I am very new to Unreal Engine 5 but have been able to run some examples and although they are rather large for the development, once compiled they run pretty well.
The project that I am interested in doing is to build a type of application that would start up a simple default “world” and then have built-in editor functions so that the user (player) could do in-game editing for a multiplayer system while others are in the game as well. Others could also collaborate on the in-game editing which would allow them to build structure, import assets, etc.
The idea is to use similar functions found in the current Unreal Editor for this in-game editor feature. As an example, think along the lines of Minecraft where you can edit and build from within the existing multiplayer world.
My questions is that I do not want to violate any EULA specifications and am wondering if this would be allowed by using the current codebase to build from?
This option is to basically build a new type of Unreal in-game editor specific to a single application that it would act upon.
I just want to make sure that I am doing things properly and any advice or guidance from the Unreal team would be greatly appreciated.
First: Nobody on this forum will give you legal advice. That’s not what we do.
Second: The “you can’t ship the editor” part of the license is generally thought to mean “you can’t link your shipping game against any of the Editor libraries or plugins.”
If you build your world, and editor, using only the runtime support libraries and plugins (like any other game,) then I believe EPIC doesn’t have a problem with you having editor-like features in your game. What they seem to be concerned with, is whether you include any of the Editor-specific code in your shipping code – presumably because they might not actually have the licensing rights to sub-license some parts of the editor, in the first place?
Build your game like a regular game, don’t link in any Editor plugins/libraries, and there likely won’t be a problem with any editor-like features in your game.
Thanks for the response on this and I was not actually asking for any legal advice even if it sounded like that in the post so I apologize for any inclinations in that direction.
I was mainly just trying to get some clarification as to exactly what you mentioned with regards to editor plugins/libraries being used or linked into a game.
