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I was originally going to post this as a response to a post in a different thread, but I feel like this deserves to be discussed in a broader sense, and to avoid derailing another topic. I have to ask: why are people so concerned with what engine a game uses? To me, the only people who need to worry about engines are the developers, as they need to work with it in order to create their game. But why is it an issue for the average consumer (or player, for free games such as the ones at W3D Hub)? It's pretty baffling, honestly. To use a AAA example: One of the many criticisms that Call of Duty has received over the years is the fact that they essentially all use the same engine. Personally, I don't see why it matters, as the IW engine clearly does everything Infinity Ward/Sledgehammer/Treyarch want it to do, not to mention the fact that it's been tweaked and updated over the years. The same could be said for W3D; Sure, it's an old engine, but it's come a long way since Renegade came out in 2002. Just look at what we have so far; sprinting, digging underground, deployable artillery, walkers, jetpacks, chronoshifting, sandworms, etc... Stuff that nobody would've thought remotely possible 13 years ago. And yet, there is still a push for a switch to UDK or UE4 because they're "better engines." While I'm not blind to the advantages of moving to UE4, I do wonder why people claim that the switch would solve all of our issues and bring in tons of players. What are your thoughts on this? Is there something I'm missing here?

For me, a game engine facilitates game functionality. If Game Engine A has all of the functionality that a team needs to make it's game, but Game Engine B has none of the functionality, but features better graphics and physics, then Engine A is the clear winner, because it already has a large amount of the key pieces in place to make the game that the team wants to make. If you chalk it up to W3D vs UDK, W3D has all of the functionality there already, whereas UDK (even with the Renegade X SDK) does not.

Mostly graphical and modding capabilities. I will admit, in the past few weeks working as a full-time developer, I got frustrated at times with outdated techniques. For those of you who do not know (most of you), I have been working full-time on TSR. I've been working on not only bringing new features and balancing, but also some new graphics. I've been updating our effects, and also implementing a new system of headlights and brakelights that is designed to bring a bit more to the table in terms of graphics. Reception internally has been positive, but it is difficult as I need to do a lot of these things. For all that work, it adds a bit graphically, but it isn't as good as what I really want. To let me demonstrate, I was working on a few lightmaps for AR before I started work on TSR. Here is my (WIP) results on the barracks after a few iterations: This looks great, yes? Well, unfortunately, w3d does not support the lighting I did here, so I need to fake it. And it still won't look as good as this render. However, with an engine like UE4, I can create the lightmap right in the engine, and essentially, what you see is what you get in-game, since the editor is the game. Do further note that I have access to the latest script builds of w3d, and a ton of documentation and helpful experience. What about modders who do not have access to this stuff? They will for sure have a much harder time.

Why is the biped top heavy walker leaning with the terrain? Does UDK not have the power to make proper mech physics? Or are you showing off that a normal tank can be animated like a mech like has been done in Renegade and many other games for years? I see little point moving to UDK if its going to have us make the same hacks Renegade already does. It might be prettier, but why move from one dated engine to another.