Amazon's Fire TV Can Run Unreal Engine 4

News
By Jane McEntegart
published

Devs already playing around with Amazon's Fire TV.

Last week, Amazon introduced us to its own media streaming solution, Fire TV. Amazon made the device available right away, and early adopters and developers have already delved in to see what the system is capable of. Over on Gamasutra, Chance Ivey reports that it's possible to get the new Unreal Engine 4 running on Amazon's $99 hardware.

Ivey explains in a blog post that while new hardware and software lack technical documentation or instructions necessary for the task, Amazon and Epic Games provided a jumping off point to get things going. The process requires an Amazon Fire TV unit (duh), a Windows machine with the latest UE4 SDK, and Android Development Tools (Fire TV is based on Android, just like the Kindle Fire), and involves setting up Unreal Engine for Android deployment. You can then hook up a controller to navigate.

The end result is a demo that Ivey describes as choppy and grainy. Still, it offers a little peek at the potential for UE4 applications for Amazon's set top box. If you have a Fire TV, check out Gamasutra for the full how to.

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Jane McEntegart
13 Comments Comment from the forums
  • Shankovich
    Considering how portable they've been trying to make the Unreal SDK, I'm not surprised. Interested to see what will come out of this.
    Reply
  • icemunk
    I will say, the specs for the device at $99 is a pretty good deal. It's a quad-core Qualcomm 1.7Ghz, adreno 320 gpu, 2GB of ram. Not too shabby, it's only flaw is being stuck in Amazon's custom UI. I'm buying a RK3288 for about the same price, but it's Android 4.4 so I won't be stuck in a walled OS.
    Reply
  • Zepid
    Of course it can, the Fire TV is on a current Snapdragon SoC and Unreal 3/4 scale to mobile. It must be obvious day at Tom's Hardware.
    Reply
  • kawininjazx
    I will say, the specs for the device at $99 is a pretty good deal. It's a quad-core Qualcomm 1.7Ghz, adreno 320 gpu, 2GB of ram. Not too shabby, it's only flaw is being stuck in Amazon's custom UI. I'm buying a RK3288 for about the same price, but it's Android 4.4 so I won't be stuck in a walled OS.

    But if it was a phone with these specs it would be $700.
    Reply
  • biohazrdfear
    Is the mobile version of Unreal Engine almost exact, though? I mean, c'mon, we're talking about two different versions of Unreal. I doubt this thing will be able to run games that look exactly like PC games. Sure it'll look great for mobile, but it won't be a Steam Box killer or anything like that. Sorry, guys, but I don't think we will see Crackdown 3 or the new Gears of War on the Amazon TV.
    Reply
  • Blazer1985
    It is the exact version of the ue4 for the blueprint (logic) part, of course it is a completely different and more restricted rendering path for mobile. This means that you'll never get gow on it but something like infinity blade or epic citadel.
    Reply
  • Haravikk
    I will say, the specs for the device at $99 is a pretty good deal. It's a quad-core Qualcomm 1.7Ghz, adreno 320 gpu, 2GB of ram. Not too shabby
    I'm inclined to agree, but then, AMD's new AM1 platform can almost get you a computer for just over $100. Granted nowhere near as neat as the Fire TV, but considering the Fire TV could be subsidised by sales of movies, games, music and even other products on amazon, it seems like they could have made it much more capable. For example, if Apple really is going to give us a beefed up Apple TV, they could pretty easily release something that tops the Fire TV on hardware by simply putting some of Apple's cut on downloads towards offsetting the hardware costs, and Google could potentially do the same, so it's not like the Fire TV is exactly leap-frogging the other offerings by such a big margin. I think Ouya definitely needs to do something along these lines, as it's looking pretty pathetic as a gaming platform right about now.
    Reply
  • condorxiii
    I will say, the specs for the device at $99 is a pretty good deal. It's a quad-core Qualcomm 1.7Ghz, adreno 320 gpu, 2GB of ram. Not too shabby, it's only flaw is being stuck in Amazon's custom UI. I'm buying a RK3288 for about the same price, but it's Android 4.4 so I won't be stuck in a walled OS.

    But if it was a phone with these specs it would be $700.
    Reply
  • condorxiii
    I will say, the specs for the device at $99 is a pretty good deal. It's a quad-core Qualcomm 1.7Ghz, adreno 320 gpu, 2GB of ram. Not too shabby, it's only flaw is being stuck in Amazon's custom UI. I'm buying a RK3288 for about the same price, but it's Android 4.4 so I won't be stuck in a walled OS.

    But if it was a phone with these specs it would be $700.

    Display, Battery, Cameras, (depending on region) Radios/Modem, Storage....
    Reply
  • gggplaya
    If someone hacked the fireTV to put XBMC on it, then i'd be down to buy one. I just want SMB support dammit!!
    Reply