Crystal Tools

The Crystal Tools engine, originally named White Engine, is a seventh generation game engine built to be used with “all of the Square Enix’s forthcoming next-generation games” on the PlayStation 3, as commented by Final Fantasy Versus XIII character designer Tetsuya Nomura. The first games to utilize it will be Final Fantasy XIII, its spinoff title Final Fantasy Versus XIII, and Square Enix’s next-gen MMORPG currently codenamed Rapture. Nomura commented that the switch from the PlayStation 2 to the PlayStation 3 was difficult, saying that “the hurdles are greater than they were in the move from the PS1 to the PS2.” This in turn gave way to the creation of the White Engine, which was later renamed Crystal Tools.One of the main aspects of the engine is that it allows photorealistic CGI to be rendered in real-time. Nomura has commented that the engine will be able “to recreate battle scenes reminiscent of Final Fantasy VII: Advent Children.” It also handles advanced audio processing, cinematic cut-scene transition, physics effects calculations and special effects rendering.[citation needed] The engine reportedly uses 4 of the 6 synergistic processing elements (SPEs) that are available to games running on the Cell processor, to achieve near-pre-rendered CGI quality in realtime.

In the latest GDC conference it was confirmed that Crystal Tools is focused to work with PlayStation 3, Xbox 360 and PC Windows, as well, the Wii.