Crytek's CryEngine in UK classrooms
by Brooke Pilley 
Sep 12th 2009 at 8:00PM
Filed under: Aion, MMO industry, Consoles, Academic
This is really big news because only the priciest universities tend to license high quality software for their students to learn on. They're the only ones that can afford it. It's also great for students to dream up pie in the sky concepts for games, but knowing what's practical in the real world is essential. "Universities are looking to foster creativity and send people out into the industry who have lots of ideas, but it's also about that practical hands-on training so that they know what the limitations are," says Managing Director of Crytek UK Karl Hilton. "It's very easy for students to come out of the academic world and not have a grasp on the realities of making a video game."
We hope more MMOs are released with CryEngine due to its stellar performance and scalability and it would be great if other graphics engine companies followed suit to increase the options in our genre.
Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)
remixedcat said on 9:31PM 9-12-2009
This is heavily flawed becuase if you teach people high end engines at college and they try to make thier own games after the graduate, their classes will be for nothing becuase the average joe cannot possibly afford CRYengine or Unreal Engine or 3dsmax or any of those tools.
They will have to seek out other cheaper alternatives and have to learn all over again anyways. So it's pointless to go to game design schools becuase I seriously doubt if they teach courses using open source engines and 3d editors.
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xslipperyx said on 10:48PM 9-12-2009
So colleges should just used dumbed down software so that when students get out into the "real world" then they have no idea what kind of possibilities there are with more advanced technology? Your logic is horrible and I doubt you even ever went to college. I would have loved the opportunity to learn on the advanced 3D engines in a school environment and I'm glad to see they're doing this. It's more of a marketing move than anything but the best way to get good people to use your product is to give lots of people a chance to use it. Then they're more likely to use it for development because they are familiar with it.
What would you have said to this if Blizzard had released their WoW engine to schools?
Cray said on 10:38PM 9-12-2009
So you are suggesting colleges teach cheaper alternatives so that when students graduate and apply for jobs in game development industry they can't get hired because their education is outdated.
Nobody is expecting students to start up a game development company right out of college. Even if it were expected, and the equipment, software was cheap. You still need capital (money) to create a new business regardless of what industry you're in.
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Myria said on 12:03AM 9-13-2009
The bulk of one's job-specific education is always outdated by graduation, if not before. In my industry we had a phrase to describe the knowledge base of engineers fresh out of school: 80% of what they know is too old to be useful, 20% is too new to be useful. That applies to most vocations, it's simply inherent in higher education as it exists today.
While this donation is nice and all, in learning the specifics are irrelevant because they change too rapidly. By the time today's students graduate Crytek will be old news or on it's fourth iteration. It's the non-specific base learning you get -- or hopefully get -- that has any long-term value, and for that what particular tools are used isn't of great importance.
remixedcat said on 11:05PM 9-12-2009
I'm just saying that people who get out of college that are used to nothing but 3dsmax and unreal engine will be dissapointed when they start thier studio with thier own cash and can't get these tools and have to start all over again. NOT EVERYONE GETTING INTO THE GAMING INDUSTRY. LOLz.
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Mike Blackney said on 11:34PM 9-12-2009
In my course we studied Unreal Engine heavily and around ten percent of my year had jobs in the industry before we even graduated. Most who didn't get jobs weren't going to be starting their own company full stop, let alone using Blender and Ogre engine.
Wanting to teach university students to be entrepreneurs seems pretty stupid to me, but nonetheless plenty of startups are using middleware these days because it's how shit gets done.
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remixedcat said on 1:09AM 9-13-2009
Look, what we need is more indies on the scene and more unique titles and IPs. Not more Crysis or WoW clone games churned out by the Cryteks and Blizzards. Just like how bland the motion picture scene and the pop music scene is. More boring clones. Unis groom them for jobs at EA or Blizzard. Not to start thier own studios. Witch is the wrong course to take since it is very rare for you to even get a job at such companies becuase they have way too many applicants for the little amount of positions they do have.
