frostbite-engine posts

Battlefield 3 may have just been announced but developer Digital Illusions is also hyping up the new version of its in-house Frostbite game engine. Now a video from a Siggraph presentation has shown up on YouTube that shows off a little more of the engine,

The video, which doesn't show gameplay from Battlefield 3, does show off the real-time radiosity features of the new Frostbite Engine 3 through the use of a middleware program called Enlighten. DICE is still not talking about if Battlefield 3 will include an SDK for mod makers although previous games in the series have had such released. You can check out the video after the jump:

[Via VG247.com]

The first details on Battlefield 3 should be revealed very, very soon. Game Informer's web site has just revealed that its next print magazine issue, due in newsstands later this month, will feature a cover story on Digital Illusions' next game in the military shooter franchise.

Details are still scarce but the web site announcing the cover article states that the game will use the next version of DICE's in-house Frostbite Engine which will have new features like "deferred rendering, real-time radiosity, a new animation system borrowed from the EA Sports label, and an exponential leap in destructibility." As we reported earlier today DICE made the design to cancel the PC port of the long awaited Battlefield 1943 to concentrate its resources on Battlefield 3.

The install base of Windows XP-based PCs among users of Steam has dropped considerable in just the past few months. The operating system, which is over 10 years old, is now used by only 25 percent or so of Steam users, according to the PC game download site's latest survey figures. That's down from over 33 percent of Steam users from the result of July's survey.

Windows 7, especially in its 64-bit version, is the current king of the hill with over 35 percent of Steam users having the OS installed and its expected that the percentage will continue to grow as more PC gamers update their systems. That's good for people who want to play games that will only run on DirectX 10 or DirectX 11. This weekend some web site spotted info that was actually first announced last summer. Battlefield 3, which will use a new version of developer Digital lllusions' Frostbite Engine, will be a DirectX 10-11 exclusive. That means Windows XP and its DirectX 9 API won't be able to run the game when it comes out in late 2011.

Last fall, Electronic Arts annouced that they were reviving their Medal of Honor shooter series by having their Los Angeles studio handle the single player campaign while the Battlefield team at Digital Illusions will build the game's multiplayer mode. Now word has come out that in addition to two separate dev teams, the new Medal of Honor game will have two separate game engines.

The game's official Twitter web site has posted up word that the single player campaign will be built by EALA using Epic's Unreal Engine 3 (indeed the recent trailer for the game is all Unreal Engine 3 footage). However the multiplayer team at DICE decided to use their own in-house Frostbite Engine (the same one being used for Battlefield Bad Company 2) for their portion of the game. It should be interesting to see how the game's development is handled with this rather unique approach.

Download HD Medal of Honor Teaser Trailer (73 MB)
[Via Blue's News]