Worst-case scenario: the UEd Goblin wipes the map and burns down your house.
Difference between revisions of "Unreal Engine overview"
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Not much is known about the upcoming fourth generation Unreal Engine, except that [[wp:Tim Sweeney (game developer)|Tim Sweeney]] and maybe a few other people are working on it. Unreal Engine 4 is supposed to target the next generation of consoles. | Not much is known about the upcoming fourth generation Unreal Engine, except that [[wp:Tim Sweeney (game developer)|Tim Sweeney]] and maybe a few other people are working on it. Unreal Engine 4 is supposed to target the next generation of consoles. | ||
| − | ===External Links=== | + | ====External Links==== |
| − | [http://www.unrealtechnology.com/ Unreal Technology] | + | *[http://www.unrealtechnology.com/ Unreal Technology] |
| − | [http://udn.epicgames.com/ Unreal Developer Network] | + | *[http://udn.epicgames.com/ Unreal Developer Network] |
Revision as of 23:37, 20 April 2010
The Unreal Engine is a game engine by Epic Games. Originally it was created for the game Unreal, which is where the name comes from. Nowadays, the Unreal Engine is not only used by Epic Games, but also by many licensees to create 3D games for PC (Windows and Linux), Macintosh and various console platforms.
Contents
Generations
Until now, there have been three major generations of the engine.
Unreal Engine 1
- Main article: Unreal Engine 1
The original Unreal Engine served as a back-end for games such as Unreal, Unreal Tournament, Deus Ex, Wheel of Time, Klingon Honor Guard and others.
Various games were ported to Linux, Mac and consoles, such as the Sega Dreamcast.
Unreal Engine 2
- Main article: Unreal Engine 2
The second generation of the Unreal Engine powered games such as Unreal 2, UT2003, UT2004, America's Army, Unreal Championship 1 and 2, XIII and others. Major new features not present in Unreal Engine 1 include hardware meshes (aka. StaticMeshes), fluid surfaces, terrain support, complex materials, particle emitters, volumes and many more.
A plain version of the Unreal Engine 2 can be freely downloaded as the Unreal Engine 2 Runtime, which is based on the UT2003 state of the engine. A special version, Unreal Engine 2.X, was optimized for the Xbox console and used e.g. for Unreal Championship 2. The state of the engine based on UT2004 is also called Unreal Engine 2.5.
Unreal Engine 3
- Main article: Unreal Engine 3
The third generation of the Unreal Engine is widely used for PC, PS3 and Xbox 360 games. Unreal Tournament 3, for example, is available on all three platforms. Other Unreal Engine 3 games include Gears of War 1 and 2, Mass Effect, America's Army 3.0 and many others.
Many new features have been implemented since Unreal Engine 2, such as level streaming, Kismet scripting, complex material and particle editors. Also, as part of the Integrated Partners Program licensees can select from many third-party components to integrate into their games.
The UDK uses the Unreal Engine 3
Unreal Engine 4
Not much is known about the upcoming fourth generation Unreal Engine, except that Tim Sweeney and maybe a few other people are working on it. Unreal Engine 4 is supposed to target the next generation of consoles.
