Which video decoder should I use for cutscenes in my game?

Question

The game franchise I am working on uses a video encoder/decoder library which produces rather large files. We want to change to something a little more efficient, particularly H.264 or VP8. However, there seem to be extensive legal issues revolving around software licensing to navigate, and threats of a challenge to VP8.

So what I want is a C++ header and library file I can statically link to the game to decode an efficiently compressed video stream. I'll consider commercial ones that offer patent indemnity (we're using Bink at the moment). Licensing needs to be sympathetic to a commercial product. An answer about the legal situation would be helpful too...

Thanks!

Guy

Underbid

What platform? When I used to work in a game studio, this was all the rage: radgametools.com/bnkmain.htm – Medalist

I'd be pleasantly surprised if you can find something that the legal wizards are OK with. My, admittedly poor, understanding is that it is extremely tough to create a viable video codec without infringing on existing patents and time-consuming to even check whether it does. – Chicalote

@selbie: that would be Bink, which we're using at the moment. I'm guessing the very reason WHY Bink exists is because of situations like this. – Underbid

@user786653: this is kind of my point... it seems like everything has ground to a halt. – Underbid

so which did you eventually choose? – Methedrine

We've now moved over to VP8. – Underbid

Here's a 2014 writeup that compares several codecs: In-depth: Playing (with) video – Koral

Answer 1

After lengthy legal consideration, we have migrated to libVP8. It is a fine library.

Underbid

+1 for the fact that the phrase "It is a fine library" tickled me for some reason. – Gustave

Answer 2

ogg comes to mind. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ogg http://www.vorbis.com/

Lashley

Theora is based on MPEG-4 Part 2, rather than Part 10. DivX, Xvid etc. are based on these and don't offer such good compression. – Underbid

Answer 3

Sorry if this obviously inappropriate for some reason, but isn't the only H.264 "Open" competitor/contender "Dirac"? The wikipedia page on the Ogg container format appears to imply that it supports Dirac, and the Dirac article on wikipedia states that there is a free (MIT-licensed, suitable for commercial use) cross-platform implementation called Shrödinger.

EDIT:

• After looking at this some more I found out that Dirac is very expensive in terms of CPU requirements during decoding; whether this is relevant to your environment would depend on the other requirements of your game(s)
• I also completely missed the whole VP8/WebM thing - you mention VP8 above with "threats of a challenge to VP8", but I can't find any recent mentions of threats (eg here or here) - the latest flurry of comments I see is in mid-2010 soon after they open-sourced it. Is there more information about current/expected threats anywhere?

Granddad

I now attribute less threat to the legal challenges to VP8. I'm now waiting on legal to approve the use of VP8. – Underbid