---
title: 'How UE6 Will Shape the Future For Gaming'
source: 'https://youtube.com/watch?v=JIpRsR9qoik'
video_id: 'JIpRsR9qoik'
date: 2026-06-17
duration_sec: 413
---

# How UE6 Will Shape the Future For Gaming

> Source: [How UE6 Will Shape the Future For Gaming](https://youtube.com/watch?v=JIpRsR9qoik)

## Summary

At Unreal Fest 2026, IGN reports on the State of Unreal keynote, revealing that Unreal Engine 6 (UE6) early access won't begin until late 2027, with a focus on scalability and asset portability rather than just visual improvements. The presentation also covered significant performance enhancements in UE5.8, including shader compilation reductions and improved PSO pre-caching, along with new AI tools for world generation.

### Key Points

- **UE6 Release Timeline** [0:00] — Early access for UE6 starts at the end of 2027, with full production taking about 12 to 14 months. It will not affect games coming out soon.
- **UE6 Focus: Scalability** [0:40] — Epic emphasized that UE6 is about scalability—making games bigger without adding developer workloads, e.g., Fortnite scaling from 100 to potentially 1,000 players.
- **UE6 Asset Portability** [1:05] — Assets, tools, and coding will be shareable across all Unreal Engine games. UE6 merges UE5 and UEFN frameworks, enabling cross-pollination between Fortnite and other UE games.
- **Shader Compilation Reduction** [2:00] — Epic reduced shader count in Fortnite by 68%, and UE5.8 will improve PSO pre-caching and seamless fallback rendering to reduce hitching in games.
- **Lumen Lighting Performance** [3:12] — Gears of War E-Day demo showed Lumen ray-tracing from thousands of light sources while maintaining 60 FPS on Xbox Series X|S. Lumen scalability also targets mobile and Switch 2 games.
- **AI Tools in UE5.8** [4:03] — A new MCP plugin allows communication with LLMs for generating worlds from outlines. Developers retain full edit control, but concerns about AI costs remain.
- **UEFN and IP Democratization** [5:14] — UEFN now includes assets from collaborations like Star Wars and The Simpsons, allowing users to create content with those IPs. This raises questions about homogenization of experiences.

### Conclusion

Unreal Engine's future—through UE6 and UE5.8—promises larger, more scalable games with fewer performance issues and new AI-assisted world-building tools, while the Fortnite ecosystem continues to expand user-generated content with major IPs.

