Source engine for Xbox 360

Valve's Source Engine is now available for the Xbox 360 and is perhaps the first real rival to Epic Games' Unreal Engine 3.

Developers looking for an alternative to the Unreal Engine 3 can now look towards Valve's Source Engine, which is now ready as a middleware solution for the Xbox 360. Source has for a long time been a major player in the PC scene and has now been refined and optimized for the Xbox 360 hardware.

According to Valve's Gabe Newell, Source Engine is suitable for the creation of "FPS, RTS, RPG or delving into new genres."

Valve is currently working on Half-Life 2 for the Xbox 360, a bumper package containing not only HL2, but also Episode One, Episode Two, Team Fortress 2 and Portal. The same Half-Life 2 bundle is also on the way to the PlayStation 3, but a Source Engine middleware solution is not currently in development for the PS3.

Half-Life 2: Episode 2 was scheduled for the end of 2006, but is now expected sometime early in 2007 - as are the Half-Life 2 packages for next-gen consoles.