14 DAY TRIAL // Frostbite 2 is the engine that seems to power most of the high-profile video games that Electronic Arts will publish in the near future, and one of the main developers behind it revealed how the new technology was pushed to the limits in order to create new and distinct game experiences.
Patrick Soderlund, who was working at DICE while the Frostbite technology was being created, told Gamasutra that, “Animation was a key component that we said, ‘That ain’t cutting it.’
“And how do we not just make a little leap, but how do we make a gigantic leap in animation? And that gravitated us towards our FIFA team, who have an advanced animation system.”
He added, “Audio is another thing. And then the other part is rendering and destruction. And destruction is cool, but we said we want to make gameplay-altering destruction, not just destruction for the sake of it. It needs to be, “Okay, I can shoot through that wall and kill someone; I can take away cover’.”
Frostbite 2 was initially shown with Battlefield 3, the first-person shooter that implemented all of its core features and impressed with the way destruction could be used in order to re-decorate the game space in both single and multiplayer.
Since then DICE has steadily improved Frostbite 2, and it is now being used for another first-person shooter, Medal of Honor: Warfighter from Danger Close.
The game is set to arrive during the fall launch season and I managed to get some hands-on time with it during E3 2012.
Criterion is also using Frostbite 2 to power Need for Speed: Most Wanted, the racing reboot that seems like a sort of spiritual successor to the last Burnout game.
The BioWare developed Command & Conquer: Generals 2 is also using the Frostbite 2 tech for its real-time strategy experience.