## Transcript

Michael with IGN here at Unreal Fest
2026 and we just got out of the state of
Unreal keynote. We learned so much about
the future of the Unreal Engine and it's
going to affect a lot of the games we
play, so you're going to want to stick
around. At the top of everyone's mind,
it's Unreal Engine 6, but that's not
coming anytime soon. Early access for
UE6 is going to start at the end of 2027
and it's going to be [music] about 12 to
14 months until it goes into full
production. So, if you think it's going
to affect any of the games that are
coming out anytime soon, that's not
happening. We also didn't get to see it
in action at all other than the Rocket
League UE6 teaser that we saw before.
So, the state of Unreal was more geared
towards how it affects game development.
[music]
So, yes, games built on UE6 are going to
look shinier, they are going to look
better, but that's not really the
priority of UE6. [music] Epic was
stressing that UE6 is about scalability,
making games bigger without adding
workloads to game developers. So, for
example [music]
Fortnite has 100 players dropping onto
an island. Ostensibly, with UE6, you
could do that [music] at a larger scale
with maybe 1,000 players or even more.
So, what this could mean is that you'll
get bigger games without adding [music]
development time or increasing
development costs. Another big part that
was stressed about UE6 [music] was
portability of assets. So, games built
on UE across the board can share assets,
>> [music]
>> tools, coding, and this is kind of being
tested with Fortnite. And part of this
is possible because UE6 is merging what
you see in UE5 and UEFN. UEFN being the
tools that you see to make
user-generated content within [music]
Fortnite. So, UE6 is merging both of
these frameworks and there's going to be
a lot of cross-pollination between
assets. So, things that are made in
Fortnite or UEFN can be ported over to
games made [music] in UE6 and vice
versa. And there's a lot of information
about the coding language Verse, which
is going to also be native to UE6 and
other versions of UE5 moving forward.
Again, that's just top-level stuff
because UE6 is a ways out, but if you
want to know where UE6 is going, it's
probably best to pay attention to what's
happening with UE5.8.
Now, folks who are worried about
performance with Unreal Engine 5, this
is where you're going to want to pay
attention. I want to talk about
compiling shaders. Epic themselves know
how much we hate compiling shaders and
waiting for that thing to load. So, it's
no secret that that is a pain point for
a lot of games built on Unreal Engine.
And so, one of the points they made is
that they've done a 68% reduction in
shader count in Fortnite. So, they could
do that for Fortnite, you can imagine
that that will apply to other games
built on UE5. And part of the 5.8 update
is also improved PSO pre-caching. It's
going to [music] have seamless fallback
rendering as well, so there's going to
be less hitching. Now, I know you
probably don't know what PSO pre-caching
means, but if you are having performance
problems or if you're having those
annoying hitches as you're playing games
that are built on UE, this is kind of a
solution to solve that problem. Related
to this, I think it was interesting that
we got a Gears of War E-Day demo that
highlighted the lighting model that's
being used in that game. So, with the
Lumen lighting technology that's built
into Unreal Engine, uh
>> [music]
>> we saw the same scenes that were shown
during the Xbox showcase for Gears
E-Day, but with a focus on Lumen and the
lighting model that's pulling from
thousands of light sources. That's all
being ray traced while maintaining 60
FPS on Xbox Series X and S, and a lot of
the destruction model is also reacting
to all of that in real time while
maintaining performance. And to the
point of performance, Lumen is also
improving scalability, so you could have
a similar lighting model but on a
smaller scale for mobile and SWITCH 2
GAMES.
SO, THOSE ARE THE broader points about
performance with Unreal Engine, but
there was also a showcasing of how
flexible the engine has become. So,
Teamfight Tactics from Riot [music]
Games is being migrated over to Unreal
Engine, and you kind of wouldn't think
of it as a game that needs to be built
on [music] UE. And all the way on the
other side of spectrum, we got to see a
lot from No Law, which is a new game
from Neon Giant. Previously, they made
the game called The Ascent, but No Law
is a first-person [music] shooter that
is a lot more dense and a lot more
detailed at the ground level.
The point that they were trying to make
is that the tools in Unreal Engine
allows a smaller team to make a game
[music] with this much detail and with
that much density. Now, there's a bigger
elephant in the room with UE5.8 and it
is the advancement of AI tools in the
engine. There's a new MCP plugin that is
part of 5.8 and [music] this
communicates with any of the LLMs that
you may want to use. We saw a live
demonstration using cloud coding and
[music] how big environments can be
generated using these LLMs and the new
5.8 tools. So, for [music] example, we
saw a city being built and you can give
instructions to the LLM within [music]
the tool set that you have with UE5.8.
So, the idea is that this is supposed to
cut down on the more busy work [music]
and the manual labor of building virtual
worlds. You can give an outline, you can
draw the boundaries, and then it will
create a world for you, but all of it is
supposed to be editable as the creators
themselves. So, you can go to the ground
level of the world that was generated
and then [music] tool it to whichever
way you see fit. So, they're stressing
the idea that creative control is still
in the hands of the developers and that
AI isn't building the worlds on its own.
However, there are ongoing questions
about the use of AI in a lot of creative
spaces, especially [music]
the cost that it takes to run these
LLMs. So, it's going to be an ongoing
conversation and I think the important
part is that you need to pay attention
to [music] how content is created.
>> It's Jurassic Park. Uh, here's Dad
having a meeting with my teacher, Mrs.
Krabappel.
>> So, everybody knows about all the
collaborations in Fortnite and all the
different IP that have been mashed into
the game. Well, UEFN is also an
extension of that where a lot of these
IP assets are usable for a lot of the
creations that you [music] see on the
user side. Especially when it comes to
Star Wars, there were a lot of games
that got a lot of engagement [music] and
you can kind of think of it as a
platform for user-created content. It's
not dissimilar from Roblox, but there is
a lot more control that Epic has and
there are a lot more sophisticated tools
to build out these sorts of experiences.
The big conclusion with this is [music]
The Simpsons. And if you remember from a
couple months back, The Simpsons had a
big collaboration in Fortnite. [music]
Springfield was the map in Fortnite. But
all those assets are now part of UEFN
ecosystem. [music]
So, people who want to create content
with The Simpsons assets can do that
now. So, like a lot of the Star Wars
content you saw on UEFN, that will also
apply to The Simpsons [music] coming
soon because the toolkit will be
available later this year. There's a
broader conversation to be had about the
democratization of IP, but also the
homogenization of a lot of these assets
and a lot of the experiences that you
have [music] mashing all these different
IP together. But, it is part of the
larger Fortnite ecosystem, [music] and
it is part of Unreal Engine's ecosystem.
So, those are some of the big ideas
coming out of Unreal Fest and the State
of Unreal keynote speech. [music] This
is going to affect a lot of the games we
play. Claire Obscure was built on Unreal
Engine. The Final Fantasy VII Remake
series is built on Unreal Engine as
well. So, if you're interested [music]
in the future of games, you should be
paying attention to this stuff. And for
all the coverage of Unreal Engine and so
much more in the world of games, stick
with IGN.