Epic Games releases Unreal Engine 5 to the public:
After nearly a year in early access and around a month in preview, Unreal Engine 5 has reached full release. All developers can now start downloading and using Epic's next-gen game engine. It comes with two free sample projects showcasing its abilities. Alongside the announcement, multiple prominent developers discussed their plans for working on the platform.
Since Epic unveiled Unreal Engine 5 in 2020, it's chiefly been noted for features like the Lumen real-time global illumination system and Nanite micro-polygons. This week, the company announced these features and others are now ready. However, they are still insufficient for non-gaming applications like film and TV productions.
One sample project Epic released alongside UE5 is City Sample, which lets users examine and explore an environment Epic built for The Matrix Awakens — the free UE5 demo released for PlayStation 5 and Xbox Series consoles last year. It's the first time this project has been made available to the public on PC. The other sample is Lyra Starter Game — a starting point and educational resource for building shooters, which Epic intends to upgrade over time.
(Score: 2) by Gaaark on Thursday April 07 2022, @02:41PM (6 children)
Shit, after watching "The Blair Shit Project", "Godzilla" with Matthew Broderick and (i think it was called) "Super Pupz" with my son, I'd watch a good movie made with this tech. Anything with good writing and plot... the expensive shit Hollywood puts out sometimes....
--- Please remind me if I haven't been civil to you: I'm channeling MDC. ---Gaaark 2.0 ---
(Score: 2) by richtopia on Thursday April 07 2022, @03:28PM (3 children)
Yea. Hollywood regularly forgets that content trumps special effects.
We've seen a massive flux of independent content, enabled by digital cameras/phones coming down in price and digital distribution platforms. Unreal could enable budget greenscreen or digital movies even at entry level productions.
(Score: 3, Interesting) by ikanreed on Thursday April 07 2022, @05:17PM (2 children)
I think it's just technet overinterpretting this quote from Epic
Which doesn't mean movies can't use it, I'd read it probably means that they're trying to deter liability if someone uses unreal for a real-world simulation that could cost money if there are bugs with the new features, and it produces inaccurate or flawed results.
Imagine hypothetically, a solar farm that used the lumen lighting engine to calculate potential generation capacity, but geometry issues caused the shadows to not show up from a nearby object in the simulation, and they can't deliver. A court might not take kindly to that.
(Score: 1) by shrewdsheep on Thursday April 07 2022, @05:27PM (1 child)
Hm..., interesting idea. I would never have thought one could hold any game engine responsible for its physical accuracy. After all, it needs to use approximation to be able to run in realtime. What makes you think a "suitability of purpose" clause could be strechted this far?
(Score: 3, Interesting) by ikanreed on Thursday April 07 2022, @05:42PM
Epic wants Unreal to be a simulation engine of choice, because that's more customers for them.
And while, like typical software licenses, the individual EULA for the unreal engine has the typical "(THE “EPIC PARTIES”) MAKE NO REPRESENTATIONS OR WARRANTIES OF ANY KIND, EXPRESS OR IMPLIED", many companies negotiate separate contracts with Epic games, which may have some level of warranty.
Also, a more plausible real time simulation case with big risks is testing software for self driving cars. Developing your own real time physics simulation with reasonable real-world graphical fidelity would be a huge undertaking, distracting from your main goal of making the car work.
(Score: 2) by Freeman on Thursday April 07 2022, @06:21PM (1 child)
I actually liked Godzilla with Matthew Broderick, but I also like him as an actor.
Joshua 1:9 "Be strong and of a good courage; be not afraid, neither be thou dismayed: for the Lord thy God is with thee"
(Score: 3, Funny) by Gaaark on Friday April 08 2022, @03:42AM
I like him too: My wife and I went to see the movie at the theater and when Godzilla died I thought "Great: this shite is over". Then when they found the eggs, i actually moaned "Oh, God!" out loud in the theater because it was then apparent that the movie wasn't over.
Give me Buehler ANY day! :)
--- Please remind me if I haven't been civil to you: I'm channeling MDC. ---Gaaark 2.0 ---
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday April 07 2022, @05:26PM (3 children)
Hooray, more Shovelware.
(Score: 2) by takyon on Thursday April 07 2022, @06:43PM (2 children)
This engine is going to catch on big time. For example, CDPR is using it for The Witcher 4 after the Cyperpunk 2077 disaster.
[SIG] 10/28/2017: Soylent Upgrade v14 [soylentnews.org]
(Score: 3, Insightful) by richtopia on Thursday April 07 2022, @07:42PM
IMHO, there are two engines worth mentioning today: Unity and Unreal. Yea there are tons of alternatives with various benefits, but my impression is these two companies make their engines so approachable and available that more and more games move to these choices. Your example of CDPR is a good one: they made a very competitive engine with bleeding edge features, but unless your game needs an obscure unsupported feature your life will be much easier developing content instead of an engine.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_game_engines [wikipedia.org]
(Score: 2) by takyon on Thursday April 14 2022, @12:22AM
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cRLnR4Kot2M [youtube.com]
TL;DW: Lumen (path/raytracing), Nanite (dynamic LOD), they acquired the Quixel Megascans asset library and made it all free to Unreal Engine 5 users, Metahumans, compatibility with Unreal Engine 4.
[SIG] 10/28/2017: Soylent Upgrade v14 [soylentnews.org]
(Score: 1, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday April 07 2022, @05:56PM (2 children)
Of course! Dangerous tech in the wrong hands would be disastrous.. so it's crippled on purpose. It's why OpenAI and GPT-3 aren't really open and downloadable
(Score: 2) by takyon on Thursday April 07 2022, @06:47PM (1 child)
https://www.businessinsider.com/scammers-use-video-game-footage-to-spread-misinformation-for-likes-2022-3 [businessinsider.com]
https://archive.ph/ec3JG [archive.ph]
[SIG] 10/28/2017: Soylent Upgrade v14 [soylentnews.org]
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday April 07 2022, @07:57PM
Scammers are everywhere
https://www.kentucky.com/news/state/kentucky/article236233163.html [kentucky.com]