Unreal Engine 5 Demo Gives Us A Glimpse Of What To Expect Next Gen

Earlier today Epic Games revealed the latest iteration of the Unreal Engine. The Unreal Engine 5 (UE5) demo was running on the PS5 and it looks absolutely jaw dropping.

Unreal Engine 5

The UE5 is due out early next year in preview form with the full version dropping for developers everywhere sometime later in 2021. The Unreal Engine 5 demo focuses on two of the new core technologies that will debut with UE5, Nanite and Lumen.

Nanite, is virtualized geometry which will allow developers to “create as much geometric detail as the eye can see”. And Lumen, which is a “fully dynamic global illumination solution that immediately reacts to scene and light changes”. For a full explanation on these new technologies, follow the link to the Unreal Engine 5 blog post.

Image unrealengine.com

Of course, Nanite and Lumen are not the only technologies at play in this demo. You can check out the demo in full below. Chaos physics and Niagara VFX are also at work here. But when everything is combined, as you will see in the video, it looks and sounds astonishing.

The Unreal Engine 5 is not just exclusive to next gen systems either, Epic go on to say in the blog post that UE5 will also be compatible with current gen hardware along with PC, IOS and Android. Also, anyone working with Unreal Engine 4 right now, will easily be able to port their work to UE5 when it becomes available next year.

Image unrealengine.com

Mind Blown

This demo has completely blown me away. It is staggering to behold. The lighting and physics on show here, combined with the audio, is like nothing I’ve encountered before on a console. The fact that all this is running on a PS5 is great news for anyone thinking of investing in a next gen machine. And although we have beautiful looking games on our current gen hardware, we simply have nothing that can equal the sheer graphical and lighting gymnastics that are at play here. It is simply mind blown. Roll on the next gen.

What did you think of the demo? Does it get you excited for the next generation of hardware? Please feel free to leave any thoughts you have in the comments below.

Video Unreal Engine

Image credit unrealengine.com