Unreal Engine 5

Unreal Engine 5. © Epic Games.

Epic Games unveiled the next generation of its game engine, the Unreal Engine 5 (UE5), with an impressive real-time demo running live on PlayStation 5, Sony’s new console due to come out at the end of the year. The two new core technologies that will debut with UE5 are called Nanite and Lumen. Nanite is a geometry virtualizing tool that “frees artists to create as much geometric detail as the eye can see”. And Lumen is Epic’s fully dynamic global illumination solution that reacts in real time. The combination of these two technologies produces stunning light, texture and photorealistic rendering, even without ray-tracing. According to Epic, the UE5 will only be fully released at the end of 2021, but developers currently working in UE4 will easily transition. “Epic is designing for forward compatibility, so developers can get started with next-gen development now in UE4 and move projects to UE5 when ready.” The business model is also being revamped, to the delight of developers, who will only start paying the 5% royalty after their gross revenue with any single piece of software exceeds one million dollars. This should allow smaller studios to save tens of thousands of dollars per game. And there are no royalties whatsoever for games sold through Epic’s Game Store.

⇨ YouTube, “Unreal Engine 5 Revealed! | Next-Gen Real-Time Demo Running on PlayStation 5.”

⇨ Unreal Engine, “A first look at Unreal Engine 5.”

⇨ Ars Technica, Sam Machkovech, “Unreal Engine is now royalty-free until a game makes a whopping $1 million.”

⇨ Ars Technica, Kyle Orland, “How Epic got such amazing Unreal Engine 5 results on next-gen consoles.”