NCsoft Chooses Donya's Simplygon For LOD Models

MMORPG developer and publisher NCsoft has signed an agreement to use Donya Labs' Simplygon, which automatically creates LOD (level of detail) models, in several upcoming titles, including Blade & Soul. Headquartered in Sweden and established in 2006, Donya specializes in 3D optimization technology designed to shorten production time and reduce development costs. Its products have been licensed by notable game studios such as BioWare and EVE Online developer CCP Games, as well as non-game companies like Boeing's Phantom Works division. Its Simplygon software is a 3D optimization pipeline and toolkit meant to offer a "one-model approach" to 3D production, in that developers can create 3D content once and have it automatically optimized and repurposed to fit different needs or platforms. Donya says this reduces the resource needs of titles. The tech developer also says that NCsoft's integration of Simplygon will allow its teams to spend more time on core elements of the game rather than devoting artists to hand-crafting tens of thousands of LOD models (models that reduce the number of polygons and visual quality for objects displayed at a distance). "There are many MMORPG projects in NCsoft," says HyungJun Kim, chief art director of NCsoft Korea. "Managing and optimizing thousands to tens of thousands of polygons are most inefficient work in time and cost aspects. Simplygon is the best solution to deal with this problem."