MetaHuman Plugin not working after switching to Unreal Engine Source

[Ampe]

Hello everybody.
I successfully installed Unreal Engine 5.5.4 from Source from Github and I was able to compile every existing plugin apart from the MetaHuman plugin. I installed it copying it from the Marketplace folder from my Unreal Engine 5.5.4 precompiled and pasting it in the Plugins/Marketplace folder, but when I try to run the editor with the plugin activated I get this message:

“Plugin ‘MetaHuman’ failed to load because module ‘MetaHumanIdentity’ could not be loaded. There may be an operating system error or the module may not be properly set up.”
and also
“Impossible to find FDNAInterchangeModule… in C:[root]MetaHuman_5.5\Binaries\Win64\UnrealEditor-MetaHumanIdentity.dll”

I searched all the internet but I can’t find a way to correctly implement the MetaHuman Plugin to Unreal Engine Source. And yet I’ve people telling me they were able to install it in Unreal Source with no issues. I asked an AI and it said that since my Unreal Engine Source is 5.5.4 version and the MetaHuman Plugin is precompiled for the 5.5.0 version there is no way to make it work on my Unreal Engine Source.
Is there someone that has any advice? I would be very grateful

[raianlp]

Yeah, it won’t work. The main issue is that Epic never released the source code for all MetaHuman plugins, only headers. Thus binaries they ship via Launcher are not compatible with any other Source engine.
P.S. In 2025 Unreal Engine is not completely open-source anymore.

[Ampe]

Thank you for the answer. But how come that other people installed it with no issues in Source engine? Was it because the precompiled version (eg 5.5.0) was the same as the engine version (5.5.0)?
Mind that I’m noob

[raianlp]

What other people? You can’t install non-source Binary version of the plugin (from Launcher) to Source Engine AFAIK (happy to be wrong and then please share how it can be done).

Was it because the precompiled version (eg 5.5.0) was the same as the engine version (5.5.0)?
There is a hack that you can OVERRIDE Build via plugin .modules file but mind ABI related issues / crashes in this case.

[raianlp]

P.S. Perhaps in might work in Editor mode but not when packaging your project (and MetaHuman plugin doesn’t work in Packaged builds anyway afaik)

[Ampe]

This person for example. I can try to contact him again and ask for information but it appears he just copy pasted the metahuman plugin in the Plugins/Marketplace folder, same as I did.

What do you mean you can’t use MetaHuman in a packaged project? I’m using it in my project where characters are MetaHuman and I use facial animation on them. Are you saying I won’t be able to use neither the facial animation nor the models?

[Bent_Vector]

I am running the MetaHumans test project in a source build of UE 5.5.4 right now:

This build of UE has the Xbox Series X|S and PS5 platform support SDKs added.

The MetaHumans.uproject file shows that it supports console platforms, which means it MUST support source code builds:

"TargetPlatforms": [
	"PS4",
	"PS5",
	"Stadia",
	"Switch",
	"XSX",
	"Android",
	"IOS",
	"WindowsNoEditor",
	"Mac",
	"Windows",
	"XboxOneGDK"
],

As far as the process for setting this us is concerned, I don’t actually USE any M-H in my game, only in a project I created for generating cut-scenes, but I didn’t jump through any hoops. I simply downloaded the UE 5.5.4 source ZIP from GitHub, extracted it, grabbed my console SDKs and extracted them over top of the source code, ran Setup.cmd and GenerateProjectFiles.cmd, opened the .SLN file and did a full solution build (which gives a few errors that can be ignored if you don’t have Android or iOS SDKs installed).

I did NOT need to copy anything from a binary version of UE 5.5.4 installed from the Epic Launcher in this case, so apologies for the bad advice. The MH plugin should be in Engine\Plugins\Experimental already when you download it from GitHub (see https://github.com/EpicGames/UnrealEngine/tree/release/Engine/Plugins/Experimental/MetaHuman) and will build as part of the engine compilation process.

