Epic Games have released an explainer on their plans for Unreal Engine 6, including tighter integration with Fortnite along with generative AI.
Written by Epic developer Marcus Wassmer, the news post goes into a fair bit of technical detail on their plans. As many suspected, it's unifying Unreal Engine 5 and the Unreal Editor for Fortnite into a single product - Unreal Engine 6. This sounds like it's going to be such a massive change that developers may need to do a fair bit of relearning with it, or switch to something else (like Godot perhaps).
Epic continue trying to build up their own version of a metaverse, and with this they're introducing what they call Verse. They say it's a "next-generation programming language purpose-built to power massive, persistent game worlds at scale, where global state just works, and transactionally correct concurrency is handled by the runtime". This comes along with Scene Graph, their new gameplay framework.
It sounds like a big thing here is making things as portable as possible. They're leaning more into open standards. Some that already exist like glTF that Wassmer said will become "first-class formats within the engine", but for those specifications they feel they need to create Epic will make those "open specifications with Verse APIs, defined asset conventions, and documentation that any engine, tool, or studio can implement against".
To prove their own point, Epic Games will be opening up Fortnite cosmetics to a more open system in Unreal Engine 6, so other games can pull them in and use them and for developers to make outfits that work inside Fortnite.
As for generative AI, it seems like it will have some pretty deep roots inside Unreal Engine 6. Wassmer notes that "for UE6, we see LLMs, generative AI models, and tools like Claude and Codex playing a central role in helping you build content faster while maintaining the creative control you need" giving developers the ability inside to "mix and match the best leading-edge models and build custom integrations of all sorts on an open Unreal Engine 6 MCP foundation". And goes on to mention what they've been investigating with AI and LLMs in the background.
Again, it's all about the metaverse, or the Epicverse, or whatever they want to brand it as. Unreal Engine 6 will let developers continue to ship standalone, but they will also be able to ship directly into Fortnite (or both).
It would be quite problematic if more developer chose to only ship via the Fortnite Verse, especially for Linux because it's one of the games blocked by the anti-cheat. Although, Epic Games are hiring to improve their anti-cheat on Linux. So Fortnite may work on Linux one day perhaps.
When to expect it? Unreal Engine 6 should come in Early Access at the end of 2027. A full release they expect 12-18 months later.
See more in the Unreal Engine post.
🌐 External Sources: godotengine.org, unrealengine.com Article taken from GamingOnLinux.com.
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HOWEVER, that said, I'll gladly take up the ai-hate side of things and run wild with it weeeeeeeeeee!!!
Unreal Engine 6 should come in Early Access at the end of 2027. A full release they expect 12-18 months later.So they are announcing an engine update that won't be ready until 2029? A lot can happen in 3 years...
UE6 on the other hand is the start of a new generation, and that means, massive performance problems, highly experimental features.
This isn't me singing Epic's song. I legitimately gave up on a game I was working on because I got trapped in Blueprint hell, where I couldn't improve the performance no matter how hard I tried. Something that was likely my fault because I wasn't being careful.
Epic has a lot of work to do, but this is generally how they do things. New Major engine versions run like crap for years, and as they get closer and closer to the next major engine release, existing engine starts to become more refined.
As for the generative AI crap they're putting into the engine, I don't have a problem with it. Asset creation is a long, arduous process, and Unreal Engine is all about getting a game built. I have extensive experience with 3d modeling programs and I've done a **LOT** of things with them. I got pretty good at hard surface modeling and UV mapping and have 10s of thousands of hours of experience with them. If I can just AI generate a bunch of sci-fi railings or something and not step foot in Maya or Blender unless it's absolutely necessary, count me in. If this bothers people, I got a big ol' shrug for ya.
Quoting: CreepioAsset creation is a long, arduous processNo shit, creating good art is hard work, but it's fun.
Quoting: CreepioIf I can just AI generate a bunch of sci-fi railings or something and not step foot in Maya or Blender unless it's absolutely necessary, count me in.Sure, you'll just need a nuclear power plant and a million GPUs to do something a junior artist can model and texture in an afternoon. You don't sound like you like being an artist, tbh. Why even bother if this is the attitude you have towards your craft?
