I work for a University and Unreal 5 has a fairly major problem, from what I can tell.
You can’t download past versions.
Imagine your studio/uni has a specific version installed. You are working for months/years and Epic updates to 5.0.4, or 5.1. Your project is on 5.0.3, but you don’t update (common in pipes and studios). Well, if one of your workers/students has a hardware failure and needs a new PC, they are in serious trouble. They can’t get the previous version from Epic.
There are, BAD, solutions. Like compiling the older version from Git, or transferring the files from a previous PC. But this is 100% counter to how UE4 worked.
Epic, do you have plans to start archiving UE5 version? Does anyone know another way to get these versions?
Yep, Unreal 5 doesn’t do that though. There is just “5”, and it always picks the newest version.
Already had this issue when we were using EA releases at the studio I work at. We just figured it was because it was EA. But 5.0.2 → 5.0.3 are the same. They are no longer keeping versions archived for some reason.
I think the 5.0 is the version with the third number 3 being the fix updates for this version. next major release will be 5.1 and that one will have its own fixes.
so you will be able to chose between 5.0 and 5.1 and the third number for each version is the latest update.
if you look at the above screenshot, you see for example 4.17.2 and 4.16.3 so version 4.16 had 3 updates with 4.17 having two updates
you can’t chose more than one 5 version because there is only one 5 version
a version introduces new features, an update just fixes bugs.
Hey there @Photonic! So the launcher based engine fixes are automatic because they aren’t meant to change any features, just to make the ones in it more stable. Usually any major changes (even some bugfixes because of their nature) tend to be pushed to the next full version due to the nature of it having the smallest chance to break small aspects of projects. So in almost every case an update from 5.01 to 5.03 is nondestructive. I am personally waiting on 5.1 for a foliage bug that could cause issues for foliage being upgraded, so it was pushed back from a fix to the next release so to avoid causing issues with projects that stay in line.
Though nothing is perfect, and as you say, for organized operations it’s best to build from source for a myriad of reasons.
Yes, this is what I figured the response would be, and I totally understand. Studio-wise, we use source.
It is always educational institutions that get the shaft in these cases. It is really hard for a whole campus to update to 5.0.4 (assuming that releases) in the middle of a term. But what choice do they really have? Without a way to get 5.0.3 again, any PC from the University or a student that dies in that time/needs a reinstall would have no choice but to get 5.0.4. So their version would not match the campus computers.
Again, super common that Universities get the shaft in User Experience. It is what it is. Thank you for responding though. I do wish there was a way to get the other version, even if by console, etc…
I believe that unfortunately the launcher itself is closed source so I can’t work any magic there. I’ve done a bit of research to see what could be done but didn’t come up with much there. Maybe another member has a magic trick on hand!
