Mark Rein, VP of EPIC Games, says that the studio’s new DirectX 11 Unreal Engine justifies the creation of new consoles by Microsoft and Sony. He recently sat down for an interview with industry publication Develop and suggested that after seeing the arrival of iPad 2 by Apple, Steve Jobs will be able to release a device that can host DX11 within just a couple of years.
If Apple continues on this scale, they’ll have a device that can run this [points to Unreal Engine DX11 demo] in a couple of years. But, that demo we’ve shown is aimed at the game console makers. We’re telling them that this is the big leap that we think justifies that new piece of hardware you’re going to build, and we’re telling them that this is what we need next-gen consoles to be capable of, because we can’t build a more powerful PC than the one that’s running the DX11 demo! [Laughs]
For us, now when we sit down with various companies and talk about the future, the discussion is no longer theoretical. We can show them this. We can say ‘here’s our demo, try it on your hardware’. And we want feedback – let us know what we can simplify, let us know what we can improve.
Epic Game claims that DirextX 11, physics engine PhysX, APEX and NVIDIA 3D bring unprecedented new levels of realism. They also revealed a tech demo for the technology they are promoting which was simply stunning.
Personally, I don’t know if this new technology alone justifies the creation and release of next-gen consoles (like XBOX 720 and PS4), but I have to agree that the graphics look quite stunning. What pleasantly surprised me though in this demo is the animation. It looks amazing. I know the animation is becoming better and better with games like Gears of War 2 and Mass Effect 2, but if Unreal Engine can provide this quality of animation and overall graphics representation, we are in for a treat.
What do you think, does Epic Game actually justifies the release of next-gen consoles, or can the XBOX 360 and Playstation 3 handle themselves just fine for the next couple of years?