US company Avatar Reality intends to license CryEngine 2, the game engine behind Crytek’s forthcoming first-person shooter “Crysis”. Avatar Reality has announced a virtual world that, like Second Life, will allow residents to create personal avatars and communicate and interact through them. The world will be set on Mars but provide Earth-like environments for its avatars.
“CryEngine 2 renders the most beautiful realtime images I have seen in my 20 years in the computer-graphics industry,” said Avatar Reality president Kazuyuki Hashimoto. He argued that the resulting graphics depended not only on artistic talent but also on the technology itself.
Crytek presented the engine at the Game Developers Conference in San Francisco. CryEngine 2 could give Avatar Reality a visual distinction from the comparatively simple graphics of Second Life. Licensing the engine would also provide Crytek with revenue independent of game sales.
