It’s still being used by Valve for inhouse development, but I remember back when HL2 was release it was as big as Unreal. What happened?
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Answer: Unreal was already a major player at the time, being used in a lot of games that didn’t make use of their own in-house engine. So Source had something of an uphill struggle out of the gate. Valve decided the USP for it would be its real-time physics capabilities – and HL2 was a big showcase for this. It had an incredibly in-depth physics model allowing objects to interact in ways most gamers had never really seen.
But with this came a lot of complexity. Even HL2 had a certain amount of “jank” to it in the puzzles. Objects would move and fall off each other in unpredictable ways at times. If Valve themselves couldn’t tame it fully, what hope would other developers have? Many simply decided that if their game didn’t need the level of realism and depth to the physics that Source provided, then they’d be better off sticking with what they knew.
And then of course Unity came around and although it’s certainly nowhere near what Source 2 & Unreal can offer, its big USP was accessibility – both in terms of price and ease of use. There’s a reason Steam is plagued by Unity Asset Flip games. Suddenly just about anyone with almost no programming experience could get something up and running out of the box fairly quickly.
So using Source just felt like a bit of a weird choice for many. Unreal was the big “professional” choice. Unity was for the indies and upstarts. And others like Rockstar, Bethesda or Polyphony would just continue to use their own because it was custom made for their needs.
Source just couldn’t fight the momentum.
Answer: Unreal was already a major player at the time, being used in a lot of games that didn’t make use of their own in-house engine. So Source had something of an uphill struggle out of the gate. Valve decided the USP for it would be its real-time physics capabilities – and HL2 was a big showcase for this. It had an incredibly in-depth physics model allowing objects to interact in ways most gamers had never really seen.
But with this came a lot of complexity. Even HL2 had a certain amount of “jank” to it in the puzzles. Objects would move and fall off each other in unpredictable ways at times. If Valve themselves couldn’t tame it fully, what hope would other developers have? Many simply decided that if their game didn’t need the level of realism and depth to the physics that Source provided, then they’d be better off sticking with what they knew.
And then of course Unity came around and although it’s certainly nowhere near what Source 2 & Unreal can offer, its big USP was accessibility – both in terms of price and ease of use. There’s a reason Steam is plagued by Unity Asset Flip games. Suddenly just about anyone with almost no programming experience could get something up and running out of the box fairly quickly.
So using Source just felt like a bit of a weird choice for many. Unreal was the big “professional” choice. Unity was for the indies and upstarts. And others like Rockstar, Bethesda or Polyphony would just continue to use their own because it was custom made for their needs.
Source just couldn’t fight the momentum.
Source is still used. Not frequently, but games like Titanfall and Apex Legends run on Source.
Source is still used. Not frequently, but games like Titanfall and Apex Legends run on Source.
I think the main thing is that Valve never really wanted to be in the engine licensing business.
There’s a saying that the first 90% of a software project takes 90% of the time you budget for, and then the final 10% takes another 90% of the budgeted time. If you’re just using your own software, you can really economise on that last 10% by only finishing up stuff you really need.
If you’re making a business if selling your software to third parties, you really need to finish up that last 10% of polish, and invest in all sorts of technical developer support and such, and it seems like Valve just wasn’t interested in growing out that capability.
The licensing deals they did do seemed to be more like: here is the source code, you’re on your own from this point.
I think the main thing is that Valve never really wanted to be in the engine licensing business.
There’s a saying that the first 90% of a software project takes 90% of the time you budget for, and then the final 10% takes another 90% of the budgeted time. If you’re just using your own software, you can really economise on that last 10% by only finishing up stuff you really need.
If you’re making a business if selling your software to third parties, you really need to finish up that last 10% of polish, and invest in all sorts of technical developer support and such, and it seems like Valve just wasn’t interested in growing out that capability.
The licensing deals they did do seemed to be more like: here is the source code, you’re on your own from this point.
Valve is rich already with Steam, Source 2 is tailored for themselves only. Unreal engine is tailored for indi devs in mind
Valve is rich already with Steam, Source 2 is tailored for themselves only. Unreal engine is tailored for indi devs in mind
Answer: The Source engine isn’t really an engine. It’s just HL2. When Valve gives you the Source engine they just give you a copy of HL2 with most of the levels and characters and dialogue stripped out. They give you the whole game code and say go nuts. In Source engine games like Stanley Parable, you can see and feel some remnants of HL2 – like the sound when you press E on a wall.
The assumption that you press E to use the thing in front of you is baked into the Source engine because it was baked into HL2. Source engine games all have a system for choosing a weapon and drawing a viewmodel for a weapon, because HL2 does – even if they have no weapons. Source engine games all have a system for changing levels when you touch a certain map area, because HL2 does. Though the game developer can try to delete the system from the code, it’s easier if they just don’t use the parts they don’t want to.
Unreal is designed as a real engine for people to build any game based on. You can build anything you want. You don’t have to have a button that you press to use the thing in front of you. You don’t have to have weapons, levels, or anything else. You choose everything about the game.
Answer: The Source engine isn’t really an engine. It’s just HL2. When Valve gives you the Source engine they just give you a copy of HL2 with most of the levels and characters and dialogue stripped out. They give you the whole game code and say go nuts. In Source engine games like Stanley Parable, you can see and feel some remnants of HL2 – like the sound when you press E on a wall.
The assumption that you press E to use the thing in front of you is baked into the Source engine because it was baked into HL2. Source engine games all have a system for choosing a weapon and drawing a viewmodel for a weapon, because HL2 does – even if they have no weapons. Source engine games all have a system for changing levels when you touch a certain map area, because HL2 does. Though the game developer can try to delete the system from the code, it’s easier if they just don’t use the parts they don’t want to.
Unreal is designed as a real engine for people to build any game based on. You can build anything you want. You don’t have to have a button that you press to use the thing in front of you. You don’t have to have weapons, levels, or anything else. You choose everything about the game.
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