Draft:Unreal Engine

Unreal Engine
Original author(s)Tim Sweeney
Developer(s)Epic Games
Stable release
5.4
Written inC++
Operating systemWindows, Linux, macOS
LicenseSource-available commercial software with royalty model for commercial use[1]
Websitewww.unrealengine.com/en-US

Unreal Engine (UE) is a series of 3D computer graphics and game engines developed by Epic Games, first showcased in the 1998 first-person shooter video game Unreal. Initially developed for PC first-person shooters, it has since been used in a variety of genres of games and has been adopted by other industries, most notably the film and television industry. Unreal Engine is written in C++ and features a high degree of portability, supporting a wide range of desktop, mobile, console, and virtual reality platforms.

The latest generation, Unreal Engine 5, was launched in April 2022. Its source code is available on GitHub, and commercial use is granted based on a royalty model, with Epic charging 5% of revenues over US $1 million, which is waived for games published on the Epic Games Store. Epic has incorporated features in the engine from acquired companies such as Quixel, which is seen as helped by Fortnite's revenue.

In 2014, Unreal Engine was named the world's "most successful videogame engine" by Guinness World Records.[2]

  1. ^ "Unreal Engine End User License Agreement". Unreal Engine. Archived from the original on August 26, 2018. Retrieved August 26, 2018.
  2. ^ "Most successful videogame engine". Guinness World Records. July 16, 2014. Archived from the original on December 22, 2015.