Unreal Engine 3 Ported to iPhone/iPod Touch, webOS Next Please 72
AnandTech is reporting that Epic Games have ported their Unreal Engine 3 game engine that powers games like Gears of Wars 2 over to the iPhone 3GS and the third generation iPod Touch. The demonstration given to AnandTech consisted of a rather impressive fly through and playable Unreal Tournament level, and in practice "works well".
This is great news for mobile gaming in general, and it looks like the iPhone isn't going to be the only platform rocking UE3 next year: Epic will be announcing support for "another platform" at CES in January. There are a number of mobile platforms that are likely candidates for a port of the engine, and while we'd love to see webOS on that list, as of right now it doesn't look likely.
The engine requires that devices have an Open GL ES 2.0 equipped GPU, which both the Pre and the Pixi have, but lacking in webOS is an officially sanctioned way to write programs in anything other than JavaScript, HTML, and CSS.
Unless Palm announces a major shift in how folks can develop for webOS at their CES 2010 presentation, webOS is out.
[Engadget via The iPhone Blog] Thanks to DJ for the tip!
72 Comments
HAHAHA WebOS Next please HAHAHA... WebOS still have no GPU Support for normal things.....
no flash for i phone ahahahahahahh roflmao
Yeah, real insightful there-- how's Flash on your Pre working out for you right about now?
/STFU.
so u have flash on pre? i dont think so HAHAHAHAHAHAH
Ditto, stupid post, misplaced priorities. If you're hoping WebOS will get this, stop hoping and go buy an iPhone/iTouch... sheesh.
I think it will end up being zunehd.... would be nice to get it on my pre as well but I got a zunehd for christmas so I'm actually hoping it ends up there.
Yeah tegra/tegra2 sounds like a likely candidate... WebOS still needs to start WebGL draft implementation... besides, I don't think there are any WebGL enabled games or game engines out there yet, so the possibility of jumping from zero to unreal 3 engine is near impossible (keep in mind WebGL is still a draft standard).
I'd settle with css transforms and some WebGL demos on the pre/pixi... baby steps, but it'll get there...
Its really beginning to bother me knowing that I paid for hardware that isn't even being utilized properly....like they tricked me into thinking I'd be getting a do it all powerhouse phone since it was comparible to an iphone3GS hardware wise....but never really intended to deliver anything of the sort performance wise...webos is looking more and more like a gift and a curse all n one....best mobile phone os hands down!....but seriously crippled by its limitation...palm better wake up a smell the coffee....and leverage this great hardware while they still can before it becomes second tier!
I agree. I love the phone and how it works. But I feel like I got a porch that can't go over 45. A xbox 360 with only xbox games. PS3 with PSone games..
WebOS can be so much more but it isn't! I want to stick around and see what happens with palm. But I'll be jumping ships to iPhone if it ever leaves ATT or android if sprint gets 2.0
love my pre. But baby isn't putting out like she said she would
Ahh "Porsche". A porch going 45 would actually be kind of impressive.
ha ha i totally read that like three times think the same thing.
thought I spelled porsche wrong.. Where is that autocorrect patch that should of been built in...
+14. Some people actually do look at specs, Palm, and I seem to have bought a non-working GPU. That's not really the thriller I was hoping for in being part of your financial comeback from the dead. Thanks guys.
i think the flip side is lots of people DO NOT look at specs and simply say how does phone x compare to phone y. they say simple games on one. rather impressive games on another. And they make a purchasing decision like that. Point being it's difficult to reason with them about specs or sdks or opengl or whatever tech developer/phone enthusiast speak that is used regarding the lack of a given feature. No sdk isn't an excuse. They don't care. They don't now what that means. They just expect it to be as good as competitors.
Then they shouldn't advertise or otherwise broadcast system specs at release or in marketing, because, frankly, buying a phone with it's balls cut off is bullshit.
i wasn't disagreeing with you just stating that to people who pay attention to specs they are disappointed cause they fully understand that the specs make it capable of more and those that don't pay attention to specs are also disappointed cause they expect more because competitors deliver more. So either way it's not a good thing.
Albeit I doubt is for webOS (android or a windows thing seems more like it), you must remember palm already said they could colaborate with any dev in making some kind of special apps for webOS if the devs believed it was needed.
