Epic Games releases Unreal Engine 5 in early access

Epic Games has released Unreal Engine 5 in early access, with a stable release to follow in 2022.

The much-anticipated next-gen version of the game engine and real-time rendering system features a wide range of disruptive new technologies, from geometry streaming and real-time GI to new character rigging, animation, level design and audio tools.

New features for geometry streaming, lighting, character rigging, level design and audio

Unreal Engine 5 offers a range of interesting – and potentially, literally game-changing – new technologies.

We covered two of them, virtualised micropolygon geometry system Nanite, and real-time dynamic GI system Lumen, when UE5 was first announced last year, so check out our original story for details.

Features announced during the latest livestream include Control Rig, a new toolset for rigging characters inside the Unreal Editor, and a new Pose Library.

Animators get a new high-performance full-body IK solver, and a motion warping system, making it possible to modify animations dynamically via Blueprints.

Level designers get World Partition, a new system that divides levels into a series of streamable cells.

Levels are also now structured on a one-file-per-actor basis, making it easier for multiple artists to collaborate on a level without overwriting one another’s changes.

Audio designers get MetaSounds, a “fully programmable material and rendering pipeline, bringing all the benefits of procedural content creation to audio that the Material Editor brings to shaders”.

In addition, Quixel Bridge, Epic Games’ free Megascans asset manager, is now built into the Unreal Editor, making it possible to drag and drop stock content directly into a level.

Epic Games has also released a new real-time demo, Valley of the Ancient, which shows off the new features in Unreal Engine 5. The project files are available to download now.

System requirements and availability

Unreal Engine 5 available in early access. The production release will be available “targeting 2022”.

The current stable release, Unreal Engine 4.26, is available for 64-bit Windows, macOS and Linux. Use of the editor is free, as is rendering non-interactive content.

For games developed with the engine, Epic takes 5% of the gross royalties after the first $1 million generated by a title.

Read more about the upcoming features in Unreal Engine 5 on Epic Games’ website.

Source：CG Channel