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Lithtech is a game engine which was initially developed by Monolith Productions in collaboration with Microsoft. Monolith later formed a separate company, LithTech Inc., to deal with further advancements of the engine technology and currently, after a change of its corporate identity, LithTech Inc. is known as Touchdown Entertainment. A number of different video game developers, including Monolith itself, has been using Lithtech to power their first-person shooter games, thus contributing to the success of the engine, establishing it as an alternative to other products, such as the Quake and Unreal engines. The Lithtech engine is continually being developed, and as of 2005, its latest incarnation has been codenamed Jupiter Extended or Jupiter EX for short. Image File history File links Jupiter_Ex. ...
Image File history File links Jupiter_Ex. ...
Software development is the translation of a user need or marketing goal into a software product. ...
A software release refers to the creation and availability of a new version of a computer software product. ...
A game engine is the core software component of a computer or video game or other interactive application with real-time graphics. ...
A website (or Web site) is a collection of web pages, images, videos and other digital assets and hosted on a particular domain or subdomain on the World Wide Web. ...
A game engine is the core software component of a computer or video game or other interactive application with real-time graphics. ...
Monolith Productions is a Kirkland, Washington-based computer game developer. ...
Microsoft Corporation, (NASDAQ: MSFT, HKSE: 4338) is a multinational computer technology corporation with global annual revenue of US$44. ...
A video game developer is a software developer (a business or an individual) that creates video games. ...
First-person shooter (FPS) is a genre of video games which is characterized by an on-screen view that simulates the in-game characters point of view and a focus on the use of handheld ranged weapons. ...
The Quake engine is the game engine that was written to power 1996s Quake, written by id Software. ...
The Unreal Engine is a widely-used game engine developed by Epic Games. ...
2005 (MMV) was a common year starting on Saturday of the Gregorian calendar. ...
Development history
Originally the Lithtech engine was supposed to be called DirectEngine, as Monolith was developing it for Microsoft to be included as a 3D engine for use with Microsoft's DirectX technology, but that deal fell through. Nevertheless Monolith continued development on their own and were able to license the engine, officially renamed to Lithtech, to other companies. Later, after a corporate reorganization, the Lithtech team was split off into a separate company, LithTech Inc., which is now known as Touchdown Entertainment. 3D computer graphics are different from 2D computer graphics in that a three-dimensional representation of geometric data is stored in the computer for the purposes of performing calculations and rendering 2D images. ...
Microsoft DirectX is a collection of APIs for handling tasks related to multimedia, especially game programming, on Microsoft platforms. ...
Upon its first release, Lithtech 1.0 did not compare favorably to the more powerful Quake and Unreal engines, lacking advanced graphical features found in its competitors' products[citation needed]. It was however, lauded for its ease of programming: this was a direct result of its development history, being originally planned as part of DirectX and a programming system originally conceived as a way to simplify game development.
Starting with Lithtech 2.0, Lithtech Inc. began a strange notion of creating many different versions of the engine. Monolith released their game No One Lives Forever (NOLF) featuring this version of the engine, however it was later revised to Lithtech 2.2 whose fixes were included in the latest NOLF patch. The LithTech team then continued to improve version 2.2 for its licensees, creating first Lithtech 2.3 and eventually Lithtech 2.4. No One Lives Forever, commonly abbreviated NOLF, is the name of a computer game and video game developed by Monolith Productions and published by Fox Interactive. ...
Lithtech had a brief stint with Real Networks, developing a custom version of Lithtech which was partially based-off Lithtech 2.2. The new engine was called RealArcade Lithtech (aka Lithtech ESD) and, among its features, it supported streaming media for in-game billboards/ads, and could be used with RealNetworks' gaming site. At one time, RealArcade Lithtech could be licensed by developers if they signed an agreement with Real Networks. This engine was used on an internally-developed title, Tex Atomic's Big Bot Battles. RealNetworks NASDAQ: RNWK is a provider of Internet media delivery software and services based in Seattle, United States. ...
