I currently work using the UDK or UE-3 engine to develop short little mini-games as a hobby, when I got that I got it for free from their website assuming I didn’t use it to distribute my work etc. etc. I’m wondering if UE 4 is available the same way for hobbyists like me, and if it is not if their are any plans to eventually make it that way. I’m not sure if a cracked version of the engine exists, but if it does I’m not intrested in using that instead of the legal version. Thank you for your replies.
Don’t think so its 20 bucks a month, I haven’t seen anything about a free release at least not yet. Was about 4 or 5 years before UE3 was free also…
Oh, that’s too bad. I guess after I’m done my work with UE 3 I might just have to stomach the subscription fee and buy it. I hope they do choose to make it free at some point. Thx for the info.
- $20 dollars, cancel anytime and keep the engine. Not much to stomach
Wait, you can canncel it and still keep the engine? I wouldn’t think they’d let you do that, if I buy I plan on still paying them at least for a little while, they deserve a couple of bucks for the wonderful work their doing for gamer(s) everywhere.
Just pay the fee when you want to update things, and chances are they’ll get the same amount of money from you without you feeling like you’re just keeping the sub up to make nice.
Tim Sweeney confirmed there will be no free UDK4. So your only chance is to subscribe. Once you subscribe you can cancel it immediately after downloading the engine and keep it and use it. But remember that once you cancel your account you wont be able to access the marketplace. To access it, you need to renew your subscription.
From what I’ve seen you are going to be able to access the marketplace, it’s just that many of the resources they release for free are going to be unavailable for unsubscribed users. (And of course if assets do not work with the version you have you cannot get them.) I don’t remember where I saw that exactly, but I will try to find the source.
On that note, how are the updates going to work? I saw that it’s going to be monthly, but are they at a fixed time each month? I’m asking because I’m likely going to subscribe soon and don’t want to end up having my subscription expire the night before an update or something.
My impression was you had to have an active account to be able to login and use the engine…
jt, Epic will update engine constantly, AFAIK without any dates (like once a month for UDK). UE4 in active development stage, so expect many updates.
The whole paradigm shifted (closed source free UDK to full source UE4 subscription), so you will get all stuff now not after big licensees but at the same time.
CloDevious, use offline mode, Luke.