We all know Epic Games [url] make great looking games – from their inaugural ZZT through to the Unreal game (and, obviously Gears of War) the Californian developers have always created stunning titles with often groundbreaking graphics.
Yesterday, Epic released a free taster demo of something called Epic Citadel onto the App Store. Designed to showcase the technical qualities of their Unreal Engine, Epic Citadel is a stunning, powerful example of what the iPhone can do in the right hands. Yes, it needs a recent model (and obviously looks best on the iPhone 4) but this is a phone, and it’s running first gen PS3 level visuals.
Hyperbole? No, not really. Epic Citadel is pushing bump offset mapping, normal mapped buildings, texture blending, proper lighting (and shadows), convincing animation, realtime reflections and all at a gorgeous 960 x 640 resolution. Sure, it’s just a tech demo, there’s nothing to do in the ‘game’ other than wander around, but seriously, you need to check this out.
I don’t know what Sony have planned for the PSP 2 (and haven’t yet tried a 3DS) but in terms of visuals alone, I’m struggling to imagine either or them will be able to beat what the iPhone is doing right now. Even the controls work brilliantly, with floating move and look ‘joysticks’ or the ability to just ‘tap’ where you want to walk next.
If you have an iPhone, please, go check it out now.
benny boy
I “played” it yesterday and it looked bloody amazing. I literally couldn’t believe that they are getting such amazing visuals out of a phone. I wonder why nothing even REMOTELY similar has been created yet.
I did have a bit of a problem in that it keeps crashing and returning to the home screen on my iPhone 4.
Sevchenko
bad luck, mine worked out fine
kevatron400
Amazing – truly impressive. Colour me blown away.
Jacko1983
An iphone bumper with some extra buttons would kill the competition
Sevchenko
i just walked around the whole game…. How did they do that?…
BAZ1307
I’m honestly more impressed with this on my iPad than any of my PS3 games have managed. When I play this on my iPad, not only is the screen resolution equally as clear as most 720p PS3 games, but the textures actually beat anything I’ve seen on the PS3. I’d say Epic Citadel on the iPad was definitely on par with the graphics of the environment in Uncharted 2. Right now, I’m already using my iPad for gaming far more than my PSP and DS, Apple have done an immensely good job at making a competing portable gaming console. :D
A very well done to Epic Games for designing the Unreal Engine for iOS devices. Hopefully this is a sign of things to come. I’m hoping for the likes of a true Mirror’s Edge port in first person and Dead Space ported as it is on consoles. :O