“We are making a new Unreal Tournament”. Seven words that will make many a gamer either punch the air with excitement or give them cringing reminders of just how much the more recent entries sucked and hopes this won’t be another of those. Epic Games’ community manager Stacey ‘Flak’ Conley used those very seven words to confirm the company’s plan to build what they’re already describing as their “next-gen competitive shooter”, which is planned for Windows, Linux, and Mac.
However, this time the game is taking a whole new approach, with a different business model and more focus on the Community. The Unreal series of games have maintained a long tradition of mod support, which is partially responsible for its enduring reputation; and now, the company wants to involve its loyal community from the beginning, letting them contribute ideas from the very first line of code, using forums and Twitch streams to keep in touch. As for modding itself, Players will be able to make maps, weapons, and near total-conversions to add into the game even if they can’t get them into the main code.
“Unreal Tournament is the perfect kind of game to do this with,” project lead Steve Polge said. “It’s always had a very open community.”
To facilitate the distribution of mods in the new game, the new Unreal Tournament will feature a marketplace from which they can all be downloaded. Modders will have the option to make their mods available for free or at a price, letting mod authors get recompensed directly for their work for the first time. The biggest news however is that Epic Games won’t be following suit and using the marketplace to implement micro-transactions into the game. In fact, the company don’t plan to make money from the game directly at all if reports are to be believed – not only is the new Unreal Tournament going to be free to play, but all Epic Games-published extra content will be offered freely as well!
The studio warned that the game will take many months to be playable, and will start off with a focus on standard Deathmatch only. Other series-standard modes like Capture the Flag and Onslaught will be added over time. Not that long-term series fans shouldn’t be used to waiting: The last major title in the Unreal series of shoot-em-ups was seven years ago, when Unreal Tournament III hit stores in 2007 releasing on PC, Xbox 360 and PS3.
