for consoles...PC flamers be gone! The power of Christ compels you!! They did it, albeit in a comparatively simple form, in Halo: Reach with the Forge. I just think it would be nice for console users to get a taste of the modding pie without having to shell out $$$$ for a gaming rig.

The forge is a level editor. A game editor is capable of making whole new games. Literally. If you had the time and man-power you could use the CS or GECK to make a whole new game from scratch, unrelated to Oblivion or Fallout in any way shape or form aside from game mechanics. And because of that, the editors WILL NEVER run on consoles. They are just too demanding on system reasources. Can you imagine running a landscape generator or region generator on a console that only has 512MB of ram? Aint happening.

» Sun Nov 21, 2010 8:34 am

I think the new Creation Kit is going to be very similar as it's made by the same company and for the same company. They're using it themselves to make the game. This is like learning to use Windows Vista/7 after Windows XP, so of course modders are going to use it.

» Sun Nov 21, 2010 5:26 am

modders mod games that dont come with mod kits. just having one different from the tool accustomed to wont be a detterent

» Sun Nov 21, 2010 3:29 am

out of all these CS and GECK and CK i loved the good old TES 3 CS most! :sadvaultboy:

» Sun Nov 21, 2010 2:49 pm

I don't think it will really be a problem.
From what I understand they made it themselves, so I doubt they're going to make it in a way that's terribly different except where is necessary. Most of the difficulty with learning to use the construction set is for people who simply weren't familiar with how that kind of development kit worked at all, and thus each area was completely new. If they're already familiar with how it works, most likely it will only take some minor adjusting.

Some of the newer features might take some learning, but that's just part of it.
I can't imagine that the fact that it is new or different being a factor in whether I will mod or not.

» Sun Nov 21, 2010 9:44 am

Please let Nifskope be a thing of the past... please lol.

» Sun Nov 21, 2010 4:54 pm

I've already made an extensive post speculating about the .nif file format, since if the format is changed to something proprietary, it'll be months before the modding community's enterprising coders put together the export/import scripts and tools necessary to get new meshes into the game. From a while back:

1. The .nif file format is specific to the NetImmerse/Gamebryo engine. If the engine is entirely new, as insinuated by Bethesda, than all of the third-party tools we use to mod Oblivion and Morrowind models are no good. I'm talking about NifTools/NIfscope, the exporters/importers for 3DSMax and Blender, etc. These are used to make new armor, weapon, and building meshes -- and let's face it, anyone who mods their game is going to add in at least one of those three. Even if you stick to OOO or MMM as your one mod to rule them all, both add new meshes. . .

2. People have been worrying that if new, proprietary model files are used, it might be several months before codes are able to make exporters and tools equal to our current ones. However, Bethesda didn't release .nif exporters and tools for Morrowind/Oblivion because they didn't own the software. Netimmerse/Gamebryo did. If the new engine uses a new model file extension, or something well-known like .obj, than tools and exporters should/might/may be released along with the Creation Kit.

3. So from what I have been able to glean from other people's speculation, people seem to believe that Bethesda's "new engine" is less of a new engine and more an overhaul of the last one. I'm fine with that, as I certainly enjoyed gameplay in Oblivion/Fallout, and whatever improvements they've made look awesome in the trailer (As food for thought, they've promised a great many things that I can't see as possible with the old engine, even with OBSE scripting, i.e., finishing moves; kung-fu knockdown move was attempted in Deadly Reflex, but it never looked/felt right). If the engine is based on the old one, than the .nif format is very likely to still be in use.

4. Looking at the available screenshots, things are looking more detailed -- but subtracting for superior modelling, this might be a mix of better in-game filters and higher resolution textures. I can discern the texture and normal mapping on the player's arm in the trailer, for example. The .nif format is fully capable of rendering Skyrim's demonstrated graphics.

I initially had a 5th point, wondering whether the .nif could handle customized bodies, but someone pointed out a few mods that proved that the .nif was perfectly capable. Since we've found out that the engine IS based on Gamebryo, I'm making an educated guess and saying that .nifs and Nikskope will make a return in Skyrim. They'll likely need to be updated for a new .nif version though; maybe coders will make the Nifskope tool easier to use? I agree that it isn't very intuitive.

» Sun Nov 21, 2010 6:36 am

The forge is a level editor. A game editor is capable of making whole new games. Literally. If you had the time and man-power you could use the CS or GECK to make a whole new game from scratch, unrelated to Oblivion or Fallout in any way shape or form aside from game mechanics. And because of that, the editors WILL NEVER run on consoles. They are just too demanding on system reasources. Can you imagine running a landscape generator or region generator on a console that only has 512MB of ram? Aint happening.

Yes you could make a new game, think Fallout New Vegas from Fallout 3.
Main reason why the CE will not work on consoles is not system resources but that its a windows program, it uses far more of windows resources than the game, like the entire user interface and that you see with the exception of the render window.
The Oblivion CS has lots of quick and dirty programming, it has lots of raw edges you would not find in an commercial program, like if you click on the mesh used by an object you have to find it, if you cancel it forget the original mesh.

