ARM : NetEase creates gamers’ paradise with Enlighten real-time global illumination technology

Beijing, China, September 19, 2016 - Geomerics, an ARM company, today announced that its Enlighten™ real-time global illumination technology is being deployed in the development of 'Justice: The Only End of Kongfu', a new game by NetEase.

'NetEase's commitment to technological innovation has produced some of China's most popular PC-client and mobile games,' said Chris Porthouse, general manager of Enlighten Business Unit, ARM. 'The integration of Enlighten into this strong technology base will help make 'Justice: The Only End of Kongfu' NetEase's most aesthetically beautiful and exciting game to date.'

With Enlighten:

• Gamers can experience a world where lights move and change without compromising on visual fidelity.
• NetEase's artists are producing high-quality game lighting nine times more efficiently than before.

'The world of 'Justice: The Only End of Kongfu' will be the paradise that our gamers have always dreamed of,' said Zhipeng Hu, vice president of NetEase. 'Enlighten allows us to achieve better lighting for its constantly changing environment, all while increasing production efficiency by nine times. This gives our development team the time needed to fulfil even more of our gamers' creative wishes.'

The effect of light and shadow appearing on an object is formed by a combination of direct light and global illumination (the way light is bounced or absorbed by surfaces in a scene). Enlighten calculates this global illumination in milliseconds, taking into account the properties of both lights and materials to ensure high-quality results. The speed of this computation means users can change the lighting setup of a scene any number of times and see the correct global illumination response instantly.

Thanks to Enlighten global illumination technology, 'Justice: The Only End of Kongfu' will be a fully dynamic experience with many different lighting effects in each scene. Take a lake scene as an example. Enlighten generates accurate indirect reflections on the water as the day transitions from dawn to dusk. The player will immediately be able to see the sun's changing position and color affect the lighting of the lake's surface.

This rapid global illumination computation also takes place in the editor and allows NetEase developers to see results instantaneously, removing the need for a lengthy offline bake after each change to the lighting setup. In the case of 'Justice: The Only End of Kongfu', an effect that would otherwise have required nine artists can be easily created by just one.

'Justice: The Only End of Kongfu' is scheduled for release in 2017.

-end-

About ARM

ARM technology is at the heart of a computing and connectivity revolution that is transforming the way people live and businesses operate. From the unmissable to the invisible; our advanced, energy-efficient processor designs are enabling the intelligence in 86 billion silicon chips securely powering products from the sensor to the smartphone to the supercomputer. With more than 1,000 technology partners including the world's most famous business and consumer brands, we are driving ARM innovation into all areas compute is happening inside the chip, the network and the cloud.

About Geomerics

Geomerics was founded in 2007 to deliver cutting-edge graphics technology to customers in the games and entertainment industries. ARM acquired the company in 2013 and has continued to invest in Enlighten, the global illumination middleware behind titles such as Mirror's Edge™ Catalyst, Street Fighter V and Star Wars™: Battlefront™.

About Enlighten

Enlighten computes global illumination in real-time. Users can change a scene's lighting either in the final application or in the editor and see the global illumination respond instantly and accurately. This capability dramatically improves the artist workflow and enables more interactive user experiences. Its lightweight runtime can deliver high quality dynamic global illumination across PC, console, mobile and VR.

Enlighten is available as a standalone SDK, pre-integrated into the Unreal Engine and is the global illumination solution in Unity 5. Visit www.geomerics.com for more information.

About NetEase

NetEase, Inc. (NASDAQ: NTES) is a leading Internet technology company in China. Dedicated to providing online services centered content, community, communication and commerce, NetEase develops and operates some of China's most popular online PC and mobile games, advertising services, email services and e-commerce platforms. In partnership with Blizzard Entertainment, NetEase operates some of the most popular international online games in China.