I mean...devs like Adobe are not making flash 10 with gpu support working on webOS using just some magic trick with javascript...
If Palm announces GPU Support whilst using UE3 as a demo then maybe.
However that's a pretty big If, well we can dream...
Its really beginning to bother me knowing that I paid for hardware that isn't even being utilized properly....like they tricked me into thinking I'd be getting a do it all powerhouse phone since it was comparible to an iphone3GS hardware wise....but never really intended to deliver anything of the sort performance wise...webos is looking more and more like a gift and a curse all n one....best mobile phone os hands down!....but seriously crippled by its limitation...palm better wake up a smell the coffee....and leverage this great hardware while they still can before it becomes second tier!
i saw this on tv. pretty sick. that's totally the stuff i expected to see on my Pre. I hope we see it on the pre. here's some video.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Pzts8tsKuHs
not to make this an iphone game posts but eliminatepro also looked damn cool. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wFH_VOT6vfo
Personally, I don't see why this couldn't be implemented in exactly the same way as Classic is implemented. Classic is written at a far lower level than Mojo, with (as I understand it) access to all sorts of things that the current SDK doesn't provide. And when you run an app in Classic, it's running in a sort of side-loading environment that's separate from (but running concurrently with) other WebOS apps.
What's to stop them from creating the same sort of environment for the Unreal engine? It could be a separate app that loads and provides access to other apps that run within it--precisely as is done for PalmOS apps running within Classic.
Frankly, this wouldn't surprise me at all.
But would this be possible without Palm's blessing? or would Palm be cool with that?
palm sucks I'm going with wm7 once it cums out
Really showing off your end of the gene pool there, aren't you?
plus the palm pre can barely last 2 hours before the battery runs out. I doubt this will be possible on the pre.
Webos 1.3.5 "improves battery life."
Didn't they say that about 1.3.1 too? If it did improve battery life I sure as hell can't notice the improvement.
I am lucky I barely use the phone, if I was a power user the thing would last me 3 hours.
My Pre went dead with no cards open while on the car charger yesterday. WebOS's heavy duty abilities, will not stand up to Smartphone Lite hardware. We all hope for Sling, but lets face it, the current Pre battery life will make it suitable to watch one or two episodes of Sponge Bob, rather than anything more, in fear of being out of battery before you can reach the charger.
As I pointed out in the tread "Do native apps matter....", yes, they matter. Aside from the lack of GPU support, you can't "port" C language code to JS/CSS. Palm's lack of support for low level programming is crippling the Pre's ecosystem. If the WebOS SDK supported C++ and Java, I think you'd already see thousands of apps ported over from other platforms.
Guys, be patient. The Pre has been out barely 6 months. I am a C developer (years ago), but I currently develop in C# with .NET Frameworks. I know Palm has not announced anything about providing any other language support other than JavaScript, HTML, and CSS. I am not sure whether the Pre ecosystem is being crippled, since it is obvious that Palm is moving as fast as it could. Palm just announced the Ares developer tool for rapid application development (RAD). The App Catalog was recently launched and is moving out of beta. Flash 10 support is coming. webGL is coming to WebKit (to access the GPU directly). Developers ability to target HTML 5 opens up new possibilities. JavaScript compilers are becoming all the rage - bringing JavaScript into the status of first class languages like C++ and Java. I think in the next 6 months we will have a lot of our questions and wishes answered - hopefully!
Pre is going to go down as the greatest phone that never happned. They don't have the resources to keep/catch up with the market.
For someone that thinks the Pre is going down, you sure are spending quite a lot of time at PreCentral. Maybe the Pre is just that interesting of a smart phone to keep you interested and coming back. To make a statement like that ("Pre is going to go down") shows that you have lost all objectivity. For one to grow intellectually, they must have and maintain an open mind. But at least you said "Pre" and not Palm :)
Why wait? Did you sign a contract with an ETF so that you could sit around and wait? Do you pay for your monthly data plan so that you can do cool stuff six to twelve months after most other smartphone users are doing them?
