Rock, Paper, Shotgun

Incredible: Inside The Titanic In CryEngine3

By John Walker on November 24th, 2011 at 12:45 pm.

I wish I had this much time.

You know what your eyes need to see? The inside of the Titanic, recreated in CryEngine 3. That is all.

Revolving doors!

Thanks, as ever, to Alex.

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91 Comments »

  1. 24/11/2011 at 12:49 The Tupper says:

    I want this, but with the Starship Enterprise. Any model except the most recent – you know, the one filmed in the Budweiser building.

    • 24/11/2011 at 12:55 The Colonel says:

      Starship Titanic you mean?

      Its just incredible that someone can make something like this (presumably for no money whatsoever) and, for example, Telltale games look like shit. Anyone who wanted to make an adventure game on the titanic has already had half the work done and just has to slip this guy/gal some francs.

      The best bits of gaming, as ever, sit well outside the flow of capital.

    • 24/11/2011 at 14:05 ezuz says:

      @The Colonel:
      They don’t look like shit. They’re not using the most modern hyper realism graphics (or the last 2 gen either) but it looks as good as it has to be for what they are doing in my opinion. The Sam & Max series, Monkey Island and Back to the Future have all been incredibly enjoyable. Mostly due to the story content and puzzles. The graphics ride shotgun in games like those Telltale makes, just as it should be. Graphics are overrated, and today it feels like more and more games are just overrated tech demos than games.

      But my hat, and I actually have one on, goes of to those responsible for that video and model. Absolutely stunning!

    • 24/11/2011 at 15:09 li says:

      If I might react about Telltale games, specifically the Tales of Monkey Island (I didn’t play any other of their production), which are nice games otherwise, they did something really really wrong with it: they populated it with two faces, the short fat and the tall skinny pirates. They really reused the same models everywhere, in the five chapters, it completely kills the mood. Can you imagine this beautiful Titanic map with clones of the two Telltale dumb pirates everywhere?

    • 24/11/2011 at 16:49 TheTingler says:

      The Colonel: I think you’ve failed to take into account just how much these engines cost to officially licence for commercial purposes, and quite how long these guys will have spent on recreating the Titanic. Telltale’s engine is designed to help them quickly make episodic games.

    • 24/11/2011 at 16:49 phlebas says:

      @Li: It would look rubbish with clones of Fred Flintstone and Barney Rubble everywhere, too. I’m not sure what that proves.

    • 24/11/2011 at 17:22 li says:

      You’re right phlebas, that proves nothing, it was just an opportunity to complain about the Tales of Monkey Island models. I know it’s off-topic, but then it’s The Colonel’s fault.

    • 24/11/2011 at 17:36 The Colonel says:

      That certainly wasn’t a comment on the quality of Telltale games. Just that if it is possible for someone to create something as good as this (and as good as all the free stuff made with Unity, for example), why aren’t the people who are paid to create visuals not A: doing better than people who only use their spare time or B: hiring or making use of the talent and drive to create on show here. That last is my main point really I suppose. Why aren’t small games companies just asking the hoardes of talented artists who create stuff for free that never gets sold to contribute to actual games?

      Much of the problem with Telltale games is that the textures are unnecessarily low-res, which in my opinion hinders the cartoony feel since the lines and textures are pixelly rather than sharp and clean lines. End.

    • 24/11/2011 at 23:43 Archonsod says:

      Because to get something like that you need to turn your back on the millions of people without dedicated graphics hardware, and saddle yourself with DirectX which can be a pain should you decide you also want a Mac or *nix version. If you’re a small developer who’s counting every sale, why on earth would you ever want to shrink your potential market?

    • 24/11/2011 at 23:45 Telke says:

      The Colonel: I don’t know CryEngine 3′s specific licencing style, but with the Unreal Engine Indie agreement, Epic take 25% of your profits after you make $50,000. As far as I know, Cryengine has a similar profit-sharing agreement.

      I mean, $50k or whatever is nice, but you can see why a company like Telltale would prefer to create their own engines.

    • 25/11/2011 at 08:38 Thermal Ions says:

      Hmmm, must go and pull out Starship Titanic and see if it will still run on a modern OS.

  2. 24/11/2011 at 12:52 Skud says:

    Impressive… but can it run Crysis…?

  3. 24/11/2011 at 12:53 Quine says:

    This will go down well.

  4. 24/11/2011 at 12:54 KingKio says:

    now fill it with zombies, and you have a pretty sweet survival game – avoid the zombies & sinking ship!

    • 24/11/2011 at 13:21 Kefren says:

      Better than that would be a haunted ship. Hardly any enemies, more of a sense of being followed, impending doom. I’m thinking of things like Ocean House Hotel in VTMB, or older adventure games like Inherent Evil, Phantasmagoria, Amber Journeys Beyond and Dark Fall.

    • 24/11/2011 at 13:31 goosnargh says:

      I was thinking The Last Express.

      Edit: Crossed with The Ship!

    • 24/11/2011 at 15:56 Mad Hamish says:

      please no zombies. How about half way through the game, the ship crashes into the risen R’lyeh.

    • 24/11/2011 at 23:28 bagga says:

      Now you take this home, throw it in a pot, add some zombies, a Cthulu, and baby, you’ve got a game going.

  5. 24/11/2011 at 12:56 Jahandar says:

    That looks amazing but the motion blur is really jarring.

    • 24/11/2011 at 18:54 Juan Carlo says:

      Ditto.

      I’ve never been able to aclimate myself to motion blur. Even when it’s well done I can’t stand it. It just looks stupid to me. I usually turn it off if I can.

