BUILD | TOOLS NEWS Spreading Havok


At GDC Havok revealed a deal with Nintendo to make its tech more accessible to Wii U developers. Will Freeman asks the firm’s managing director David Coghlan what that, along with the Vision Engine acquisition, means for Havok’s future


The demos of Havok’s tech shown at GDC 2012 (right) by MD David Coglhan (above) and his team demonstrated that, since acquiring the Vision Engine, the company is now offering a complete development solution


WHAT DOES THEWii U deal mean for Havok, and the developers of Wii U games? For developers of Wii U games it means access to two of our flagship products – Havok Physics and Havok Animation – for any games that they are developing on the platform, and in an extremely cost effective way. The deal applies to developers worldwide, including both third-party and Nintendo studios. From a Havok point of view it means we’re


potentially expanding the range of studios that are getting their hands on our tech. That’s something we’re always trying to do at an overall level, and at every level. Historically Havok has been very focused on the triple-A side of things, but in the last two years we’ve seen our tech get into the hands of many more people, and this is an important step along that road. This Wii U deal really will put leading tech in a much broader range of studios worldwide.


And will we see more Havok’s middleware added to the rostrum of products that are supported by the Wii U deal? Speaking with Nintendo, they identified Havok Physics and Animation as priority products to make more accessible to Wii U developers. The other Havok products are available for Wii U games development, but under standard licensing models from Havok.


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So why was it Havok Physics and Havok Animation were chosen to be made available to Wii U devs through the deal? Nintendo clearly recognised the value that cutting-edge physics can have on a platform. I think animation is also a key area that people are focused on as they look to the future. Wii U games developers can still come to us for other products, but something like Havok


The progress we’ve made has really


been possible because of the modular architecture of the Vision Engine.


David Coghlan, Havok


Cloth may not be applicable to for every game for the platform, while things like physics and animation are clearly relevant to every title.


How about the integration of the Vision Engine into the Havok toolset. What motivated the move into the engine space? Historically Havok had been known for providing ‘best in class’ middleware


components, and for many studios they were happy to take that and integrate that with their in-house render. But we also started seeing a lot of studios that were coming to us and saying something like ‘we’re using so many Havok components in our games development pipeline, how about just rounding it out and giving it to us pre- integrated inside an engine?’. We’ve known the guys at Trinigy for years, including the founders, and we had a number of common customers that we shared, and we liked the fact that as architects of their own software they have a very similar approach to Havok; a very modular approach to their technology. About six months ago we made the


acquisition and we’re all thrilled with the progress we’re making. At GDC 2012 we were showing the Vision Engine fully integrated with the full range of Havok products, all out of the box.


So a modular tool set is now paired with a central engine. Why is that modular nature significant in this case? The progress that we’ve made in that short space of time has really been possible because of the modular architecture of the Vision Engine, and a number of our customers are already using Vision with Havok products integrated.


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