Ubisoft’s next-gen Snowdrop Engine detailed

Based in Malmö, Sweden, Ubisoft Massive has discussed some details of its Snowdrop Engine which will be powering upcoming MMORPG / tactical-3rd-person-shooter hybrid, Tom Clancy’s The Division.

Going into the development, efficiency and flexibility were key tenets. Snowdrop gives everyone involved – from artists and animators to coders and design testers – access to the game’s assets and mechanics from directly within the running game engine, enabling them to quickly visualise and adapt concepts and ideas.

The real-time nature of developing on Snowdrop helped speed up iterations, Massive explained, as each alteration made would trigger a dynamic change for related elements in the rest of the game.

“Each thing the creators develop needs to be instant and in-game, so that they know exactly if it will work, with no baking time. We built Snowdrop in a way so that the game is always playable during development. We conduct frequent play tests at Massive to ensure it’s constantly tested at every stage of production. Not only does this allow us to obtain the best quality possible, this enables us to achieve a high level of coherence within the game.”

Fun was also an important element for developing on Snowdrop, Massive explained, because the team feels if they are not having fun making it, people won’t have fun playing it.

“If the tool is not fun, you kill individual creativity. We get all kinds of crazy, fun and unexpected results from an intuitive and powerful tool like Snowdrop. That’s exactly what an innovative gameplay experience is about.”

In the video below you can see some of the Snowdrop Engine features in action, such as the procedurally generated real-time terrain and object destruction system, a key element to the game’s cover-based combat. Massive explained that the destruction is not pre-baked into the game, and reacts to different forces.

The lighting system is apparently inspired by film techniques, Massive explained, and lighting sources are calculated for both indoor and outdoor environments.

“If we move one object in the game, the light in the environment will immediately react accordingly, thus obtaining the most realistic effect,” said Massive.

“Tom Clancy’s The Division has been designed specifically for and on next-gen, using our 100% next-gen Snowdrop engine,” said Massive.

“This new generation of consoles has opened many new opportunities to create more immersive and dynamic worlds, and enabled us to create the universe we had envisioned for The Division.”

The Division is heading to Xbox One, PS4, and PC in 2014.

The Division takes place in New York three weeks after a lethal virus, released on Black Friday, swept through the city. Players have to scavenge and fight for their lives in order to survive the now derelict city.

A devastating pandemic sweeps through New York City, and one by one, basic services fail. In only days, without food or water, society collapses into chaos. The Division, a classified unit of self-supported tactical agents, is activated. Leading seemingly ordinary lives among us, Division agents are trained to operate independently in order to save society. When society falls, your mission begins.