Ubisoft plans to use cloud computing to make its game worlds even bigger

metro.co.uk:

Through its new Scalar technology, Ubisoft wants to make its games even larger and we’re already dreading it.

A common complaint with Ubisoft’s modern games is how bloated they are, with the likes of Assassin’s Creed Valhalla packed with so much content that it begins to feel like a full time job. To this day, some people still haven’t fully cleared Assassin’s Creed Odyssey and that came out four years ago.

Now, Ubisoft is threatening, uh, promising to go beyond that and make even larger game worlds using its newly announced Ubisoft Scalar cloud technology.

Unveiled ahead of this year’s Game Developers Conference (GDC), which will run from March 21 to March 25, a new trailer explains how it ‘enables the construction of gigantic game worlds at a scale far greater than anything that has come before.’

We’re not going to pretend we completely understand how it all works, but it sounds like Ubisoft will be using this cloud technology to stand in for a traditional game engine.

‘Ubisoft Scalar is a new foundational technology, led by the team at Ubisoft Stockholm, that leverages the possibilities of cloud computing to enable unprecedented freedom and scale for the games of tomorrow,’ reads the video description.

‘Ubisoft Scalar takes the components and systems of traditional game engines and transforms them into microservices in the cloud – moving from the closed, single-processor systems of today to a distributed model across a potentially unlimited number of machines.’

Some theoretical capabilities include being able to support even larger numbers of assets and updates that don’t interrupt play sessions. Imagine a game receiving new features on the fly, without the need to manually download an update.

You likely won’t see the fruits