The recent announcement by 3D Realms to switch to the Unreal engine to finish Duke Nukem Forever has caused quite a stir in the gaming community, and many concerns have arisen. According to recent polls by various Web sites, the majority of gamers are in favor of Duke 4 using the Unreal engine, but there is unquestionably a significant number of people opposed to the idea. This article is an attempt to weigh the advantages and disadvantages of the Unreal engine against the Quake 2 engine, to help explain how Duke Nukem Forever will be affected by the switch.

Here is a chart with the pros and cons of the switch, and below is further explanation. I am trying to focus on how the switch to the Unreal engine will affect the game, so I didn't include details like the cost, etc.

Pros and Cons of the Big Switch

Pros	Cons
Vast outdoor areas such as Hoover Dam now possible Software renderer Development may go faster due to better tools Less engine modification required MMX and 3DNow! support	Internet play Higher system requirements Delay Unreal doesn't like overclocking

Pros:

1. Vast outdoor areas such as Hoover Dam now possible

Many people who saw Duke Forever at E3 are surprised or disappointed that 3D Realms is switching to the Unreal engine because they were able to create great outdoor scenes with the Quake 2 engine. This was only after lots of modification, and even so, the Unreal engine is still superior for outdoor areas. Almost all outdoor areas in Unreal run with little performance hit, with the exception of a few poorly-optimized ones. 3D Realms will be sure to optimize theirs, because as George says, they are all frame rate freaks.

2. Software renderer

One thing that most people don't realize is that with the Quake 2 engine, Duke Nukem Forever was going to be hardware-only. Writing a 16-bit software renderer would have consumed too much of their time to be worth it. Unreal already has a very good 16-bit software renderer that will be used in Duke 4. Some of the game's features will require a 3D accelerator, but you will still be able to play the game without one, although not without a performance drop.

3. Development may go faster due to better tools

One of the three main concerns people have about the switch to the Unreal engine is that Duke 4 will be significantly delayed. There will, naturally, be some delay, but one of the reasons 3D Realms chose to go with the Unreal engine is its excellent set of tools. The Unreal Editor and UnrealScript are both very powerful tools, and Unreal maps take about five minutes to VIS, as opposed to the three-to-four hour VIS times for Quake 2 maps. This should significantly speed up the mappers' productivity. In the end, it is possible that with more productive tools, the initial delay of porting the content from the Quake 2 to Unreal engine will be cancelled out, and there will be effectively no delay.

4. Less engine modification required

This fits in with the topic above; with less engine modification required, the game may be out sooner, as 3D Realms won't have to tweak with so many issues to make the engine work for them. Unreal's scripting capabilities are powerful enough that the entity system will hardly need to be modified (Chris Hargrove and Nick Shaffner spent over a month re-writing the Quake 2 entity system, which will now be scrapped).

5. MMX and 3DNow! support

Despite MMX's disappointing abilities, Unreal's performance is unquestionably improved with MMX chips. AMD's 3DNow! technology in their new K6-2 chip has made a buzz recently as well, as games specifically designed for use with 3DNow! technology boast a significant performance gain over the original floating-point handicapped K6. When Duke 4 was using the Quake 2 engine, neither of these technologies was to be supported. It has been pointed out that Quake 2 has a 3DNow! GL driver, so it is possible that 3DNow! would have made it into Duke 4 anyway.

1. Internet play

Right now Unreal's Internet play, quite frankly, sucks. Even players with fast connections experience lag. One thing that the Quake 2 engine really has going for it is that it has proven Internet performance. Over regular modem connections to the Internet, Quake 2 performs well, and Unreal is unplayable. This is reminiscent of the early Quake 1 days, and Quake Internet play was eventually fixed. Right now, Epic's top priority is, as it should be, to get an Internet patch out for Unreal. With time, and almost certainly before Duke 4's release, Unreal's Internet play will be improved, although how much is yet to be seen. It is rumored that an Unreal Internet patch will be out soon. If worse comes to worst, and Epic does not fix the Internet play, George Broussard promises that 3D Realms will fix it themselves.

2. Higher system requirements

Another major concern for many gamers is that Unreal's system requirements are too demanding for their systems, and now they won't be able to play Duke Forever. This is a reasonable concern, but keep in mind that Duke 4 will most likely appear on shelves in mid 1999, by which time average system specs for computer games will probably be similar to or greater than those of Unreal's. As mentioned above, Duke 4 will now also have a software renderer, which, in a way, decreases system requirements.

3. Delay

Having to switch to a completely different game engine, it is quite possible that Duke Nukem Forever will experience a delay. George Broussard said that most of their work will go right over to Unreal, taking from around a month to six weeks. All of the maps will have to be redone however, and can't be redone until after the map designers learn to effectively use the Unreal Editor. As Broussard stated, however, they are professionals, and it hopefully won't take them too long to start cranking away with UnrealEd. In game development, many things can go wrong, and that is why we see games delayed so often. If it only takes a month to six weeks to move to the Unreal engine, 3D Realms will have done well. As mentioned above, however, Unreal's tools may actually speed up the development of Duke Nukem Forever in the end.

4. Unreal doesn't like overclocking

The fact that Unreal sometimes has problems with overclocked processors and video cards is an issue to some gamers. Many gamers who run overclocked systems have no problems running Unreal, but some overclocked systems experience bad side-effects in Unreal that go away after de-overclocking. This could possibly be an issue in Duke 4 for gamers who overclock their systems. Because overclocking is generally discouraged by the computer industry, it is doubtful that time will be taken to fix this problem.