I have just run a full build of the MetaHumans test project for XSX and PS5 and deployed them to my dev/test kits and both run fine.

[Ampe]

Thank you so much.
For a moment I thought I was dumb and I tried to add and compile a plugin into a project that already had that plugin. But I looked into it and i think that what you are showing is only the MetaHuman SDK, which differs from the MetaHuman Plugin, which is what i need and was hoping to add to the project

[Bent_Vector]

Hmm…this IS confusing. There is a Metahuman SDK on Fab (MetaHuman SDK | Fab), but it is a paid plugin NOT created by Epic but rather by this team: https://metahumansdk.io/ based in Russia.

I wonder what the difference is between the built-in MetaHumans SDK and the MetaHuman Plugin on Fab?

So I proceeded as follows:

• Installed the MetaHuman Plugin from Epic Launcher into UE 5.5.4 binary build installed from Epic Launcher
• Created a new UE 5.5.4 project “MetaHumanTest01” with C++ support from the source code build version of the engine.
• Copied the Metahumans folder from Engine\Plugins\MarketPlace in the UE 5.5.4 binary build to the new project into MetaHumanTest01\Plugins\
• Updated the .SLN file, opened it a built the project with no problems
• However, launching the project gives the same error you mentioned
  
  

According to this post, it is possible to avoid the re-compilation process for plugins after moving them, which may or may not help:

500×500 2.84 KB

I found workaround. copy AutoRigService MetaHumanCaptureData MetaHumanConfig MetaHumanCore MetaHumanFaceAnimationSolver MetaHumanFaceContourTracker MetaHumanFaceFittingSolver MetaHumanIdentity MetaHumanMeshTracker MetaHumanPipeline MetaHumanSpeech2Face folders in [UnrealEngineSourceRoot]\Engine\Plugins\Marketplace\MetaHuman\Intermediate\Build\Win64\UnrealGame\[Development or Shipping] to [ProjectRoot]\Intermediate\Build\Win64\[YourProjectName]\[Development or Shipping]. And edit all *.precomp…

Going to give that a whirl here shortly.

[Bent_Vector]

Just fails in a different place…

[Ampe]

Hey man, thank you so much for the answer and for taking the time to actually try to implement it yourself! You’re a legend.
Unfortunately I too tried that same “workaround” but with no luck.
I guess @raianlp was right from the start and it is not possible to use the MetaHuman plugin on Unreal Engine Source.
I hope this thread helps others and avoids them wasting time in trying it.

p.s. @raianlp are you saying that i will not be able to use MetaHuman in my game? I’m developing a project basically centered around them (I have MetaHuman characters that reproduce facial animations while talking)…

[raianlp]

@Ampe It depends on which part of Epic MetaHuman “framework” you use. If you only need MetaHuman characters then you’re fine.
Main issue is that Epic never released Source code for its MetaHuman plugin. Thus you are left with Binaries only(!).
Good question here is how to install MetaHuman plugin to Source from Github. My bet is that you need to patches .modules files and also copy the MetaHuman plugin binaries over to Source engine but it seems like you already tried and it led to more errors.

What do you want to achieve anyway? Can you share that?

[raianlp]

Hey, that is great summary, thanks for sharing! I didn’t know Source engine includes its own version of MetaHuman plugin (under Experimental path). Indeed there is no source code included as well, Epic just decided to go full binary way..

That will be useful to know for all folks playing with Source engines.

My point was about copying Epic’s Marketplace version of MetaHuman to Source Engine → not sure it will work due to reasons mentioned above (binaries incompatibilities being the root cause).

In case of using Epic’s MetaHuman version of the plugin from EXPERIMENTAL directory → that should work I believe.

[Ampe]

This problem was “fixed” with the release of Unreal Engine 5.6, which integrates the MetaHuman plugin in the engine, so it works with Unreal Engine Source too