Unreal Tournament (free Epic-led community project for PC/Mac/Linux)

[Tain]

The Future of Unreal Tournament Begins Today.

Work on the future of Unreal Tournament begins today, and we’re happy to announce that we’re going to do this together, with you. 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.

Here’s the plan:

• We’ve created a small team of UT veterans that are beginning work on the project starting today.
• From the very first line of code, the very first art created and design decision made, development will happen in the open, as a collaboration between Epic, UT fans and UE4 developers. We’ll be using forums for discussion, and Twitch streams for regular updates.
• If you are a fan and you want to participate, create a free account and join the forum discussion.
• All code and content will be available live to UE4 developers on GitHub.
• The game will be true to its roots as a competitive FPS.
• Development will be focused on Windows, Mac and Linux.

So what’s the catch?

• It will take many months until the game is playable by gamers. This is real development from scratch.
• When the game is playable, it will be free. Not free to play, just free.
• We’ll eventually create a marketplace where developers, modders, artists and gamers can give away, buy and sell mods and content. Earnings from the marketplace will be split between the mod/content developer, and Epic. That’s how we plan to pay for the game.

A lot of this is brand new for Epic, and we don’t yet have everything figured out. Things will probably definitely go wrong from time to time, and when they do, we’ll have to work through them together. There will be a lot of tough decisions to make, and not every feature will make it into the game. But if you’re a fan of Unreal Tournament, a UE4 developer, or a future modder – or if you just want to learn how we make games – we hope you’ll join us. It’s going to be fun.

Want to get involved?

• Want more detail on the project? Read our wiki.
• Want to participate & give feedback? These forums are the place to do it. Sign up for a free account here to join Unreal Engine 4 community.
• Just interested in getting updates? Subscribe to our newsletter.
• In case you want to check out the classic Unreal Tournament games, we’ve put them on sale on Steam.

Long story short, Epic has a small team making a new UT game, and they'll be curating community work that goes into the official release. There will also be a marketplace for distributing user-made content, which can be free or sold by users with Epic getting a cut.

This could be cool if Epic puts in the work and does a good job at curating.

[Joust Williams]

Epic is 2 for the last 2 in generations started with great ideas.

Last gen, GoW, this gen, this

[Diff-chan]

Sounds stupid.

[Rumpy]

Could be cool. Updates using Twitch is a great idea.

[Joust Williams]

It's a great idea
You can show off the engine, show how east it is to use, learn a lot about creating an in-game marketplace to improve this on future projects and have a low cost of entry

[cka]

yeah this is a p. good idea, I guess UT was the perfect posterboy for the project too as the IP is unprofitable these days so why not use it in a crazy ass co-developed gpl game

[Chux]

Can't wait. I used to waste so much time playing Onslaught.

[jyoung]

I'll try it.

Let's hope they don't ruin sniper arena this time.

[bVork]

Very clever move by Epic. Don't forget that you need to subscribe to UE4 to make stuff. So that means modders will make them money just by existing, and then they get a cut on top of that for any sales of the mods produced.

Not that I think that's a bad thing! I imagine a lot of people are going to subscribe to UE4 just to play with it, and this will give them a way to turn that into potential income. And hopefully this will mean a stream of interesting content for people who just want to play the game.

[Changeling]

Woulda been nice if they could've thrown a dog a bone and released UT99 or '04 as a browser game ala Quake Live.