Wasteland 2’s Engine Upgrade Promises Better Visuals And Modding Tools

An increasing number of games are being built using Unity (including the writer’s own Deadnaut), thanks to the flexibility and power it provides, as well as simplifying the process of developing for multiple platforms. The next version of the middleware, 5.0, is just around the corner and inXile is already in the process of upgrading Wasteland 2 to use the new tech.

In a state of the union-type blog post, project lead Chris Keenan breaks down a number of things the developer has in the pipeline for the Kickstarted title. The biggest change is the Unity 5 update, which Keenan says will result in significant “visual improvements” and “better tools for modders”:

…one task we’re working on right now is migrating the Wasteland 2 codebase from the Unity 4.5 engine to Unity 5, which will enable some new possibilities for us. A major benefit of moving to Unity 5 is that 5 will include many of the tools from Unity 4.x Pro. We relied on many of these tools during our development (like creating and building navigation meshes), and they will be available to modders without having to pay thousands of dollars for a Pro Unity license … Unity 5 offers physically based shading, which is already starting to look amazing in the scenes we’ve touched up.

Apparently the developer has “quite a few quirky tricks up [its] sleeves”, but isn’t ready just yet to reveal what those are. Hard to be disappointed with the promise of improved graphics and mod tools though!

Kickstarter Update #60: Work… work never changes [Kickstarter]


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