Onyx?

[lobotomy42]

Back when Dungeon Siege III came out, I remember there a was a big (little) deal about how Obsidian was on a better technological track, since they had their own in-house engine to work with.  DS3's comparatively bug-free state was given as evidence of the dividends.

 

Fast forward to today, and Obsidian's big 2D RPG critical success is...Eternity, made with Unity.  With expansions and presumably sequels to come all using similar or successor versions of the engine.

 

Just out of curiosity, is Onyx still around? Did South Park use it? I haven't heard Obsidian talk about it in awhile.

[Gorth]

Just out of curiosity, is Onyx still around? Did South Park use it? I haven't heard Obsidian talk about it in awhile.

Based entirely on memory... I think they said something about having scrapped it, the reason being the cost of the middle-ware used in the engine meant it wasn't cost efficient depending on what scale of game you wanted to develop. Hence the choice of Unity for PoE without half a dozen other companies needing to be paid licenses/royalties.

 

My perception quite possibly got warped over time, but that was the gist of it

[Sannom]

Just out of curiosity, is Onyx still around? Did South Park use it? I haven't heard Obsidian talk about it in awhile.

South Park used it, yes. As for the rest, see Gorth's answer above.

[Guest]

I remember one of the Obsidian folks stating that middle-ware costs made Onyx impractical for PoE, not impractical period. So unless I'm mistaken, Onyx has not been "scrapped".

[C2B]

I remember one of the Obsidian folks stating that middle-ware costs made Onyx impractical for PoE, not impractical period. So unless I'm mistaken, Onyx has not been "scrapped".

It has been scrapped and the engine development team dissolved. It was first mentioned by feargus in a talk at a russian con related to Skyforge I THINK two years ago.

Edited May 8, 2015 by C2B

[lobotomy42]

Thanks, that description led me to Google this rpgcodex report, confirming:

 

http://www.rpgcodex.net/article.php?id=8973

[Tigranes]

Yep. Onyx would only have been viable really for a track of AAA games. At that stage it seems clear Obsidian's plan was to have at least 2 AAA RPGs in development at any given time, ideally both using Onyx, which would easily make the engine development worthwhile. The cancellations of certain projects basically enacted a cosmic explosion of that plan. Eternity couldn't use Onyx due to middleware costs, and at this point, it's safe to say Onyx has mostly been mothballed. 

[lobotomy42]

Kind of a shame, if I do say so. Dungeon Siege III looked pretty and played quite smoothly.

[Leferd]

Onyx Aliens.

 

[Oerwinde]

That was the only Alien game I had ever looked forward to.