How UE6 Will Shape the Future For Gaming

[00:00] Michael with IGN here at Unreal Fest

[00:01] 2026 and we just got out of the state of

[00:03] Unreal keynote. We learned so much about

[00:05] the future of the Unreal Engine and it's

[00:07] going to affect a lot of the games we

[00:08] play, so you're going to want to stick

[00:09] around. At the top of everyone's mind,

[00:11] it's Unreal Engine 6, but that's not

[00:13] coming anytime soon. Early access for

[00:15] UE6 is going to start at the end of 2027

[00:17] and it's going to be [music] about 12 to

[00:19] 14 months until it goes into full

[00:21] production. So, if you think it's going

[00:22] to affect any of the games that are

[00:23] coming out anytime soon, that's not

[00:25] happening. We also didn't get to see it

[00:27] in action at all other than the Rocket

[00:29] League UE6 teaser that we saw before.

[00:31] So, the state of Unreal was more geared

[00:33] towards how it affects game development.

[00:34] [music]

[00:35] So, yes, games built on UE6 are going to

[00:37] look shinier, they are going to look

[00:38] better, but that's not really the

[00:40] priority of UE6. [music] Epic was

[00:41] stressing that UE6 is about scalability,

[00:44] making games bigger without adding

[00:46] workloads to game developers. So, for

[00:48] example [music]

[00:49] Fortnite has 100 players dropping onto

[00:51] an island. Ostensibly, with UE6, you

[00:54] could do that [music] at a larger scale

[00:56] with maybe 1,000 players or even more.

[00:58] So, what this could mean is that you'll

[01:00] get bigger games without adding [music]

[01:01] development time or increasing

[01:03] development costs. Another big part that

[01:05] was stressed about UE6 [music] was

[01:06] portability of assets. So, games built

[01:08] on UE across the board can share assets,

[01:11] >> [music]

[01:11] >> tools, coding, and this is kind of being

[01:14] tested with Fortnite. And part of this

[01:16] is possible because UE6 is merging what

[01:18] you see in UE5 and UEFN. UEFN being the

[01:21] tools that you see to make

[01:22] user-generated content within [music]

[01:24] Fortnite. So, UE6 is merging both of

[01:26] these frameworks and there's going to be

[01:28] a lot of cross-pollination between

[01:30] assets. So, things that are made in

[01:32] Fortnite or UEFN can be ported over to

[01:35] games made [music] in UE6 and vice

[01:37] versa. And there's a lot of information

[01:38] about the coding language Verse, which

[01:40] is going to also be native to UE6 and

[01:42] other versions of UE5 moving forward.

[01:45] Again, that's just top-level stuff

[01:46] because UE6 is a ways out, but if you

[01:49] want to know where UE6 is going, it's

[01:51] probably best to pay attention to what's

[01:52] happening with UE5.8.

[01:56] Now, folks who are worried about

[01:57] performance with Unreal Engine 5, this

[01:59] is where you're going to want to pay

[02:00] attention. I want to talk about

[02:02] compiling shaders. Epic themselves know

[02:05] how much we hate compiling shaders and

[02:07] waiting for that thing to load. So, it's

[02:09] no secret that that is a pain point for

[02:11] a lot of games built on Unreal Engine.

[02:13] And so, one of the points they made is

[02:15] that they've done a 68% reduction in

[02:17] shader count in Fortnite. So, they could

[02:19] do that for Fortnite, you can imagine

[02:21] that that will apply to other games

[02:22] built on UE5. And part of the 5.8 update

[02:25] is also improved PSO pre-caching. It's

[02:27] going to [music] have seamless fallback

[02:29] rendering as well, so there's going to

[02:30] be less hitching. Now, I know you

[02:32] probably don't know what PSO pre-caching

[02:34] means, but if you are having performance

[02:36] problems or if you're having those

[02:37] annoying hitches as you're playing games

[02:39] that are built on UE, this is kind of a

[02:41] solution to solve that problem. Related

[02:44] to this, I think it was interesting that

[02:45] we got a Gears of War E-Day demo that

[02:48] highlighted the lighting model that's

[02:49] being used in that game. So, with the

[02:51] Lumen lighting technology that's built

[02:53] into Unreal Engine, uh

[02:54] >> [music]

[02:54] >> we saw the same scenes that were shown

[02:56] during the Xbox showcase for Gears

[02:58] E-Day, but with a focus on Lumen and the

[03:00] lighting model that's pulling from

[03:01] thousands of light sources. That's all

[03:03] being ray traced while maintaining 60

[03:05] FPS on Xbox Series X and S, and a lot of

[03:07] the destruction model is also reacting

[03:09] to all of that in real time while

[03:11] maintaining performance. And to the

[03:12] point of performance, Lumen is also

[03:14] improving scalability, so you could have

[03:16] a similar lighting model but on a

[03:18] smaller scale for mobile and SWITCH 2

[03:21] GAMES.