However the new editor might be pretty different, objects has more properties because of decals, the data structure might be different, they might even change scripting language,

» Sun Nov 21, 2010 7:32 am

While not officially confirem, they technically only needed to take out the renderer (The only Gamebryo part in the entire engine) and they can call it a brand new engine. Which is more then likely what is the case because I highly doubt they bruild a next-gen engine from scratch in the time post Fallout 3. I would bet anything they resued a lot of code from their previous engine.

You do realize they've been working on Skyrim since SI was published, right? The trademarks were in place in mid-2007 and I know one of the head guys has said they will have been working on it for 4 years by the time the game is actually out.

Even so, Fallout 3 was 2008. It's not inconceivable that they could have written a new engine since late 2008 but it's not as likely.

» Sun Nov 21, 2010 6:34 am

Todd has admitted multiple times that "the Creation Engine" is based entirely around the technology used in Gamebryo. So much so that a few months before Skyrims announcement, they stated that they were using a heavily modified version of Gamebryo for their next game. Then they changed their story to state that they modified the engine so much that they are considering it a new engine and gave it a new name. Seriously, just take a look at some Skyrim screens and tell me that the game doesn't have a very "familiar" look to it. I'm not saying that the game doesn't look great, but it is definitely built around the same tech they have been using, albeit heavily modified.

If you want proof, here is quote from Todd directly off the Skyrim website: So yes, the game is still based around the tech from Gamebryo, it has just been heavily modified.

"Rewriting" each of those game systems could be as simple as minor tweaks or it may have been rewritten from scratch. Logically, if they literally rewrote every system from scratch, it would have been much easier to just license a new engine or create an entirely new one. They obviously wanted to keep what was familiar and what worked, and tweak it to suit their preferences. I personally think it is more of a marketing tool to avoid the negative stigma of the Gamebryo engine, but that is just me. Truth is, whether you want to admit or not, the game is based on Gamebryo.........hurrr durrr.

That quote from Todd is unfortunate indeed...at least for people who wants to see a new engine (like meh

).

On the other hand, apart from many claims that the engine is "entirely new" by the devs, and that modifying an engine that is not owned/created by you (as I think Gamebryo is), and releasing it claiming that it's your own engine maybe it's a bit...erhm...illegal? makes me doubt. Maybe Todd only was referring to "ways of doing things", and not the engine/code literally.

» Sun Nov 21, 2010 3:45 pm

nice gaming rig will cost you around $800.

I paid around 800 for my laptop, it'll handle Dragon Age 2 just fine on medium (Which is basically the setting the 360 will be using it seems by comparing graphical quality, either that or there's not much of a difference in the settings), despite it's GPU being kinda meh, the rest of the machine makes up for it.

So yeah, you can easily get a nice rig for 800$.

» Sun Nov 21, 2010 5:17 am

I looked at a Creation Kit video and it looks kinda sweet. Don't remember if the dialogue system was in it though

» Sun Nov 21, 2010 8:37 pm

Todd has admitted multiple times that "the Creation Engine" is based entirely around the technology used in Gamebryo. So much so that a few months before Skyrims announcement, they stated that they were using a heavily modified version of Gamebryo for their next game. Then they changed their story to state that they modified the engine so much that they are considering it a new engine and gave it a new name. Seriously, just take a look at some Skyrim screens and tell me that the game doesn't have a very "familiar" look to it. I'm not saying that the game doesn't look great, but it is definitely built around the same tech they have been using, albeit heavily modified.

If you want proof, here is quote from Todd directly off the Skyrim website: So yes, the game is still based around the tech from Gamebryo, it has just been heavily modified.

"Rewriting" each of those game systems could be as simple as minor tweaks or it may have been rewritten from scratch. Logically, if they literally rewrote every system from scratch, it would have been much easier to just license a new engine or create an entirely new one. They obviously wanted to keep what was familiar and what worked, and tweak it to suit their preferences. I personally think it is more of a marketing tool to avoid the negative stigma of the Gamebryo engine, but that is just me. Truth is, whether you want to admit or not, the game is based on Gamebryo.........hurrr durrr.

Majorly taken out of context, and an incredibly arrogant scale.

"being based around the technology" can mean anything, assuming you even quoted him correctly. By that standard everything is based around everything since most game engines are created in very similar fashions. The problem with Bethesda gamebryo was that it has been in such constant use and under such constant modification that the code base itself became rather unoptimized and disorganized. Being based around "Gamebyro technology" likely means that the game engine has been made to function in a similar method, such as utilizing the same format types or having a similar editor tool. This does not mean for a second that the two engines are anything alike in practical performance.

You can't piece together code to create a game engine. It jsut woudln't work. In most circumstances it's actually more work to heavily modify an engine than it is just to write your own from scratch. It's likely that the engine has just been created to operate and handle in a similar fashion to Gamebryo, that does not mean it's based on the shoddy code of Bethesda's Gamebryo.

Obviously the developers are not going to create a game engine with an interface aspect that operates in an entirely different fashion if they just spent the last 10 years working in Gamebryo, they'll create a new engine that's just as easy to work with. It still does not mean the engine itself "based on gamebryo" it is based on Gamebryo on concept only, not in the damn codework.

