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The Scottish Enterprise Online Games Development R&D programme has developed a platform to address some of the key issues associated with the development of online games.

The opportunity

Online games have a brief history but are expected to have a brilliant future. There are now enough people on the internet willing to pay for entertainment and other services to make online games a viable proposition. The big challenge is making them work.

How can we create games, communities, and companies that are able to ride the online wave? Many of the key challenges can be solved by technology. We have set out to make the online games development process more productive via the provision of novel technologies that can be integrated into the existing tools and middleware chain.

We have invested in the creation of novel technologies to address some of the key issues associated with the development of online games.

The solution

Our Online Games Development (OGD) programme has developed intellectual property in the form of game design tools, programming productivity enhancements, a network scripting language and procedural content generation which present an opportunity to create new, market leading businesses.

Applications

Game design

Solving problems during the game design process is expensive. Currently, more than 20 percent of development cost is attributed to resolving issues that would never have arisen if the industry had suitable game design tools. At present, tool development tends to be proprietary and in-house.

There are few specialised game design tools in the market, and those that do exist tend to be integrated with games engines. Clearly, the industry could benefit from a suite of tools that allow game developers to validate game playability before expensive game assets are created.

We have developed a notation and simulation system that abstracts game design into notational format that allows developers to simulate design scenarios and test difficulty, survivability and other gameplay features before game assets are created. The solution can be used for:

  • Simulating gameplay
  • Usability and testing
  • Modelling difficulty
  • Proving correctness

Programming productivity

We have created tools that enhance the performance of games systems. Such tools already exist but the Scottish Enterprise development improves the implementation of them.

Network scripting

We have developed a simple language that handles the complexity of writing games and simulations that run over a network and that comprises:

A scripting language that enables:

  • Real time updates to game servers without down time
  • Optimisation for multi-core processors
  • Management of the effects of variable network quality
  • Deterministic online behaviour

Administration tools that support deterministic online behaviour, including:

  • Accurate testing, fault recreation and debugging of network code
  • Monitoring and repurposing of resource usage

Network physics integration that interfaces the network system with existing physics solutions to ensure that physics-based events occur synchronously across multiple network nodes.

Procedural content generation

Online worlds and increasingly larger games are creating an ever greater need for game assets thus the industry needs to find quicker, easier and cheaper methods for creating these assets.

We have created a toolkit for non-expert users that will enable the procedural generation of buildings, which enables easy creation of architectural game assets while minimising the use of memory and disk space.

Key benefits

Reduce development cost and time

  • Allow developers to focus on game design and playability
  • Facilitate planning and increase the predictability of the games development process

What we're looking for

We are seeking engagement with organisations and/or individuals who may have an interest in licensing this technology. The technology can be licensed as a complete system or in its component parts for a range of applications. We seek to exploit these intellectual assets for the benefit of the Scottish economy.

This technology is already being exploited in anti-tamper/anti-hack applications however; opportunities for commercial exploitation of this technology exist in a number of application areas, including:

  • Embedded software optimisation
  • Multi-core software parallelisation

If you have experience in, or would like to be involved with, the start-up, spin-out, mentoring or management of Scottish companies, or if you wish to expand your business horizons through the exploitation of new technology, get in touch.

Get involved with this opportunity