but it could lag maybe depending on ur hardware
AAA means millions in development budget (ten to hundreds) and some more millions for marketing.
It means release on the latest consoles (and PC)
It means a century or more in man hours to develop it.
By definition, Indie can’t be AAA, matter of scope and budget.
The engine plays a small part in making a AAA title, and why so many AAA titles use tech built in house, which can be a heavily modified licensed engine build or built from scratch (well, relatively)
Photo realism, as has been already said, is a matter more of technical art direction and budget than using a particular license.
AAA means you’re trying for GotY with marketing clout, competing with WoW, CoD, GTA, Fortnite and games based on huge licensed IP like Star Wars, Marvel, etc.
As an Indie, for 99.9% of us, it shouldn’t even be something to measure yourself or even compete against, as we’re talking orders of magnitude differences in available ressources for development.
It’s mostly a red herring, a downward spiral of wasted ressources and manpower, leading to major studios closing, mass layoffs, etc. cause it’s so hard to succeed in AAA even with a 100 million dollars budget. You can work 10 years in AAA and never ship a title, it’s that ruthless.
The Indie space as we know it was born as a reaction to ballooning budgets at the turn of the century by developers who started as Indies in the 80s and wanted to rekindle that flame of small dev teams shipping games alongside the big boys, by using licensed engine technologies with specific licensing terms allowing many to fulfill their dreams of making games.
AAA is both the biggest hits and all that’s wrong with the industry. More and more flops and soulless GaaS where, each year, thanks to Indies, they are countless quality games, innovative takes on genres and a few exceptional gems, too many for one person to sample them all.
I buy (some) Indie, and borrow AAA games from the library. .
Cheers !
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