I’Unreal Engine 5 was officially launched on April 5, 2022. Version 5.1, released last November, brought two main new features for the VR : Nanite And Lumen. Now that the Meta Quest 2 and Pro headsets have been made compatible with the latest 3D engine fromEpic Games, the real question is what future titles will look like !
What’s changing for developers
THE plugin of compatibility is now called MetaXR (formerly Oculus-VR). Meta will gradually drop support for theUnrealEngine 4the update V49 is therefore the penultimate to offer new features, while the V55, scheduled for May 2023 will bring the final patch. Of course, bug fixes and critical flaws will continue to be released until the end of 2023. However, Meta warns that its technical support will no longer support incident tickets related to theEU4 after applying the latest patch.
Unreal Engine 5 includes many significant feature updates and architectural changes, the latter of which may cause performance issues.
Meta recommends that developers not port their projects (EU4) below Unreal Engine 5, the architecture, the system and the functionalities are different, so it is better to start from scratch. So be careful, this also does not mean that it will be impossible for developers not to publish their games under UnrealEngine 4but it must however be taken into account that they will not be helped by Meta in case of trouble.
What changes for players
Bad news for the Oculus Quest which will not be supported by the latest 3D engine fromEpic Gamesanother proof that Meta wants to speed things up to maintain its Meta Quest 2 afloat, while the Meta Quest 3 be disclosed to the general public. And one bad news leads to another, know that the Meta Quest will not be compatible with Nanite, a technology that is nevertheless essential, because it makes it possible to reduce resources by refining the elements of the game in real time. It’s a shame, the system Nanite could have allowed the developers to refine the textures of the games, quite poor in stand-alone. Wait, it’s not over! Lumenthe 3D Engine Global Lighting Systemequivalent to ray tracing of NVIDIA, will also not be compatible with Meta Quest.
As you will have understood, when it comes to video games, compatibility Unreal Engine 5 on the latest helmets from Meta will above all allow developers to facilitate the development of new titles. So don’t expect to have a rendering equivalent to Half Life: Alyx on your autonomous helmets, the contribution of theEU5 will instead drive a wedge with the PC world VR And PSVRsince the GPUs dedicated are infinitely more powerful to ensure compatibility with most engine features.
Needless to think that the Meta Quest 3, supposed to be twice as powerful as its elder, will approach the console or PC versions. On mobile chips, you have to forget the idea. To compare, only NVIDIA RTX 2000 are physically capable of supporting Lumenwhich is to say that the GPUs mobiles can never keep up ! So, of course, there are developers who achieve a similar result between standalone and PC versions. VRas the excellent RedMatter 2 (read our test), but it is a pity that in the current video game landscape this is still an exception.
Interested in Meta Quest 2 ? Know that you can afford it at the Fnac, Darty or Amazon for €449.99.
Read also: Oculus Quest 2: choosing the right games and applications to start in autonomous virtual reality?