Is it possible to just use the Unreal Engine as a realtime rendering API?

Development Platform & Builds
,
1

Hi guys,

We’re an indie game developer and currently considering to port our custom engine (PlayStation/Switch) to Unreal, mainly to be more flexible and more independent from platforms in the future.

We already have a complex toolchain, data management and many of the features that Unreal has build in too. Maybe not with the same flexibility, but very customized to our needs, so we would like to stay with our internal tool and data management.

The question is, can we use the Unreal Engine as a realtime rendering API only, and keep control of all the textures, shaders, geometry and vertices in our game logic? In fact we’re looking for a similar interface that a specific graphic API has (DirectX, PS5, PC, Switch), but with the advantage of being multi-platform-compatible. It could be some standard like OpenGL but also an UE specific standard, that doesn’t matter.

I’m aware that the majority of developers is using UE to the full extent, including all the editors, game logic features etc. So I’m really not sure if anyone has used it in the way I described, or if that’s even possible.

If anyone can answer this or even has experience with this approach, feedback would be much appreciated.

Many thanks and kind regards
Marcus

2

I’m not an expert but I dont think I need to be one to realize that what you asking is almost impossible to do. You want to strip the render pipeline of unreal engine to use it in your own engine.

I’m not saying is impossible but ,by the time you finish such task , you can probably make two whole games in UE alone.

3

Many thanks for the feedback! I would particularly appreciate feedback from users who have already gained experience with it or have already tried it out.

There are some references in the internet, that indicate it might be possible, but I couldn’t find a thread that really goes into details, see:

https://www.reddit.com/r/unrealengine/comments/1ihn7jb/how_does_a_project_use_unreal_only_for_game/

All additional info about that would be appreciated.

Thanks!