I signed a contract for the phone I have. There is no expectation that Palm make improvements. Sprint nor Palm ever guaranteed me anything. Im just glad Palm is trying to upgrade their product. They could probably save money by just leaving us at 1.3.1 and announcing a Pre 2 that can do more. That
Does palm need an adrenaline shot or what? I hope they collaborate and cook up something that will keep what user base it has from walking astray. 2010 make it or break it,palm.
In other news, Palm announces assignable tones for the calendar application.
lol...
I suggest not expecting much from Palm... so we can be (hopefully) surprised.
...and video recording!
although we've comes to terms with it, it's still laughable
i don't really have a need for this Unreal stuff as I'll be spending my time using my tip calculator and hunting for pics.
I don't think many great things will happen with the Pre.. as an owner I hope if we ever do get a Pre2 it will be comparable to the iPhone 3GS, if not hopefully in that time the iPhone will be on different carriers or Android 2.0 will be.
The battery life on the Pre alone is depressing to say the very least. Barely using the phone and you get just over a day out of it, actually use it and watch the battery life drop 10% within minutes.
Palm had a decent idea, failed epicly with the implementation.
10% in a few minutes, yeah right!
BS! Vid or it didn't happen! It's call out time for all the sh!t talkers and JNG's (Jobs Nut Huggers)
Making claims against WELL documents fact to the contrary sounds like "troll-bait" to me
Well I haven't owned an Apple product in my life and I'm 21 years old, and I can vouch for the "10% within minutes" drop too! It's really ridiculous! Standby life is great but I seriously hope the battery life improvements in 1.3.5 actually improve the life with the screen ON! I can have the touch Facebook site open in one card, no other cards open, and can see the % drop 3% in 5 minutes with the stock battery, which I have 2 of, along with the Seidio 2600 battery. It's really depressing.
Yet another reason I wish I had an iPhone. Oh Palm, will you ever cease to disappoint me?
come on palm.. don't disappoint the community that's been behind you for a long time.. we need GPU access and this could be great! the phone is amazing, and could be 10 times better than the iphone if you just give us what we ask for!
the article says opengl 2.0 es support...
i'm betting that it will the the google nexus they are going to announce next month. google/android has been on fire recently.
the google nexus will have opengl 2.0 es support.
blackberry storm2 has opengl 2.0 es support as shown when they demonstrated need for speed a short time ago and i also believe zunehd.
Why I love the Palm Pre
I think PreCentral should stop posting articles that has headlines that include the iPhone. It seems to attract all sorts of iPhone fans (via the search engines) claiming to own the Palm Pre and posting all types of false information about the Palm Pre. But I know it is hard not to compare the Pre to other platforms from time to time.
My Palm Pre's battery lasts about 5 to 10 hours from heavy to moderate use. Its battery life is similar to most other smart phones. The major advantage the Palm Pre has over the iPhone is that you can replace the battery in the Palm Pre (so you can carry a backup battery). With the iPhone the battery cannot be replaced - so when it dies, it is dead!
The Palm Pre has been on the market about 6 months and has over 800 applications. In the first 6 months, the iPhone had zero applications.
Adobe Flash 10 has been developed for the Palm Pre and should be released soon. This will vastly expand the web viewing experience. Apple refuses to allow Flash on the iPhone.
A major release of the Palm Pre webOS operating system version 1.3.5 will be announced within 3 weeks - we are expecting it to be available around the same time. Palm users have come to expect frequent updates with new features for their phones. It makes owning a Palm Pre exciting. I have owned my Palm Pre phone for over 6 months now, and I am more excited about the phone than the day I bought it. Palm is constantly innovating and updating the phone's features and not waiting a whole year like the competition (i.e. Apple's iPhone) before giving its users major updates. For example, with the iPhone, it took
Apple 2 years to give its users cut and paste. With the Palm Pre, we get new features and major feature updates about every 2 months. This is exciting!
And I love the fact that the Palm Pre can run multiple applications at the same time. With the iPhone, you practically get to run only one application at a time. To switch between applications running on the Palm Pre, I simply move from one application to another using my fingers similar to moving a deck of cards on your desk. webOS is an extremely intuitive and innovative operating system that is ideal for smart phones. I am so happy I bought the Palm Pre.
And a thunderous applause fills the room!
Actually, the engineers at Palm deserve a thunderous applause... and by way of the press, they received it!