      It’s kind of become the new “bloom,” though, in that it’s popping up everywhere now and thus is kind of hard to ignore.

    • 24/11/2011 at 19:49 Zyrusticae says:

      Camera motion blur is probably a bit overdone, yes.

      Object motion blur, on the other hand, is a basic necessity to increase verisimilitude. The reason why, say, films can run at 24 FPS and not seem herky-jerky is because of that motion blur. There’s a reason 120hz TVs seem really quite jarring when viewed by normal human beings – it’s because we rely on that motion blur to sense movement, and not having it there just puts things squarely into uncanny valley territory at very high frame rates.

      I really think every game released post-2010 should have object motion blur, at the very least. It makes 30 FPS more than bearable (although the input lag is another ball of wax to tackle).

    • 25/11/2011 at 18:28 Megadyptes says:

      I also hate motion blur in games.

  6. 24/11/2011 at 12:56 Lacessit says:

    I was going to comment on that silly wood colour, but thank god, they’re going to adjust it!

    • 24/11/2011 at 12:58 The Tupper says:

      Oh I know. First thing I thought of when I saw it.

      Got to admire their dedication to veracity, though.

    • 24/11/2011 at 20:30 Donjo says:

      I think they might want to up the frame rate a bit first… this isn’t really that impressive to me.. seems like walking through treacle.

  7. 24/11/2011 at 12:57 Gnoupi says:

    It looks beautiful, for sure.

    And yet my gamer eyes have difficulties watching the videos without forcing the thought “too low fps, eyes hurting, not smooth enough when turning”.

    Sigh.

  8. 24/11/2011 at 13:01 Shazbut says:

    Dear The People Who Made This,

    Please remake The Last Express in this manner. I will give you one centillion dollars.

    Regards,

    Shazbut

  9. 24/11/2011 at 13:03 Hoaxfish says:

    It’s got a lot less water in it than I remember

  10. 24/11/2011 at 13:10 TheBigBookOfTerror says:

    While a deathmatch on the Titanic would be massively distasteful, is it equally wrong that I want to play an epic game of hide n’ seek using this? With just two or three people you could be playing for hours! (Assuming the radar can be toggled off, I’ve not played Crysis.)

    • 24/11/2011 at 13:49 The Tupper says:

      If it was, for example, a recreation of the Anne Frank Museum it would be tasteless. I think you’re okay with your suggestion.

    • 24/11/2011 at 13:51 BooleanBob says:

      Damn it Tupper, you’re a bad man for making me laugh. (Obv. I’m a bad ‘un too, for laughing.)

    • 24/11/2011 at 13:51 Dozer says:

      It would be distasteful? Would it? I don’t see the problem. The Titanic’s crew and passengers died when it drove into a solid object at high speed – they weren’t stormed by the Royal Marines and caught in the crossfire when they started fighting an organised crime mob trying to escape to the US…

      edit: I Am Slow.

  11. 24/11/2011 at 13:40 Will Tomas says:

    Is it possible to download this? Or is it part of a project for something not specified yet…?

  12. 24/11/2011 at 14:06 Heliocentric says:

    I was worried about the wood colour for a minute there, phew.

  13. 24/11/2011 at 14:45 Electricfox says:

    Amazing. I’d love to see the Crystal Palace given the same treatment some time, now that would be beautiful :D

  14. 24/11/2011 at 16:00 Jahkaivah says:

    Suddenly I want Outerlight to come back together to make The Ship 2.

    Or, given the more realistic approach here, perhaps a less cartooney and somewhat different take on the multi player murder-em-up. It would be interesting to have a focus on mystery solving by figuring out who on the server is killing people.

  15. 24/11/2011 at 16:04 mongpong says:

    Give me a destructable environment, a shotgun and 31 other players. Time to tear that boat up!…again

  16. 24/11/2011 at 16:33 YanDaik says:

    i can see a nice zombie game potential there.

  17. 24/11/2011 at 17:02 Roshin says:

    Stuff it full with zombies, give me some guns, and we’re all set.

  18. 24/11/2011 at 17:03 Ross Angus says:

    I bought a copy of Quake II just to see a Titanic map. It wasn’t quite as detailed as this one. And I don’t remember so much bloom, back in 1999.

  19. 24/11/2011 at 17:12 S.T.A.L.K.E.R. says:

    If you could somehow recreate the game Titanic: Adventure out of Time using this map I would die of happiness, I played this game so much when I was younger. Memorized almost the entire layout of the ship

    • 24/11/2011 at 19:50 domowoj says:

      oh man i had flashbacks of that game throughout the entire video. Adventure Out of Time with true 100% free-roam would come very close to Best Thing Ever status.

  20. 24/11/2011 at 19:14 Untitled says:

    The dramatic toilet flush was definitely the best part of the video

  21. 24/11/2011 at 19:25 Cunzy1 1 says:

    I’ve been reflecting on the profoundness of “Everything is work in progress”

  22. 24/11/2011 at 20:38 Gabbo says:

    Now, can they render the ship hitting the iceberg and splitting in half?
    That would be interesting to experience in first person.

  23. 25/11/2011 at 00:36 jezternz says:

    This is incredible! Amazing eye for detail, good work. Reminds me of the game “The ship” :’( Sad to see that game die, it was so clever.

  24. 25/11/2011 at 06:18 Hastur says:

    The lifeboats are a lie.

  25. 25/11/2011 at 13:30 Cognitect says:

    Clearly, an immersive sim in the making.

  26. 26/11/2011 at 20:23 caddyB says:

    It looks more real than the movie.

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