No way to set item lifetime to infinite – Mutator Zone only allows up to 30s, 0s causes instant despawn

Summary

There is currently no way to set item lifetime to infinite in UEFN.

The Mutator Zone only allows item despawn values up to 30 seconds. Setting the value to 0 seconds does not mean infinite and instead causes items to despawn immediately.

Despite UI descriptions suggesting that item despawn can be disabled, there is no available option to prevent items from despawning. This blocks any gameplay system that relies on persistent ground items, including Verse-driven custom spawners.

Please select what you are reporting on:

Creative

What Type of Bug are you experiencing?

Assets

Steps to Reproduce

  1. Create a new UEFN project.
  2. Place an Item Spawner device in the level.
  3. Place a Mutator Zone and set it to be global (affects the whole island).
  4. Enable the option related to item despawn / item lifetime in the Mutator Zone.
  5. Observe that the maximum selectable value is 30 seconds.
  6. Set the value to 0 seconds.
  7. Start the game and spawn an item on the ground (via Item Spawner or Verse).
  8. Observe the item behavior.

Expected Result

There should be a way to configure items so that they do not despawn at all, or at least allow a very long lifetime (for example 1 hour).

Specifically:

  • A value of 0 seconds should mean “infinite” or “do not despawn”, OR
  • There should be an explicit option such as “Infinite”, “Do not despawn”, or similar.

This would allow creators to rely on persistent ground items for custom gameplay systems.

Observed Result

There is no way to set item lifetime to infinite.

  • The Mutator Zone only allows values up to 30 seconds.
  • Setting the value to 0 seconds does NOT mean infinite.
  • Instead, 0 seconds causes items to despawn immediately.
  • There is no “infinite” or “do not despawn” option available anywhere.
  • Leaving the option disabled does not prevent item despawn either.

As a result, items always despawn after a short forced delay, which breaks custom Verse-driven systems.

Platform(s)

PC

If you leave the logic option Pickup Life Span (Unticked) this is infinite

I don’t get the issue ?

You can only have a maximum of 100 items around the map for example if you fished 100 fish from a pond and there on the floor then they start to replace the 1st with the new. Maybe this is what your seeing ?

Also i believe the item spawner allows 100 devices then it starts to bug/respawn at will even without the mutator so maybe this is also what your seeing ?

Hello, Thank you for your answer.

My case is the following, if the logic option Pickup Life Span is Unticked, The mutator doesn’t affect the despawn of items and the default value of 40 seconds is working.

If I tick it, I can only set 0 to 30 secondes, if 0 second is set (The item despawn immediately) So, I can not find any way to set Unlimited Time.

I’ve never know there to be any type of auto default time on it tbh news to me