[03:25] SO, THOSE ARE THE broader points about

[03:26] performance with Unreal Engine, but

[03:28] there was also a showcasing of how

[03:30] flexible the engine has become. So,

[03:32] Teamfight Tactics from Riot [music]

[03:33] Games is being migrated over to Unreal

[03:35] Engine, and you kind of wouldn't think

[03:37] of it as a game that needs to be built

[03:38] on [music] UE. And all the way on the

[03:40] other side of spectrum, we got to see a

[03:41] lot from No Law, which is a new game

[03:43] from Neon Giant. Previously, they made

[03:45] the game called The Ascent, but No Law

[03:47] is a first-person [music] shooter that

[03:49] is a lot more dense and a lot more

[03:50] detailed at the ground level.

[03:55] The point that they were trying to make

[03:56] is that the tools in Unreal Engine

[03:58] allows a smaller team to make a game

[04:00] [music] with this much detail and with

[04:01] that much density. Now, there's a bigger

[04:03] elephant in the room with UE5.8 and it

[04:05] is the advancement of AI tools in the

[04:07] engine. There's a new MCP plugin that is

[04:10] part of 5.8 and [music] this

[04:12] communicates with any of the LLMs that

[04:14] you may want to use. We saw a live

[04:15] demonstration using cloud coding and

[04:18] [music] how big environments can be

[04:20] generated using these LLMs and the new

[04:23] 5.8 tools. So, for [music] example, we

[04:25] saw a city being built and you can give

[04:27] instructions to the LLM within [music]

[04:30] the tool set that you have with UE5.8.

[04:33] So, the idea is that this is supposed to

[04:35] cut down on the more busy work [music]

[04:36] and the manual labor of building virtual

[04:39] worlds. You can give an outline, you can

[04:41] draw the boundaries, and then it will

[04:43] create a world for you, but all of it is

[04:45] supposed to be editable as the creators

[04:47] themselves. So, you can go to the ground

[04:49] level of the world that was generated

[04:51] and then [music] tool it to whichever

[04:52] way you see fit. So, they're stressing

[04:54] the idea that creative control is still

[04:56] in the hands of the developers and that

[04:58] AI isn't building the worlds on its own.

[05:00] However, there are ongoing questions

[05:02] about the use of AI in a lot of creative

[05:04] spaces, especially [music]

[05:05] the cost that it takes to run these

[05:07] LLMs. So, it's going to be an ongoing

[05:09] conversation and I think the important

[05:11] part is that you need to pay attention

[05:13] to [music] how content is created.

[05:14] >> It's Jurassic Park. Uh, here's Dad

[05:17] having a meeting with my teacher, Mrs.

[05:19] Krabappel.

[05:19] >> So, everybody knows about all the

[05:21] collaborations in Fortnite and all the

[05:22] different IP that have been mashed into

[05:24] the game. Well, UEFN is also an

[05:27] extension of that where a lot of these

[05:28] IP assets are usable for a lot of the

[05:31] creations that you [music] see on the

[05:32] user side. Especially when it comes to

[05:34] Star Wars, there were a lot of games

[05:36] that got a lot of engagement [music] and

[05:37] you can kind of think of it as a

[05:39] platform for user-created content. It's

[05:42] not dissimilar from Roblox, but there is

[05:43] a lot more control that Epic has and

[05:46] there are a lot more sophisticated tools

[05:48] to build out these sorts of experiences.

[05:50] The big conclusion with this is [music]

[05:51] The Simpsons. And if you remember from a

[05:53] couple months back, The Simpsons had a

[05:55] big collaboration in Fortnite. [music]

[05:56] Springfield was the map in Fortnite. But

[05:59] all those assets are now part of UEFN

[06:01] ecosystem. [music]

[06:02] So, people who want to create content

[06:03] with The Simpsons assets can do that

[06:05] now. So, like a lot of the Star Wars

[06:07] content you saw on UEFN, that will also

[06:10] apply to The Simpsons [music] coming

[06:11] soon because the toolkit will be

[06:12] available later this year. There's a

[06:14] broader conversation to be had about the

[06:15] democratization of IP, but also the

[06:18] homogenization of a lot of these assets

[06:20] and a lot of the experiences that you

[06:21] have [music] mashing all these different

[06:23] IP together. But, it is part of the

[06:25] larger Fortnite ecosystem, [music] and

[06:27] it is part of Unreal Engine's ecosystem.

[06:30] So, those are some of the big ideas

[06:31] coming out of Unreal Fest and the State

[06:33] of Unreal keynote speech. [music] This

[06:34] is going to affect a lot of the games we

[06:36] play. Claire Obscure was built on Unreal

[06:37] Engine. The Final Fantasy VII Remake

[06:39] series is built on Unreal Engine as

[06:41] well. So, if you're interested [music]

[06:42] in the future of games, you should be

[06:43] paying attention to this stuff. And for

[06:45] all the coverage of Unreal Engine and so

[06:47] much more in the world of games, stick

[06:48] with IGN.