+1000 - The pre on a good CDMA network (Verizon) will give palm the press and applause they deserve.
i totally agree with you. From now on Precentral should act as though the iphone does not exist and should report only positive stories about Palm. In the event a story has a negative aspect Dieter should omit that portion and rewrite it so that it sounds positive. For example the earnings news should always say Palm sold 2 million Pres this quarter and increased it's profits by 300 Million dollars. Everyday a story should be written stating "Palm Stock up 13%", even on Sundays when the market is not open. Cellphones have been accused of increasing cancer. Precentral should therefore declare the Palm Pre's deflect radiation and cure cancer.
My battery lasts quite long. Just yesterday i made a phone call and only used 80% of my battery. I've no idea what people expect. 3 and 4 phone calls? And Adobe Flash 10 is coming out and having flash completely beats that iphone crap with it's video recording, nice music player app, and autocorrect dictionary, virtual keyboard, and 3D games.
And who the hell cares about these fancy 3d first person shooter games and a hundred thousand fancy apps. Pre has been around just a few months an we already has 800+ apps tons great flatulence apps, 140 brighthouse sports apps, 40+ Dijit apps of backgrounds and girlie pics. That can't be topped by any darn itunes store. Just yesterday i
From now on let's just pretend everything is perfect. We can just ignore that iphone thing. Act like it's not even there. Kinda like that German guy Adolph in the 40s that that kept walking around Europe with his buddies. What's the worst that could happen? Cause like my main man George Dubya, if you just declare victory you win. Right?
I say "Palm Pre, Mission Accomplished."
omit anything considered negative... and make changes to stories to sound positive... sounds like communist china. how about water torture those that dont buy pre.
Totally kicking myself for not thinking of that first. I'm calling Dick Cheney to get right on that. We'll get rid of this iphone and Droid business once and for all. We'll see if "droid does" water boarding.
@blackmagic01
I am not pleased with your uninformed ramblings!
I don't know what you are talking about, you don't make any sense. If you read my article with any level of comprehension, you will understand that the focus was not on PreCentral but on the iPhone trolls. My first paragraph ends by stating that it is essentially impossible for PreCentral not to write articles with headings containing the term iPhone because of obvious reasons. When replying to a comment, focus on the facts - don't make things up. Your sarcism simply makes you look bad... I think you were looking for an opportunity to ramble on and throw a few unorganized thoughts on paper, and you found it by misunderstanding the context of my statement.
Actually, you sound like the perfect iPhone troll my article was addressing - as shown by the following statement you made: "I made a phone call and only used 80% of my battery" - yeah right!
For your information, I think that the iPhone is a great phone - not so much the phone as the ecosystem it inspired. I like it, but it is not the phone for me - I will take the Palm Pre any day in place of the iPhone. I think Apple has done a commendable job with the iPhone, but Palm has already shown that other companies are capable of innovating in the smart phone business.
To address you statements about the 800+ applications that are available for the Palm Pre, I need to clear up some misconceptions. No one needs 800 applications (or apps). Even on the PC, I do not use more than about 10 to 20 applications. The fact that a company releases 140 applications is not news. If Brighthouse decides to release one application for each team in the league, that is not a problem for me. If you are a Cowboys fan and there is an app dedicated to your team, that is acceptable so long that the app in your opinion is valuable. Maybe Brighthouse wants to sell multiple applications to people who have a few favorite teams. So instead of creating one application for the entire league, they decided to create a separate app for each team. Palm should put all Brighthouse applications into a single folder instead of littering their store (i.e. the App Catalog) with all those apps. Now, since I think it is appropriate to compare the Palm Pre to other products such as the iPhone or Android phones, let me make a comparison. One company was found to have released over 1,000 applications for the iPhone. So if you think that 140 applications by one company for the Palm Pre is a problem, then 1,000 applications by one company for the iPhone poses a much bigger problem.
And finally, the issue of good or bad journalism is not whether the story is negative or positive, but it is about the nature of the reporting - is the story balanced. In other words, does the article handle the story in a fair manner? Is the journalist objective? Or does the journalist have a hidden agenda? I am sure Dieter will not appreciate your using his name in a context that does not apply to him. On the whole, I have been pleased with PreCentral. But I am not pleased with your uninformed ramblings.
