At GDC yesterday Epic Games announced that they were going to be making their Unreal Engine 4 game engine free to use for all users, including all future updates to it.

There will be no imposed limits on use of the game engine, with users utilising it for purposes from game development, education, visualisation or architecture. However despite free to use Epic will have the royalty fee – five per cent on gross revenue after the first $3,000 per product, per quarter – remain in place.

Last year Epic launched the Unreal Engine 4 with a subscription fee of $19 (although it was later made free for educational establishments) and said that they wished to make the Unreal Engine attractive to creative consumers. Removing the subscription fee will probably go someway to making that a reality for Epic. Current subscribers will get a pro-rated refund for their most recent month’s payment and anyone who has ever paid for the subscription for the Unreal Engine 4 will also receive $30 credit for the Unreal Engine Marketplace.

“This is the complete technology we use at Epic when building our own games. It scales from indie projects to high-end blockbusters; it supports all the major platforms; and it includes 100 per cent of the C++ source code.” said co-founder of Epic, Tim Sweeney. “Our goal is to give you absolutely everything so that you can do anything and be in control of your schedule and your destiny. Whatever you require to build and ship your game, you can find it in UE4, source it in the Marketplace or build it yourself – and then share it with others.”

Now that smartphone makers are finally starting to adopt wireless charging more often into their newer models, companies are beginning to make it easier to use the technology by offering wireless charging pads in their products and services – for example Starbucks are trialling wireless charging coasters on some UK stores. Now the world’s largest furniture retailer, IKEA, is all geared up to give the technology a major boost by announcing a range of lamps and other furniture which will have wireless charging built-in to them.

As part of its commitment to making homes smarter, IKEA will soon launch a range of desk, table and floor lamp with wireless charging pads included in the base or a platform higher up. The technology being built-in to the lamps is based on the more common “Qi” standard – the market leader in wireless charging technology – so most smartphones with wireless-charging capability will charge as soon as you leave them on the lamp. However, should you happen to have an iPhone or a flagship Samsung phone – which both utilise a rival technology – IKEA will also sell you a number of wireless charging covers that will let you take advantage of your new power-giving furniture as well.

Besides the lamps, IKEA will also offer two wireless charging bedside tables; as well as charging pads to add the technology to your existing furniture. The wireless charging lamps and bedside tables will be available to buy in all UK IKEA stores from mid-April, starting at £30. The company has also confirmed that its new range will debut in US stores at the same time, but pricing will be announced in the near future.

Tools firm Autodesk is due to debut their entry into the game engines market at GDC in San Francisco with a preview of their Stingray Game Engine.

Built on the tech found in the Bitsquid engine that Autodesk acquired last summer, Stingray is supposed to be designed to be user-friendly for both experienced developers as well as those just starting out; helping them create what Autodesk says will be “graphically advanced games” for a range of different platforms. Last year Autodesk said that the new engine would “change the way games are made and buildings designed”.

The demonstration will take place on Wednesday March 4th in Room 3003 of the Moscone Center’s West Hall from 3:30pm to 4:30pm. They hope to demonstrate how the engine will allow developers to evaluate how their games run on multiple platforms as well as the integration with 3D content tools, among other things.

Already one developer, Fatshark Games, is using the engine for their Warhammer: End Times title, Vermintide.

Studios will be able to learn more about the engine, as well as gaining Beta access from the www.autodesk.com/stingray site.

In their “Utopia in Progress” presentation at the World Mobile Congress in Barcelona earlier today, HTC announced that they have entered into partnership with Valve to develop virtual reality technology, showing off a small video presentation to show off their new headset – the HTC Vive.

We’ve already heard from Valve that they’re planning to develop VR hardware called SteamVR that will be properly shown off at GDC in a few days, but the announcement of a partnership means that HTC, developer of smartphones and other related devices, will be one of the first to be making use of the SteamVR system.

Speaking on stage to the crowd HTC CEO Peter Chou talked about Valve as the leader in gaming saying that they were “dedicated to bringing the best” to their customers. He said that HTC were “so excited” to be working with them on this project and that HTC believes that virtual reality will have the ability to “totally transform” the way we interact with the world, and will eventually become a mainstream device for the general consumer, with the possibilities being “limitless”.

The Vive will make use of 70 sensors allowing for full 360-degree exploration and will have a 1200×1920 screen in each eye, powered by a 90Hz refresh rate. HTC have also announced two VR game controllers that will work in tandem with the headset so each hand can be represented accurately within the virtual space.

HTC will be at GDC along with Valve, and we know that Valve plan to demonstrate the SteamVR there so it’ll be interesting to see if the two companies are planning to do presentations and demonstrations in tandem there or not.

GDC will be taking place next week, and Valve have big plans for it or so it seems. They’ve said that they will be revealing “previously unannounced SteamVR hardware system” alongside the new Steam Controller and other devices for the living room.

SteamVR is nothing new, it’s been around for a year already providing support for the Oculus Rift on Steam and was released in a patch. Now it seems to have always been the foundation for Valve’s own VR efforts, with a headset prototype having been revealed last year despite public reassurances that for the time being Valve were happy enough to support developers like Oculus rather than make their own VR devices.

Now it seems that their plans are in motion, they’re even reaching out for VR creators on Steam with a message that reads: “With the introduction of SteamVR hardware, Valve is actively seeking VR content creators. Are you a developer or publisher interested in experiencing the new SteamVR hardware? We’ll be giving scheduled VR demos during the week of GDC, March 4th-6th, 2015, at Moscone Center in San Francisco.”

I guess now we just need to wait and see the reveal to know how far along Valve are with their plans.