The Unity Engine.
It's purdy.
We're coming a little full circle here. As of this writing, Oddworld: New N Tasty will launch in five days. And...well, just look at this. This is impressive work for the engine to create...and gamers who feel the need to innovate and begin working with developer-level software will find it within a reasonable price. A year of Unity Pro costs as much as your typical phone subscription, or if you have cash to burn, you can dump a full $1,500 to use it as you see fit. Of course, this is just one such option gaining popularity among amateur aspiring game developers. For those on a budget, Steam sells tons of software catered to those wanting to test the waters or begin serious development of an idea.
For $10 or less per month, you can rent out the Cryengine™, which builds environments as gorgeous as this.
We're...honestly kind of in a mod and do-it-yourself hay-day. I remember purchasing the book of Video Game Careers back at a Gamestop once, and being intrigued by said do-it-yourself section. That was a decade ago, and since then, a plethora of software has come out and become more accessible, if not just outright more powerful. It's available for reasonable rates and prices, and even if you're not doing it for the video game industry, the tools are still potent enough to gain skills in illustration and modeling, audio, programming...the gaming industry has many facets to it, and most if not all of them branch out into other industries looking for those very same skill sets.
Being a 90's kid, I came into the world of gaming around the time Sega Saturn (I will get to that later) and PSX hit the scene. It's funny, looking at games back in the day and remembering how much I admired the graphics at the time. If you had shown any of us how games would look in two decades, we wouldn't have believed you. From 16-bits to the aforementioned pictures I've already shown? Seriously? And the software has gotten to the point where it's commercially available?
And it can actually make full-fledged recreations of classics!?
I constantly reflect on the old stuff because the new stuff keeps getting more and more intense. A lot of stuff is being generated by the public eye, free games constantly get released both in flash form and true stand-alone games. The only thing separating the common man from a big-budget release title is time and manpower, honestly. It could theoretically take ONE game that becomes a smash hit before you become your own company anyway. And before you say that it can't happen...
It totally can.
But even earlier examples, such as the mod of Half Life called Counter-Strike came about from a garage. It's STILL being played nearly 20 years later, since virtually every computer in the world could run it with ease nowadays. Garry's Mod went commercial as well two years after multiple free updates. The modding community has been in its own element for years now, but with the tools becoming more powerful and more accessible, true retail games are now on the table for people to develop. The only thing holding people back is time.
But even THAT can be mitigated. Sound team can work as D.J.'s, artists can commission their work on Etsy and Deviantart and a million other websites that will sell their works. Programmers never miss a beat going back and forth between projects for work and the game. Design team keeps an eye on their game and can add valuable information from their experience understanding the public eye. The software people use for making the game can actually help them with their jobs; and if some so choose, this could become their full-time job using their creation as part of a portfolio.
Technology keeps advancing. Failed technology of the past is being improved upon; what was once the Virtual Boy is now the Oculus Rift. People keep pushing the idea of full-immersion in a game, and they're getting closer and closer. The Virtuix Omni is a little rough of an idea, but the technology can eventually get that far to have full motion as directed by your physical movement. Reading where your gun is has become trivial, so honestly combining the Oculus Rift with the Virtuix Omni...and you can have an entire entertainment business around interactive games. The only real trick is incorporating full movement with a minimalistic setup; because no matter how you do it, you know you're still in a harness.
While I have a disdain for the influx of Slenderman-style games released, things like the Oculus Rift and Unity engine have allowed people to design basic games and get a feel for how they're done. It's getting pretty crazy, when you consider that the Fifth Generation of games (1993 to 2001) had just begun to spawn things like the Gameboy Color...as late as 1998. We're now in the Eighth Generation, and we now have advanced the portability tech to the point where your phone can essentially have and run every single Gameboy game, NES game, SNES game, Genesis Game, along with a handful of PSX and N64 games and not even bat an eye; and that's just the Seventh Generation talking really, the 8th generation has just gotten started.
Imagine where we'll be when the Ninth or Tenth Generation hits.
They knew all along.
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