Streaming media is multimedia that is continuously received by, and normally displayed to, the end-user whilst it is being delivered by the provider. ...
Tex Atomics Big Bot Battles is a third person shooter for the PC developed by Monolith Productions and published by Real Networks. ...
However, for use of Monolith, LithTech Inc. developed a different engine to be used specifically for the company's newest title, Aliens versus Predator 2. This release was called Lithtech Talon and was based-off Lithtech 2.2, rather than Lithtech 2.4. Because of this choice, Lithtech 2.4, RealArcade Lithtech, and Lithtech Talon resulted to be largely incompatible with each other. The Talon version of the engine had many newer features, including advanced animations (facial animations) and some vehicle support, finally allowing Lithtech to better rival its competitors of that time, the Quake 3 engine and the Unreal Tournament version of the Unreal engine. Lithtech Talon's biggest selling point lay in its reasonably good multiplayer support, more efficient when compared to prior versions of Lithtech multiplayer that featured poor networking code. Despite its good achievements, Talon was intended as only a partial step towards the true next-generation version of the Lithtech engine. For the upcoming film, see Alien vs. ...
The Quake 3 Engine was developed by id Software and is used in many games today. ...
The Unreal Engine is a widely-used game engine developed by Epic Games. ...
Lithtech 3.0 was being developed concurrently with Talon, but, along with its revisions, Lithtech 3.0 would largely be considered an internal version of the engine. While it was sent to licensees, no games were finished on it. Lithtech 3.x was merely a "stop-gap" version only used as a demonstration of the (now vaporware) Monolith game, Shogo II. The primary feature of Lithtech 3.x was the Distributed Object System, a revolutionary system for MMORPGs and multiplayer. Unfortunately, Lithtech 3.x was also plagued by a significant number of bugs and problems and all games developed with Lithtech 3.x would eventually convert to the newer Lithtech Jupiter or to Talon. An image from World of Warcraft, one of the largest commercial MMORPGs as of 2004, based on active subscriptions. ...
With the demise of the 3.x release, Lithtech Discovery was created as the true MMORPG version of Lithtech. Discovery improved upon the working technology from Lithtech 2.2, but also included the Distributed Object System which was the centerpiece of Lithtech 3.x. The only game title to be powered by Lithtech Discovery has been The Matrix Online, but it should be noticed that this version of the engine was never licensed to any other developer besides Monolith. The Matrix Online (MxO) is a MMORPG developed by Monolith Productions. ...
Lithtech Jupiter was developed as an alternative to 3.x, but was not branched off of it, the engine instead being completely overhauled with the release of Jupiter. With this version, Lithtech became a worthy competitor to the Unreal and Quake engines: in some ways, the original version of Jupiter was even more technologically advanced than its competitors, since it supported Shader Model 1.x and included a visualization tool, whereas at the time Unreal and Quake only supported CPU-based shaders. However, without the Distributed Object System of Lithtech 3.x, Jupiter started its life with virtually unusable multiplayer support. A custom version of Jupiter was made especially for Monolith, for use with their Tron 2.0 game; this release was codenamed Lithtech Triton. Eventually, Lithtech Triton's new features were merged back into Lithtech Jupiter for licensees. A Shader in the field of computer graphics is a set of software instructions, which is used by the graphic resources primarily to perform rendering effects. ...
Tron 2. ...
As of 2005 the latest incarnation of the Lithtech engine is Jupiter Extended (or Jupiter EX for short), which was featured in the highly rated games F.E.A.R. and Condemned: Criminal Origins, both developed by Monolith. Compared to its precursor Jupiter, the Extended version is driven by an all-new DirectX 9 renderer and has seen some other major advancements, including the addition of Havok physics to simulate realistic physics. Along with Havok's character dynamics, Jupiter EX includes also the "Havok Vehicle Kit", which adds support for common vehicle behavior. Further features present in Jupiter EX are normal mapping, parallax mapping, vertex/pixel and high-level shaders, volumetric lighting and lightmapping with the addition of a per-pixel lighting model to allow complex lighting effects to be developed. F.E.A.R. (First Encounter Assault Recon) is a horror themed first-person shooter computer game developed by Monolith Productions and published by Vivendi Universal. ...
