Epic Gives a Taste of Unreal Tournament 2014

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By Kevin Parrish
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Back in early May, Epic Games revealed that it had begun developing Unreal Tournament 4/2014, a moddable, free-to-play, first-person shooter. What will make this installment different from the prior three is that not only is the game free, but the team actually wants fans to help them build the game.

"We're happy to announce that we're going to do this together, with you," Epic's Steve Polge wrote. "We know that fans of the game are as passionate about Unreal Tournament as we are. We know that you have great ideas and strong opinions about where the game should go and what it should be. So let's do something radical and make this game together, in the open, and for all of us."

A small team of Unreal Tournament veterans are currently working on the new installment. Polge confirmed that they would stay true to the franchise's roots as a competitive FPS, but later admitted that the team would define the basic game and its mechanics. However, he also acknowledged that long-time fans have valuable insight and opinions about how the game should evolve, and will not go unheard.

Now the Unreal Tournament team is giving fans a tour of work in progress on Epic's Unreal Tournament YouTube channel. The video includes Art Director Chris Perna who warns fans that the "map" is not only unfinished, but doesn't represent the entire game: it's just an example of lighting and visual clarity. Also seated in the video is Stacey Conley (community manager), Jim Brown (senior designer) and Josh Marlow (environmental artist).

"We take a look at the first work-in-progress concept art by the Unreal Tournament art team and talk about visual clarity in the new game," reads the video's description. "We also answer some of your questions and say hello to our newest team member, Gameplay Programmer Pete Knepley."

The video posted below is just over 49 minutes long, so you may want to grab some popcorn or some other snack before having a seat. The prototype level (concept art preview) doesn't appear until 1:50 or so if you're anxious to see how Unreal Engine 4 renders our favorite competitive FPS.

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Kevin Parrish
15 Comments Comment from the forums
  • eklipz330
    i heard the developers are super disorganized. don't have high hopes for this one
    Reply
  • back_by_demand
    Seeing as they are getting us the public to help make it then yes, they are super disorganised and unlikely to agree on anything, when it messes up with they accept the blame? No, blame Epic.
    Reply
  • CaedenV
    Soooo excited about this! Give us an engine and good tools, that is all we really need!
    UT2K4 was (at least in my not so humble opinion) the best FPS ever made. It was fun, a little cartooney, deaths were just as fun as kills with the ridiculous ragdoll effects, and it was good fast-paced action. But the best part of all was the modding community which brought some truly amazing maps and mutators which kept the game fresh for years!
    UT3 however was awful. It was much slower, very dark, very resource intensive (for it's day at least) and the attempts to make it console friendly really broke things.
    UT2K14 looks to bring the fun and community of UT2K4 and the graphical quality of UT3.
    Reply
  • Bean007
    Meh, I think UT is done with. They messed up really bad when they started the move to console. I won't be getting excited about it till it actually comes out. However I doubt it will have any kind of MOD support which will be a real downer for me. All those MOD's UT had were so awesome back then. Also the homemade Maps as well. I remember a map with a Hockey Rink and everybody used the pulse rifles. If you crouched you like turbo skated.
    Reply
  • alidan
    correct me if im wrong, but the way you sould make a level for multiplayer is very basic minimal visuals as possible. and if the map is fun when its that basic, you move over to adding in the visual fluff... are they really making all the visual fluff first THEN making the maps?

    this is concerning to say the least.
    Reply
  • It's an FPS game based on the Unreal Engine 4. And it's going to be free (hopefully of micro transactions too) and moddable. Don't care about the maps, the community will build better, not that bothered about minor kinks in the gameplay either, the community will Mod those straight and add a whole lot more. Looking forward to this
    Reply
  • MoxNix
    Sounds like Epic expects mappers and modders to pay a $19.00 per month subscription fee for access to the editor.
    Reply
  • Bean007
    13806393 said:
    It's an FPS game based on the Unreal Engine 4. And it's going to be free (hopefully of micro transactions too) and moddable. Don't care about the maps, the community will build better, not that bothered about minor kinks in the gameplay either, the community will Mod those straight and add a whole lot more. Looking forward to this

    Are you like some kind of console gamer or somebody that only play F2P games that buys the hell out of MicroTransactions? Why would anybody want MicroTransactions. I do understand that if the game is going to be free that it does need to make money but I would so much rather pay for a well made game then have a F2P game that could turn from a P2P to P2W game. We have seen this in games that don't make either enough money to keep the game a float or the company wanting more money to change it to a Pay 2 Win.

    I doubt this game will allow mods as most F2P games are hosted on there own servers and there won't be any dedicated servers like in the old days.

    "Don't care about the maps, the community will build better"? WTF do you think map making is. Most of the time maps that come from the company will cost you money, but most user created maps don't unless the person asks for donations for this. Most people create other maps as they want something else to play besides the same standard maps.

    If it's gonna be a so so game that's free I would rather them not even bother with it. Soon the F2P model will change again as too many people flood the market with crappy F2P games and want better quality. Take for instance MMO's. When everybody saw how much money Blizzard was making EVERYBODY was making MMO's trying to get on the MMO money train. But the problem was there was way too many and most of them were just meh. Some did last longer then others but for most they died quickly. Some died out right while others took to the new F2P model. Even still today companies are still trying to get on that MMO Money Train but very few now do it as a P2P model and just make it F2P but even still most of those F2P you rarely here much about them after they've been released.

    Back in the day they made quality games and even now some companies still due but it just lacks quality of games like the original UT or Command & Conquer or Neverwinter Nights. Even Counter Strike. Counter Strike has hardly changed that much and almost to the point on why buy the so called newer ones when it's still the original game. Sure we've added a few new things but it's still the same thing. Granted it's on the more up to date HL engine but yet we've seen like 3 I think Counter Strikes on the HL 2 engine.
    Reply
  • hotwire_downunder
    I remember playing the original Unreal in 1998.

    Still remember the opening sequence of the the prison ship crashing and stepping out of the ship and onto the open landscape, As you walk away from the ship the psychedelic techno theme starts and a small bunny like creature hops by... man! it takes me back!

    Played it on a Pentium II MMX 233MHz, 64MB PC100 RAM, Quantum Fireball 5.3GB HDD, S3Virge GX2 with 8MB of VRAM on AGP, Had Creative Infra CD Rom and Creative AWE64 ISA SoundCard.

    I was the envy of all my mates :)
    Reply
  • gaborbarla
    Not sure why EPIC doesn't revive the original unreal concept. Na pali, Skaarj with the same but re-worked great .mod music, modern graphics, water with waves and challenging single player. I would pay for that.
    Reply