Talk:Hero (video game)/@comment-5638713-20130129200613/@comment-5598003-20130129215947

Eh, that's a long story, hope you don't mind reading.

While I was looking in to various engines and development platforms (Unreal, CryTech, Microsoft XNA, Conitech, etc), Unity stole the stage on its ease of use. When I first downloaded the free version, within minutes I had already developed a visually pleasing island full of plants, and added a FPS character to move around. The ability to integrate with 3DS Max and MotionBuilder left a great impression also. When I started to hit snags and have questions, I found all the help I needed in the forums and tutorials. And for additional resources, the Asset Store was a great help. Combine that with the fact that Unity can port the game to virtually any platform from PC to Mac to Android to Xbox (although you need a license from Microsoft for Xbox), and my mind was made up.

Developing a complex 3D game like Hero by yourself is an extreme undertaking, so I needed to look for the development platform that would give me the look and feel I wanted, but also would let me work as fast as I can think, with a visual WYSIWYG editor and easy access to help and resources. When I saw how quick I could develop in Unity it was an easy decision which engine would be the best fit. Now had I had a dozen developers working alongside me and a budget for premium support and such, I probably would have opted for Unreal or Cry, but going it alone with no budget, it had to be Unity.

But don't knock Unity, it is a very powerful and high quality development platform, and it can produce graphics that rival CryEngine3. The only advantage CryEngine3 has over Unity is it runs faster. You have to think, when developing Crysis 3, Crytech had a 7 figure budget. If I had a 7 figure budget I could make something just as good in Unity. Unity is designed for indie and amateur developers that don't have that big budget, so nobody ever sees anything high budget come from it. Hero is not as realistic and beautiful as Crysis 3 because the fanbase didn't want it to be, it lacked that fluffy cartoony feel of MGQ. But it could be done. If Hero gets funded, you'll see, because after Hero, I plan to make a sequel, and then loop back and make a prequel that follows the legend of Heinrich, which will be done in realistic 3D.