I have a question I cannot seem to find the answer of.
If I am creating a project that is not a game, but want to create a cinematic scene or just a test-project for learning the engine, is it possible to disable or turn off all the “mobile stuff” in Unreal Engine, if one is not planning on using the features/platforms?
I wonder because I noticed my Derived Data Cache folder had become huge, almost 300 gigs. And according to what unreal docs states: “The Derived Data Cache (DDC) stores versions of Assets in the formats used by the Unreal Engine on its target platforms, as opposed to the source formats artists create that are imported into the Editor and stored in .uasset files.”
I might be wrong, but in my understanding it sounds like having a project that targets many platforms creates many “versions” of each asset, thus increasing Derived Data Cache and the overall data/size of the project. Therefore I wonder, is there a way to “turn off” or disable all the mobile/ios/android stuff, so that I can play around with the engine or create my cinematic scene without it creating all these huge files of cache for something that I currently don’t need?
Maybe that will even increase the performance? since the engine wont have to create multiple versions of renderings and such?
I am still a beginner in this and so what I ask might not be possible or how things work, but I just thought of it and had to write here in case there was a way.
You can set the target formats in your project settings.
In general, mobile isn’t the space hog … most mobile games are less than a gigabyte, with less than a few hundred megs being best for compatibility and sales.
You can set the target formats in your project settings.
In general, mobile isn’t the space hog … most mobile games are less than a gigabyte, with less than a few hundred megs being best for compatibility and sales.
Thanks for your reply and for sharing your knowledge!
So, in theory, regarding the quote "(DDC) stores versions of Assets in the formats" unchecking most of the options in Supported Platform will prevent the “storing” and “creating” of asset versions?
Also, searching around yesterday in the settings I actually found this:
Have I understood it correctly that I can play around and disable some of these settings, and the engine will be faster to Recompile since it does not have to create different shaders for lets say mobile and such?
Yes, it is correct.
compile times - 0 to open - of a fresh engine with no derived data che for an 84GB project take only about 1 hour vs the 3 it needed prior.
if you also optimize the materials to avoid extra permutations even compiling 8km landscape tiles takes only about 14k shaders - compared to something like 24k the week before.
However those are engine settings, so remember what you changed if you work on a different kind of project…
I would just like to share if anyone comes across this forum thread while googling.
By deactivating some settings in the Permutation Reduction area in Rendering (screenshot above) I managed to reduce compiling time/size by a lot; in fact, it almost halved.
This will speed up production time for sure:)
My guess is that the “cached derived data” really only matter when you cook for that platform, though, so if you develop on Windows and test/cook on Windows, it’s unlikely to make much of a difference.
Disabling those “support …” features are not really about content, it’s about how the renderer sets up the shaders, and may give you some cycles per pixel on low-end platforms, like intel integrated laptops, low-cost mobiles, or webgl web pages.
I’m a little worried about the report that the cached folder keeps growing as of 4.25, though. It’s totally possible there’s some kind of bug there. The good news is that you can nuke everything in that folder, and re-cooking will re-build it all for the next published version of the game.
Hi! I just came across this post and I was wondering which of these is actually ok to uncheck if you’re working on heavy-graphic PC game? Are they only directed to mobile rendering or do they affect everything? (I’ve unchecked all that seem directly related to mobile - tooltips are actually clear on those, but the others are pretty vague)
