For the third generation Unreal Engine, we are building two versions of every model in our game. We are building a source model with several million polygons, between 2 and 6 million polygons. We use that model for all the lighting detail on the mesh. Then we go to the in-game version, which is usually about 10,000 polygons.
It's a big and growing problem, the amount of power possessed by Google and Facebook. President Eisenhower said it about the military-industrial complex. They pose a grave threat to our democracy.
The mobile gaming experience is fundamentally limited by this very small screen in front of you that occupies maybe 15 degrees of your field of view. The PC and console experience, you have a 45-degree field of view. VR is 120 degrees: your entire view space. The expectations of users on the platform will rise to levels we've never seen before.
My role is more like a chairman and founder. I am used to overseeing the company's heritage and our strategy.
We're trying to make our software available to users in as economically efficient a way as possible. That means distributing the software directly to them; taking payment through Mastercard, Visa, Paypal, and other options; and not having a store take 30 percent.
Asian online games are far ahead of Western games in terms of business model, but the Western games do have a real advantage in terms of production values.
That's the great things about games as social experiences. You play with all your friends across social groups. You see young girls as well as young boys playing. These are kids in school, people in offices, in pubs, all having fun together.
Streaming is something that's going to require tons of billions of dollars of investment, building server farms close to users and 5G and everything else.
I've never met a skeptic of VR who has tried it.
We need to avoid going down a path where we might find the doors slamming shut behind us.
We've been happy to be able to work with Sony and Microsoft to have the first game that honors everyone's purchases across iOS, Android, PC, Mac, and the console platforms.
Onstage at Build, Phil Spencer said the Xbox is an open platform - which surprises me, because you have to get your game concept approved before you start developing it. Then you have to get every update approved. Microsoft has absolute control.
We'll turn down crappy games that are submitted to the Epic Store.
Microsoft has been taking a series of steps for a while now to close down the Windows ecosystem. They can't do it all at once, because there would be an industry uproar. But one little step at a time, they're trying to take it all over.
Do you remember the first three years of Steam? People absolutely hated that Valve forced you to launch their game through what some people called a virus at the time, which was the Steam client. But Steam led the digital distribution revolution: it was the first across all platforms.
Videogames have existed for almost 40 years now, yet every year, we see major and unexpected advances.