The Havok Game Dynamics SDK, better known as simply Havok, is a middleware physics engine (in this case Dynamical simulation) designed for computer and video games by allowing interaction between objects or other characters in real-time. ...
Normal Mapping used to re-detail simplified meshes. ...
Parallax Mapping (also, Photonic Mapping, Offset Mapping or Virtual Displacement Mapping) is an enhancement of the bump mapping or normal mapping techniques applied to textures in 3D rendering applications such as video games. ...
Volumetric lighting is a technique used in 3D computer graphics to add lighting to a rendered scene. ...
A Lightmap is a data structure which contains the brightness of surfaces in a game. ...
In computer graphics, per-pixel lighting is commonly used to refer to a set of methods for computing illumination at each rendered pixel of an image. ...
Lithtech implementations The following is a partial list of computer games built with the Lithtech engine. If not otherwise stated the game was/is developed by Monolith Productions. A computer game is a game composed of a computer-controlled virtual universe that players interact with in order to achieve a defined goal or set of goals. ...
Monolith Productions is a Kirkland, Washington-based computer game developer. ...
Lithtech 1.0 - Shogo: Mobile Armor Division (1998)
- Blood II: The Chosen (1998)
Lithtech 2.0/2.2 No One Lives Forever, commonly abbreviated NOLF, is the name of a computer game and video game developed by Monolith Productions and published by Fox Interactive. ...
Legends of Might and Magic, sometimes referred to as LoMM or simply Legends, is a first-person shooter game released by The 3DO Company in 2001 for PC. Unlike other Might and Magic games, Legends of Might and Magic is mainly a multiplayer game. ...
RealArcade Lithtech / Lithtech ESD Tex Atomics Big Bot Battles is a third person shooter for the PC developed by Monolith Productions and published by Real Networks. ...
Super Bubble Pop is a video game of the puzzle genre released in 2002 by Runecraft. ...
Zombie Studios is a Seattle-based independent video game developer of console, PC, mobile and web-based games. ...
Lithtech 2.4 Global Operations is a first-person shooter computer game developed by Barking Dog Studios and published by both Crave Entertainment and Electronic Arts. ...
Barking Dog Studios was a video game company founded in May 1998 by several former employees of Radical Entertainment. ...
Rockstar Vancouver is a video game studio located in downtown Vancouver, British Columbia. ...
Lithtech Talon For the upcoming film, see Alien vs. ...
Purge or PurgeFinal (formerly known as PurgeJihad), is a free massively multiplayer first-person shooter computer game published by Freeform Interactive. ...
Might and Magic IX is a computer role-playing game developed for Microsoft Windows by New World Computing and released in 2002 by the 3DO Company. ...
New World Computing, Inc. ...
Groove Games is a Toronto-based publisher of budget computer game titles. ...
Lithtech Jupiter To meet Wikipedias quality standards, this article or section may require cleanup. ...
Cyberwar is a somewhat over-hyped term for a variety of uses of technology in warfare. ...
Mnemosyne (Greek , IPA in RP and in General American) (sometimes shortened to Mneme) was the personification of memory in Greek mythology. ...
No One Lives Forever, commonly abbreviated NOLF, is the name of a computer game and video game series by Monolith Productions. ...
Gods and Generals screenshot. ...
Tron 2. ...
Face of Mankind is a Massively Multiplayer Online Roleplaying Game in a persistent world. ...
Duplex systems (DPS) are a german game company. ...
Lithtech Discovery The Matrix Online (MxO) is a MMORPG developed by Monolith Productions. ...
Jupiter Extended (EX) - F.E.A.R. (2005)
- Condemned: Criminal Origins (2005)
F.E.A.R. (First Encounter Assault Recon) is a horror themed first-person shooter computer game developed by Monolith Productions and published by Vivendi Universal. ...
External links - Official Touchdown Entertainment website for the Lithtech Jupiter engine
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