Quoting: SlaxerNobody generates railings with AI and that wasn't announced at Unreal Fest either. It's called Procedural Content Generation (PCG) and has nothing to do with Gen AI. It's been a thing in Unreal Engine since 5.2 and many used Houdini for that much earlier. UE5 City Sample (Matrix Awakening) was initially also built with Houdini, Electric Dreams used UE5 PCG.Quoting: CreepioIf I can just AI generate a bunch of sci-fi railings or something and not step foot in Maya or Blender unless it's absolutely necessary, count me in.Sure, you'll just need a nuclear power plant and a million GPUs to do something a junior artist can model and texture in an afternoon. You don't sound like you like being an artist, tbh. Why even bother if this is the attitude you have towards your craft?
https://youtu.be/FodXp5BkENk?t=1605
https://youtu.be/FodXp5BkENk?t=1830
Quoting: tarmo888Nobody generates railings with AI and that wasn't announced at Unreal Fest either. It's called Procedural Content Generation (PCG) and has nothing to do with Gen AI. It's been a thing in Unreal Engine since 5.2 and many used Houdini for that much earlier. UE5 City Sample (Matrix Awakening) was initially also built with Houdini, Electric Dreams used UE5 PCG.Assets generated procedurally still need to be worked on; leaving them as-is generally looks lazy. What he was saying was that he wanted the assets to be generated and finished by AI without having to open up another software package to polish things up.
https://youtu.be/FodXp5BkENk?t=1605
https://youtu.be/FodXp5BkENk?t=1830
Quoting: SlaxerBecause I've watched Star Trek and I see how things operate in that fictional universe. They have holodecks and a computer that you can literally speak to. You can do iterative work on something using entirely your voice and you can create something spectacular just by telling the computer what changes you'd like to be made. Is it exactly 1:1 precisely your vision? No. But nothing ever is. Programs these days have all sorts of modular workflows that let you approximate your vision and when it lands somewhere close to what you were imagining, you don't stop and say, "hold on, let me redraw every pixel precisely how I see it in my mind", you just fine tune it and ship it. That **IS** art. Nothing art is ever perfect, and if generative AI can get me some modular sci fi railings with a few iterative prompts, that's going to change workflows in ways that you can't even imagine. Imagine a future in which you can toss in some placeholder railings and then prompt some highly detailed railings into existence?Quoting: CreepioAsset creation is a long, arduous processNo shit, creating good art is hard work, but it's fun.
Quoting: CreepioIf I can just AI generate a bunch of sci-fi railings or something and not step foot in Maya or Blender unless it's absolutely necessary, count me in.Sure, you'll just need a nuclear power plant and a million GPUs to do something a junior artist can model and texture in an afternoon. You don't sound like you like being an artist, tbh. Why even bother if this is the attitude you have towards your craft?
Also, only a fool would assume that technology in its current state will remain that way forever. We're already eyeballing photonic CPUs where much of the calculations can be achieved faster without any heat generation. No heat = no massive cooling requirement. No cooling requirement = no closed loop water system and unfathomable electric usage, and no noise pollution either. No need for natural gas powered turbines. And if you really want nuclear, why not go thorium? Photonic CPUs can be practical for AI related workflows. We're still trying to figure out a way to optimize L cache (memory on cpu) so that it doesn't produce much heat. When that happens, you won't **need** a nuclear power plant to power an AI super computer.
And let's be honest, nobody's making **good** looking sci fi railings in an afternoon. Trust me, I would know. You're making low-medium quality placeholders in an afternoon. Good sci-fi railings with AAA polish and true modularity and efficient UV layouts require days or a whole week. You're not talking to a total amateur here, so you can scale back on the dramatization.
I have spent many years and 10s of thousands of hours caring about my craft, (possibly even hundreds of thousands of hours), so when I say it's exciting to think what iterative, generative AI can bring to that, that comes directly from care of my craft. I spent many many years in 3d modeling programs (autodesk maya, blender, zbrush) and 3d painting programs (substance, mudbox, photoshop, quixel ddo/ndo, etc)
Last edited by Creepio on 21 Jun 2026 at 3:04 am UTC
Quoting: CreepioAnd let's be honest, nobody's making **good** looking sci fi railings in an afternoon. Trust me, I would know. You're making low-medium quality placeholders in an afternoon. Good sci-fi railings with AAA polish and true modularity and efficient UV layouts require days or a whole week. You're not talking to a total amateur here, so you can scale back on the dramatization.What dramatization? There's nothing dramatic about sci-fi assets like railings or panels... it's pretty standard stuff that most juniors would be modeling and texturing with trim sheets.
Quoting: CreepioI have spent many years and 10s of thousands of hours caring about my craft, (possibly even hundreds of thousands of hours), so when I say it's exciting to think what iterative, generative AI can bring to that, that comes directly from care of my craft. I spent many many years in 3d modeling programs (autodesk maya, blender, zbrush) and 3d painting programs (substance, mudbox, photoshop, quixel ddo/ndo, etc)Me too, only I enjoy the process like a true artist. The software packages I use these days are Blender (sometimes Maya), ZBrush (the only program I need Windows for :( ) and Substance. I keep it simple.
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