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Unity to Acquire Weta
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This week saw an interesting confluence of gaming, film and technology.

Unity Technologies, developers of the Unity game engine, announced a deal to acquire film-maker Peter Jackson's New Zealand based visual effects company, Weta Digital.

What does this mean? In their own words:

We are thrilled to democratize these industry-leading tools and bring the genius of Sir Peter Jackson and Weta’s amazing engineering talent to life for artists everywhere.

Unity is one of the major game development engines used by independent (i.e. not major studio) developers.

Some great and really successful sci-fi games have been built with it, eg. Kerbal Space Program and Subnautica.

This deal could see a big jump in the visual quality of indie games sometime in the next decade.

Possibly also in indie film production. There are already some very impressive sci-fi works being made by indies with cinema grade special effects, but this deal could offer them superior tools.

[ Main Image: Lord of the Rings. Credit: New Line Cinema via WETA. ]

References

Spangler, Todd (November 9, 2021). Peter Jackson Selling Weta Digital’s VFX Tech Division to Unity for $1.625 Billion. Variety.

WETA (November 10, 2021). Unity Announces Intent to Acquire Weta Digital's Tools, Pipeline, Technology, and Engineering Talent.

Wikipedia. Unity (game engine). (viewed November 14, 2021)