What pleases you doesn't concern me in the slightest. Continue to be "not pleased" at my sarcasm. Feel free to to lighten up. Or don't. Don't care.
You, sir, are an ass.
Now get off of my internets.
umm i actually thought blackmagic's ramblings were pretty funny
"No one needs 800 applications (or apps). Even on the PC, I do not use more than about 10 to 20 applications. " ideal fanboy, seriously
i for example use these programs on PC: Chrome, uTorrent, QIP, total commander and 3 games (just an example, im not gonna write all programs i use)
now imagine there are NO other apps, just these 7 for everybody in the world
do you see now why your logic fails miserably?
No, my logic has not been disproved by you.
(1) I said "No one needs 800 applications". To come close to disproving my logic, you must cite a reputable source that casts doubt on my statement. Do you know how large a number 800 is? Do you even have as many as 400 applications installed on your computer?
(2) I used the word "need" not "want". Though I would find it hard to believe, I can conceive - for the sake of argument, someone installing 800 applications on their PC because they "want" to. But I repeat, no one "needs" 800 applications.
(3) Don't call someone names, "fanboy" or whatever else, unless you have a serious justification. And even then, use wisdom - in other words, don't call names, unless you absolutely have to. The word "fanboy" is used to refer to people who hold opinions without reasoning, not someone who holds an opinion you disagree with.
(4) I studied philosophy and logic while I was in engineering school, and so I am fun of using the word logic. A word of advice, please use the word "logic" with caution. It is not easy to reason logically. To this day, I have found that for me to reason logically requires great effort, especially in the technical field where one needs to do research to support their views. So no, my logic does not "fail miserably" as you have intimated. You have not even taken the first step to disproving my statement.
(5) On a personal note, I like the idea of hundreds or thousands of applications, but I would rather have 50 quality applications than fifty thousand rubbish apps. And personally, I would love to see the Palm Pre, iPhone, and Android phones all succeed, because obviously healthy competition is good for the entire cell phone industry.
lol
The Pre definitely has some good points, but my day to day usage scenarios are constantly being overshadowed by all the shortcomings. Battery life, freezes and restarts, the GPS seeming to lock on to where I actually am only when it feels like it.. Right now it's a total love/hate relationship, but in the end I'm finding I can't rely on it when I really need to. The updates from Palm can't come soon enough, imo.
It seems to me that a lot of the negative reports we are receiving are from the competition... people that do not own the Palm Pre but are trolling various Internet sites.
For the record, my comments are from a legitimate standpoint. I've owned my Pre for a couple of months now.
I all depends on your connection. As far as the GPS, I have a Garmen that fails miserably. I use it to get in the vicinity I need to be in, then use a Pre to locate the exact house I need. I also have used the GPS inside to see were Im at in a large building. It works great. As long as you have a 3G signal. I actually tested my GPS VS my buddies 3GS. I tore him up on how close it was to our exact location. Not just once, but repeatedly.
lol
The Pre definitely has some good points, but my day to day usage scenarios are constantly being overshadowed by all the shortcomings. Battery life, freezes and restarts, the GPS seeming to lock on to where I actually am only when it feels like it.. Right now it's a total love/hate relationship, but in the end I'm finding I can't rely on it when I really need to. The updates from Palm can't come soon enough, imo.
My Palm Pre is very stable and a pleasure to use... and the battery life is great. But then again, I have not installed unofficial applications on my phone. I am look forward to the new release for the new features and enhancements.
FWIW, I initially had a lot of Homebrew Apps and patches installed, but recently decided to Doctor it to factory settings, and try it out with only official programs installed. Google Maps still caused my phone to freeze and then restart, and the battery life was still pretty bad. Battery has been solved with a Seidio extended battery, and I am expecting/hoping that an update to either WebOS itself or Google Maps will solve the issues there.
Thanks for the reply, this sheds a lot more light on your earlier comments.
The pre is a cool phone, but let's be honest... Is there anyone that would really have bought one of these if the Iphone were available on Sprint? If a better phone is available this summer when the first 1 year upgrades start becoming available, are you really keeping your pre?
Yes
i would definetely buy an iPhone.
not I.
And they did it!
http://blog.palm.com/palm/2010/03/palm-webos-games-get-unreal-.html