At GDC 2024, Epic held its State of Unreal event, unveiling the latest news and developments coming to Unreal Engine — specifically Unreal Engine 5 and Unreal Editor for Fortnite (UEFN).
If you missed the event, here's a quick rundown of everything announced during the 2024 State of Unreal presentation.
Amy Hennig Reveals Marvel 1943: Rise of Hydra at State of Unreal
In an unexpected yet pleasant surprise, Amy Henig and Skydance Media started the show by unveiling Marvel 1943: Rise of Hydra, one of two projects Hennig has spearheaded since joining the studio.
Alongside a proper reveal of the game, we also learned that it would use Epic's tech, most notably MetaHuman Animator, to provide more photorealistic facial animations. Last year, it was revealed that Ninja Theory was using this same technology in its upcoming game Hellblade 2: Senua's Saga.
Epic is Integrating MetaHuman to UEFN
As we previously mentioned, MetaHuman Animator is one of the tools part of MetaHuman, and Epic announced today that both MetaHuman Animator and MetaHuman Creator are coming to UEFN. Epic says integration will debut "at the end of April."
With MetaHuman, UEFN creators can craft both photorealistic fictional characters and provide photorealistic facial animations using captured footage they obtained from an iPhone or a head-mounted camera.
Epic Will Launch a Fortnite Season Developed on UEFN Next Year
As part of its UEFN roadmap, Epic Games revealed that "by the end of 2025," it will ship the first season of its widely popular free-to-play Battle Royale, made entirely using the level editor.
Beyond that surprise, Epic went into more detail about the UEFN roadmap and the new creator tools it will add this year. This includes confirmation that the highly-requested first-person camera setting will arrive in UEFN sometime this year.
Fortnite Creators Will Get Access to Elements From Rocket Racing, Fall Guys, and LEGO Assets
Epic continues expanding on the Fortnite creator economy by introducing new creative devices and race track templates. Specifically, the publisher revealed that Fortnite creators would be able to leverage elements from Rocket Racing, Fall Guys, and LEGO, allowing creators more ways to express their creativity while building unique experiences all within Fortnite.
Fortnite's creator economy has continued to go strong since both it and UEFN launched roughly a year ago. Epic revealed that since then, it has paid more than $320 million to creators in the first year of engagement payouts and that creators have published over 80,000 UEFN islands.
Some New Details on Epic Games Store Mobile Version
We already knew that Epic Games was planning to release its digital storefront on mobile devices via the iOS App Store and Android's Google Play later this year, thanks to the new EU legislation, the Digital Markets Act (DMA).
Epic took time during today's State of Unreal to share its plans. It touts that the Epic Games Store (EGS) will become the "first-ever game-focused, multi-platform store" that will work across Android, iOS, PC, and macOS. Epic further revealed that mobile developers would benefit "from the same fair terms" found on EGS with an 88/12 revenue share, in addition to other programs that allow you to keep 100% of the revenue earned from using your own payments for in-app purchases.
Epic also revealed that when this digital storefront releases, Fortnite will be brought back to mobile devices (EU only) after the mobile version of its popular battle royale was removed from the App Store and Google Play in 2020.
Dune: Awakening Gets a Deep Dive at the State of Unreal
Skydance Media was not the only game developer to attend the State of Unreal. Funcom also appeared to dive deeper into its upcoming open-world game Dune: Awakening.
It was previously revealed that Dune: Awakening was powered by Unreal Engine 5, but Funcom also elaborated further on how the Dune IP was leveraging Epic's technologies. This includes Funcom sharing how Dune: Part 2 cinematographer Greig Fraser used Unreal Engine for planning and pre-production purposes for the film.
Unreal Engine 5.4's Full Release Is Coming Next Month
Epic told IGN ahead of the presentation that while it has some ideas for Unreal Engine 6, we should not expect the next major iteration of its game engine anytime soon.
With that in mind, State of Unreal provided the latest update for the already impressive Unreal Engine 5, revealing that version 5.4 Preview 1 is launching today with a full release slated for "late April."
Most notably, Epic says that "animation takes big strides forward," thanks to Unreal Engine 5.4, confirming that it features Motion Matching, a streamlining but highly effective way for developers to animate characters. Epic revealed that Motion Matching has already been on full display via Fortnite, which has used It since Chapter 5 was released.
Taylor is a Reporter at IGN. You can follow her on Twitter @TayNixster.
