Unreal Engine

Unreal Engine is a suite of game development tools from Epic Games. Written in C ++, it has high performance and supports most modern platforms including Windows, Linux, Mac OS, Android, PlayStation, and Xbox.

The Unreal Engine was originally created as a shooter engine and was first introduced in the 1998 first-person game Unreal. But now the area of its application has spread not only to other genres – platformers, fighting games, MMORPG and others, but also went far beyond the game dev.

The engine is popular for several reasons. Here are the main ones:

• Fully open source.
• It supports a huge number of functions, thanks to which you can create a project of any complexity on it.
• Provides a free cloud-based application for creating photorealistic digital people in minutes – MetaHuman Creator.
• The engine can be used absolutely free of charge until the profit of the project exceeds $ 1 million. This is especially true for startups with tight budgets.

• Supports almost all popular platforms.
• Boasts a huge developer community. This means that there are many ready-made assets that you can freely use in your projects, which reduces the cost and development time.

Another reason why Unreal Engine is so popular with newbies is its support for the visual language Blueprints. With its help, you can create games without writing a single line of code, which makes it possible to test yourself in game development even for people far from programming.

Unreal Engine’s capabilities are not limited to any one direction. The engine is popular in almost all areas where high-quality visualization is needed. Let’s consider the most popular areas of its application.

Game development

Unreal Engine is primarily a game engine, and it has everything you need to create games of any genre and of any scale. UE provides developers with full source code access, robust C ++ APIs and visual Blueprint scripts to create next-generation projects.

Examples of popular Unreal Engine games:

• Fortnite is a cross-platform, pop-culture-style multiplayer project from Epic Games, in which the developers have combined almost all popular trends. And it worked. For 2 years, the game brought the creators more than 9 billion in profits.
• Hellblade: Senua’s Sacrifice is an indie game from the British studio Ninja Theory, which, thanks to the capabilities of the Unreal Engine, was equipped with the technologies of the AAA project. The sale of 500 thousand copies at $ 30 each fully paid for the development and began to generate income already in the third month after the release.
• Final Fantasy VII Remake is a remake of the 90s cult game with incredibly realistic graphics. In just the first three days of release, the developers have sold over 3.5 million copies.

Filming

Unreal Engine is used by more than 160 film studios around the world, including such giants as MARVEL and Lucasfilm. Among the main tools that the engine offers to cinematography, it is worth highlighting the Sequencer. It solves most of the tasks on the set in real time: selects suitable lenses, moves parts of the scene, adjusts lighting and sets focus.

Paired with the nDisplay system, which renders 3D content across multiple displays, Sequencer creates a realistic background, and creates the illusion that the actors are inside this space. At the same time, the UE tools eliminate disadvantages such as crew shadows and more.

As a result, the actors inside the shooting scene look more natural, as they can naturally react to the objects around them. This significantly reduces the time and money spent on post-production, and allows even small teams to use professional tools.

Popular Unreal Engine feeds:

• Guardians of the Galaxy 2
• Thor: Ragnarok;
• The jungle book;
• Mandalorian.

Architecture and interior design

A person perceives a picture better than complex drawings and architectural plans, therefore part of the work of designers and architects is associated with the creation of realistic 3D visualizations of projects.

More and more often, to create such visualizations, specialists choose not niche services, but the Unreal Engine. And there are several reasons for this:

• Unreal Engine is a free tool.
• The UE allows you to quickly create interactive visualizations within which the user can “move” and interact with objects.
• The engine makes it possible to change objects in real time.
• Thanks to full immersion in the project, designers and their clients can find hidden defects in a timely manner and make the necessary adjustments to the plan.

Automotive

The use of a game engine in cars makes it possible to bring the work of car interfaces to a completely new level. Using the Unreal Engine, their graphics become more modern, realistic and convenient, and the speed of work is much faster.

TV and live broadcasts

By creating lifelike virtual interfaces in real time, Unreal Engine is redefining the concept of live streaming. Using the engine’s tools, you can “immerse” the filming studio in any virtual space so that people look natural and harmonious in it.

Unreal Engine is not just a game engine. It is a technology with almost limitless possibilities when it comes to 3D rendering and photorealistic content creation.

AVADA MEDIA employs experienced UE developers, whose knowledge we are ready to use to implement your project. Still have questions about the Unreal Engine or its application? Contact us by filling out the form below.