LazyTown : Powered by the Unreal Engine!
Hi everybody, this would be my first posting in this community, thought I've been browsing and posting for the past month or two. That sentence is somewhat cliche and I say it whenever I post something in a new place, but I feel wrong if I don't say it! Anyways...
At the very end of LazyTown, I noticed something new to Season 2...
Third icon on the far right side, I recognized the symbol immediately. It's the "Unreal" graphics engine symbol, and you can even read the "Unreal" under it. This is a game engine that is sold by "Epic Games" to other game developers to make games in. I'm sure at least some of you have heard of games like, "Unreal Tournament", "Unreal", "Gears of War", and "Lineage II". All of those are powered by different versions of the Unreal engine. As someone who is majoring in computer science, I found it extremely awesome that LazyTown is taking advantage of this technology. I have to admit I was a bit shocked to see the same engine that powers "Postal" is being used in LazyTown (shocked in a good way).
What I really want to know if which version of the engine they are using. I'm assuming they are using Unreal 3 engine, which is being used in "Gears of War" for the Xbox 360. Here's what it is capable of (image courtesy of IGN):
I'm guessing they'll use the engine to do CGI fly-by's in the town and such. I haven't actually had a chance to watch the new episodes yet (I just skipped to end to make sure the file was okay), but I'll be looking forward to see what they used the Unreal engine for!
I hope this is as cool to everyone else as it is to me, haha. If not, oh well, this made my day!
Edit:
I realized the picture is a bit small, but it's a lot more clear when watching the episode in fullscreen. Here's a digitally enlarged version. You can definately read Unreal (not to mention it's the symbol =p ).
Edit2:
I did a little more research and found that the cost for licensing the full Unreal 2 engine is $350,000 USD for video games. They also get 3% royalty from all game revenue. They have a little section where they talk about "Non-Traditional Products", which would be what LazyTown would fall under. These are negotiated on a per-case basis. But in general, I'm sure it wasn't cheap for them to license it. If they licensed the Unreal 3 engine, we can assume it is even more =). Bottom line: I'm sure they will put it to good use, because it isn't cheap (though I bet LazyTown makes a lot of money compared to ~$350k)!
At the very end of LazyTown, I noticed something new to Season 2...
Third icon on the far right side, I recognized the symbol immediately. It's the "Unreal" graphics engine symbol, and you can even read the "Unreal" under it. This is a game engine that is sold by "Epic Games" to other game developers to make games in. I'm sure at least some of you have heard of games like, "Unreal Tournament", "Unreal", "Gears of War", and "Lineage II". All of those are powered by different versions of the Unreal engine. As someone who is majoring in computer science, I found it extremely awesome that LazyTown is taking advantage of this technology. I have to admit I was a bit shocked to see the same engine that powers "Postal" is being used in LazyTown (shocked in a good way).
What I really want to know if which version of the engine they are using. I'm assuming they are using Unreal 3 engine, which is being used in "Gears of War" for the Xbox 360. Here's what it is capable of (image courtesy of IGN):
I'm guessing they'll use the engine to do CGI fly-by's in the town and such. I haven't actually had a chance to watch the new episodes yet (I just skipped to end to make sure the file was okay), but I'll be looking forward to see what they used the Unreal engine for!
I hope this is as cool to everyone else as it is to me, haha. If not, oh well, this made my day!
Edit:
I realized the picture is a bit small, but it's a lot more clear when watching the episode in fullscreen. Here's a digitally enlarged version. You can definately read Unreal (not to mention it's the symbol =p ).
Edit2:
I did a little more research and found that the cost for licensing the full Unreal 2 engine is $350,000 USD for video games. They also get 3% royalty from all game revenue. They have a little section where they talk about "Non-Traditional Products", which would be what LazyTown would fall under. These are negotiated on a per-case basis. But in general, I'm sure it wasn't cheap for them to license it. If they licensed the Unreal 3 engine, we can assume it is even more =). Bottom line: I'm sure they will put it to good use, because it isn't cheap (though I bet LazyTown makes a lot of money compared to ~$350k)!