Epic Games has released the full version of the Unreal Engine 5 engine, which until recently was distributed through the early access program. This was announced right during the State of Unreal presentation. Anyone can download the program for free through the Epic Games Store and start making their own games.
The release version of Unreal Engine 5 supports all declared technologies, such as:
- Lumen is a fully dynamic global illumination solution that allows you to create realistic scenes in which indirect lighting adapts on the fly to changes in direct lighting or geometry.
- Nanite is a virtualized micropolygon geometry system that makes it possible to create games with a huge amount of geometric detail.
- Virtual shadow maps (VSM) – Specifically designed to work with Lumen and Nanite, providing realistic soft shadows at a reasonable, controllable performance cost.
- Temporary Super Resolution (TSR) is a built-in and platform-independent high-quality upsampling system that allows rendering at a much lower resolution, but with the same output pixel fidelity as when rendering at a higher resolution, thereby improving performance.
In addition, a large number of changes were made to the engine aimed at a more convenient game development process. For example, to create high-quality animation, users will now have to spend much less time. You can read more details on a dedicated page.
Along with the release of Unreal Engine 5, the company released the Lyra Starter Game project, which serves as a starting point for creating new games, as well as a resource for hands-on learning. Over time, developers are going to update it, adding new features.
