This is...kind of disappointing, actually. I was really impressed with what I've see done with the Luminous Engine, and I think Kingdom Hearts III would have been the second game ever to release developed on it.

Unreal Engine 4 is still really good, and I'm glad that the game is at least transitioning to such an engine.

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Oh, I know they're not just ditching the stuff they have lol. I just like to see more engines. Keeps visual styles a bit more varied in games, though Unreal can still do the Kingdom Shader as you said, so I'm less worried.

I sure hope that Unreal 4 resolved some of Unreal 3's issues; I don't want texture pop-in all over my Kingdom Hearts. Also I don't think Unreal 3 could've handled the graphics we've seen so far in trailers, can anyone vouch for Unreal 4?

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I'm not even going to pretend to know or not, but is that engine switch...better for a more cinematic experience? Or will the animations be fluid? Like what does that actually mean for the less savvy of us?

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Alright, so instead of trying to do all of the technical stuff from the ground up, they're using a more template approach? I'm actually very happy with that news. At least the game's important aspects, like its writing, can be focused on more. I looked up a video showcasing Unreal 4's capabilities and I'm really impressed, so this is all actually better news than I had expected. Thanks.

As long as it doesn't hold things up and helps development along, there's nothing really wrong with it. Weren't they having problems with bugs with the old engine anyway? That's not something you want to be stuck with.

sooooo PC release? sounds like PC release to me lol

For people like me who aren't very knowledgeable about video games, what does this mean? I mean I get that it seems significant (the change), but why?

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Oh, that's neat. What about the development process? How does this affect the game itself and why is switching engines noteworthy?

With Square Enix, and now Disney being on Steam. It could be possible for Kingdom Hearts III may get a PC release.

Please UE4, don't suck. Pleeeeeeaaaaasssse.

Square-Enix doesn't seem to have a good history with western engines, and I REALLY don't want long loading times in KH. I'm not even familiar with KH having loading screens in the past and it's not something I want to see.

Related: D4 came out. Its wiki says it was made on UE3, but the UE4 wiki says that D4 was made on UE4. It looks like UE3 to me, but asking anyway to see if that's a demo of the engine.[DOUBLEPOST=1412849439][/DOUBLEPOST]

I don't mean to counter Libre here, because he's not wrong at all, but a big problem in the last gen is that so many games used the same engine and didn't diversify their profile enough. That's not going to be a problem for Square Enix with KHIII. However, there is a reason big developers swear that every game should have its own engine. Even, ironically (and maybe hypocritically), Insomniac Games. The reason for that is if you build an engine with the design of a particular game in mind, then you know it's going to handle everything the game needs- no more, no less. Which is great for a game because you can kind of prioritize the systems you want. In terms of an engine like UE3 (I'd say UE4, but I can't speak for it honestly), or MT Framework (Capcom, but to a lesser degree), the engine is more universal meant to handle few particular situations and is a rather broad spectrum. But as Libre said here, because they don't have to program an engine, they now have more time to focus on the game portion of the game, which you'd be surprised how late that comes into play. Is it a problem? No. With UE3 in particular it was because it handled models in a particular manner, it was easier for it to render dark colors with complexity and depth (a lot of colorful games on UE3 were either still gritty or very simple to counter this, so I've read), it was really bad for action games (How Killer is Dead functions on UE3 I do not know), and it was known for long loading times and big texture pop ins. So we had a lot of games that had similar patterns that, frankly, didn't need to be there and arguably put a bruise on a generation (I disagree with this sentiment, but it's arguable that we lost a lot of identity due to laziness). A more positive example for using a universal engine would be MT Framework from Capcom (which basically exists to render things at very high quality, make big areas, load well, and have lots of things going on- it's actual magic compared to UE3) or iD Tech 5 from... erm... iD. Basically, with that in mind, it could mean a lot of things for KHIII and a lot of it depends on how stable the engine itself is. It could mean PC release because UE4 is a pc-based engine so there'd be no porting involved. But, like the finished Luminous Engine, the work is still in Square's hands. The engine switch isn't going to give them an excuse if they fuck it up.

On the talk of specific engines: I really liked MT Framework, which made games like Devil May Cry 4 and Ultimate Marvel Vs. Capcom 3 look and play really well.

MT Framework is freaking magic. Dead Rising had zero slow down and dynamic events among the hordes? Lost Planet 2 was huuuuge and could contain levels within levels and display both for each player so no interruptions? Crazy

Capcom REALLY should've sold the engine to other studios. They'd not be in the crisis they are now.

But that's unrelated

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