I looked at a Creation Kit video and it looks kinda sweet. Don't remember if the dialogue system was in it though

I have not heard any word of this.

» Sun Nov 21, 2010 3:20 pm

obviously, this is directed at modders. supposedly, this is a whole new engine (arguable but lets give them the benefit of the doubt) and im assuming that means a new SDK. as a modder will you still be interested in modding if you have to relearn how to use an entirely new software?

I fully expect that there will be differences and similarities. For example, I am willing to bet that the Navmesh system has changed little since the Fallout games (perhaps some new improvements, new tests, maybe an auto-gen mode we can use), but the core aspects would be the same of how it worked. There are many such functions in the game that will likely work the same, and thus the CS will also contain similar functionality.

That said, I don't expect them to "look" very much alike, and certainly there will be alot of differences. The one thing to bear in mind is that BGS spent a great deal of time making the CS->GECK->NVGECK. Just like the game itself, it would be impossible for BGS to produce these games at 1 every other year if they completely re-built the CS every time - its a Massive tool for those that know software applications, I am daily still amazed by the things it can do all in one package.

I work and live in the GECK, been modding in it for > 3 years now and I Still have not unlocked all of the things it can do, I probably never will. A full manual for the GECK would be 1,000 pages. If you had to buy it in the store as a commercial app, it would be several thousand dollars if priced per-feature. I have probably logged 2,000-3,000 hours in it now, far more than any of the BGS games I've bought combined, and I love the tool. My respect for Bethesda for having made and freely-given this tool to the community is one of the things that has made me life-long Bethesda fan, and I very much look forward to the new things they add for Skyrim!

Miax

» Sun Nov 21, 2010 6:08 pm

I have to agree here, I have tremendous respect for Bethesda for making these tools available and letting us add, remove or build on the game the way we see fit to truly make it our own, thank you Bethesda. I don't know who orginally thought "Hey...let's give tools to the players so it's easier for them to mod our game!" but if I ever find out, I will do whatever he/she wants...seriously, anything goes...anything.

» Sun Nov 21, 2010 3:54 pm

As an xbox user i cant use mods. But i always check youtube to see what people have done mod wise. I think there are some very creative people out there,and i am looking forward to see what they do with skyrim mods ,always a good watch

» Sun Nov 21, 2010 8:34 pm

I have not heard any word of this.

My bad. I was thinking about the http://www.havok.com/index.php?page=havok-behavior engine

» Sun Nov 21, 2010 7:12 pm

I just watched that Havoc video -- does this mean that there can't be any new animation mods, because new animations would need to be run through Havoc? Or would all of that animation blending they were talking about be done in-game, on the fly?

Nooo, animation moooods :ahhh:

» Sun Nov 21, 2010 7:10 am

I personally would rather it be more powerful and require me relearning everything I know about modding TES than a creation tool that is simplified so that I don't have to do any reading or experimenting before I can do what I want.

» Sun Nov 21, 2010 9:23 pm

Todd has admitted multiple times that "the Creation Engine" is based entirely around the technology used in Gamebryo. So much so that a few months before Skyrims announcement, they stated that they were using a heavily modified version of Gamebryo for their next game. Then they changed their story to state that they modified the engine so much that they are considering it a new engine and gave it a new name. Seriously, just take a look at some Skyrim screens and tell me that the game doesn't have a very "familiar" look to it. I'm not saying that the game doesn't look great, but it is definitely built around the same tech they have been using, albeit heavily modified.

If you want proof, here is quote from Todd directly off the Skyrim website: So yes, the game is still based around the tech from Gamebryo, it has just been heavily modified.

"Rewriting" each of those game systems could be as simple as minor tweaks or it may have been rewritten from scratch. Logically, if they literally rewrote every system from scratch, it would have been much easier to just license a new engine or create an entirely new one. They obviously wanted to keep what was familiar and what worked, and tweak it to suit their preferences. I personally think it is more of a marketing tool to avoid the negative stigma of the Gamebryo engine, but that is just me. Truth is, whether you want to admit or not, the game is based on Gamebryo.........hurrr durrr.

Thank for this info! I don't know this! So... Bethesda only rename their engine to say "It's new and better than Gamebryo!", but the truth is they are using the same engine since Morrowind game came out... But heavy modifications...

It's truth Oblivion of 2005 have Radiant IA and all dynamic shadows? Oblivion in 2005 have Creation Engine?! Bethesda's lies... But they do GREAT games, when the las thing change i become on a TERRORIST

» Sun Nov 21, 2010 7:15 am

I'm just looking forward to being able to customise the game to personalise my own player home - even if it means learning again from scratch.

It's a bit finger-in-the-wind to say how similar it would be - I mean, even Windows is very different when you compare Vista to Win 95. Morrowind came out 9 years ago! Even the GECK is only just about similar enough to the Morrowind CS for modders to be able to work out mostly how to use it. If the devs can work out how to use the Creation Kit - even if they are professionals and we hobbyists - it's still within the realms of mortal (wo)man to be able to figure out how to use it.

One pink castle coming up!