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Boy, I loved that game, Outcast. And I am really excited about tzhe upcoming Outcast 2, even if it is only for PS2. Now Gamers.nl has done an interview with Franck Sauer, art director at Appeal, about the upcoming sequel. Here's something:
Gamers.nl: You have chosen to develop a new polygon based engine called Himalaya. What were the biggest advantages above a voxel based engine and were there any drawbacks?
Franck Sauer: There were obviously a few advantages in using the voxel engine, and that's why we did it in outcast. Like the visibility culling, or the usage of mip maps to draw vast landscapes. But the disadvantages were numerous. Artistic constraints like we could only draw convex things, edges problems, fixed resolution... But the main disadvantage was the fact that it did not match at all the new hardware architectures based on polygon that meant that we had to relly on a software renderer.
Now with Himalaya, we have a consistent engine were everything is made of polygon objects, and it is very effective because it is very close to the hardware architectures, especially on consoles. Now we have the game running at 60 fps on a Playstation 2, compared to the 17 fps average we had on outcast when it came out. That means more detailed animation and camera movements, and a feeling of really being there in the world. |
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Outcast 2 Interview at Gamers.nl