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Mike Blackney said on 4:07AM 9-13-2009
And there are plenty of indies on the scene. Lots of them use Unreal. Look at the Make Something Unreal contest, there are tons of entries with new and fresh gameplay and art styles.
In fact, one of the presenters at Sense of Wonder 2009 is Alex Bruce who made Hazard using Unreal Engine 3. And went to a game design school. Where he learned Unreal.
Great game design can be achieved regardless of whether you choose to use a proprietary engine or a free one. It's awesome whenever any game developers make it easier for students and the community. Yes, even if it's publicity for them.
remixedcat said on 10:48AM 9-13-2009
How old is the guy and did he mortgage his house and go into massive debt to get unreal engine? Some people think a company who'd been in business for 10 years and has a staff of 30 is an 'indie' and has had games out for several years using crappy engines first and "working thier way to unreal"... but if you want to first start out with unreal engine you gotta get rich quick or pirate the thing but you seriously don't wanna do that! No fresh-outta-college kid is going to be able to afford to get unreal engine for his/her first game. No way.
Rocky said on 3:52AM 9-13-2009
CryEngine was the FarCry engine... not Crysis. Crysis was on CryEngine 2.
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Archipelagos said on 6:11AM 9-13-2009
As someone who came out of college without the practical skills to go straight into studio work I cannot applaude this move enough. Bravo.
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Hub said on 10:49AM 9-13-2009
Learn the maths, learn more maths, and then do some more number work until you can spout the crap off the top of your head in conversation. 32bit floating decimal will not pull at a bar but will get you a job if you can talk someone through it and many will ask you face to face. It will impress more than all the 'fun' packages you can fit onto a CV template.
You can mod remixed cat down all you want but he/she has a painfully good point. You have been warned, not that I ever listened, and nor will you of course :)
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AnkleSpankle said on 12:33PM 9-13-2009
This is a great move as universities DO teach the right skills even if some people think they just use basic software.
I'm at Derby University and i've been programming games using the GameBryo engine (Fallout 3), creating mods from scratch using UnrealEngine3 as well as programming with XNA.
This move is great for student who want to work with a top quality engine and it means it's much more accessible to more people.
Now i can use CryEngine2 at home and at Uni =D
@remixedcat: Buy a copy of Crysis or Crysis Warhead, voila! Sandbox2 Editor using CryEngine2, nothing stopping people making mods for it.
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Pingles said on 4:37PM 9-13-2009
Happy to hear of this. Not only will Crytek get more folks used to working with their engine but students will be able to create much more impressive demo reels for their resumes.
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steve said on 6:18PM 9-13-2009
Both side bring up good points
1. most Knowledge is useless fast
2. it is important to let the students at these engines
i will add a three
3. most schools still operate as if we are still in the industrial era not good
but i see a lot of this changing
1. more open source-ware
2. giving ware away for long term gains (which is what this is about)
3. the ability of the person to make there own game/mod/mmo on there own (case in point love mmo) not that people would do that
one things that does not seem to of changed is this the more you do the more you get. you can make games for xbox live i forgot what it is called but you can use it too build a arcade like game to publish to the site.
you get money for it if people buy it now that a test so by the time you live college you will have a book of games some of witch have made you some money. IF people do not sign you on it would be there lost your gain because you are still making money.
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jmmo said on 4:01AM 9-14-2009
"... only the priciest universities ..."
It's worth pointing out here that in the UK the amount a university can charge for courses is regulated by the government, so for instance of my two local universities only one offers a games course ( http://wwwm.coventry.ac.uk/undergraduate/ugstudy/Pages/ugft_ComputerGames.aspx?itemID=304 ) and isn't generally considered a particularly great university, but would charge £3,225 per year for that course. The other, which is a top-10-in-the-country university, would also charge £3,225 if they offered an equivalent course ( http://www2.warwick.ac.uk/study/undergraduate/studentfunding/ugfees ).
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