Epic Games has revealed its next-generation game engine, Unreal Engine 5, with a tech demo played on a PlayStation 5 console in realtime.
To show off the new engine, which is the software framework which developers use to build games, Epic shared a trailer of a brand new, fully playable tech demo to tease what we can expect games to look like on next-generation consoles using its software.
Whilst gameplay in tech demos in the past hasn't exactly been truthful — I'm sure we all remember that Killzone 2 trailer from 2005 — but this isn't really a demo for a game. Instead, this is a demo to showcase an updated engine, which means that what we're seeing here has a high chance of being a truthful representation of what your average Unreal Engine 5 game will look like on PS5 and Xbox Series X.
It's fair to say that people have firmly boarded the hype train and aren't getting off any time soon, singing the praises of the PS5 as the winner of the console wars.
It is important to note, however, that Unreal Engine is currently and will be used on the Xbox Series X as well, which means that, as they do right now, graphics will look just about the same on both consoles.
While there was no ray-tracing in this demo, it did show off two key technologies that are part of Unreal Engine; Nanite and Lumen.
Nanite can create realistic surfaces while Lumen dictates the lighting effects, both of which Epic has said changes some small way if you replay the same part every time.
While it does feature what is clearly a heavily scripted cutscene-looking event, there is some gameplay shown off at the beginning of the reveal video, which details some impressive visuals but is still mostly what we're already used to with current-gen consoles.
Needless to say, fans are hungry for more.
Always ready to take a stab at the Xbox
There was a lot of praise for the overall graphics
People are quick to announce PS5 as the clear winner over the Xbox.
The full demo shows a woman traversing a rocky cavernous landscape and finding a crumbling temple.
At the start, the developers walk us through the lighting and effects used and explain that what we're seeing is all in real time, which means the PlayStation 5 is processing the demo as it happens.
Speaking to IGN, Epic Games CTO Kim Liberi said: “I think a lot of people [will ask], ‘Oh is [the demo] real?’ But you know that demo was grabbed from the back of a PlayStation 5 development kit,”
“An HDMI cable went into a disc recorder and played out real-time — no editing, no tricks, that’s what comes off the box".
