CODEBREAKERS

Threatened by homogeneity, PC gaming needs proprietary engines more than ever

- Phil Iwaniuk

Audio engineers will tell you a piece of music has 'that Pro Tools sound'. The track sounds cleaner, glossier, but overly digitized and brimming with artifice, they'll say, as you nod politely before being handed your change at the bar, putting a hand on their shoulder, and giving them an 'enjoy your night, pal' before walking off.

In a similar way, PC gamers have all become accustomed to 'that Unreal Engine look'. You know the one. Really blurry textures for a half-second when your save game first loads. A faint plasticky look to every surface. More bloom than a garden center. There are specific reasons UE games tend to look a certain way, like the material defaults that many developers don't change, and the multiplicative lighting solver that illuminates spaces in a distinctive way. The summation of those components, the recognizable look, used to be a fun little quirk, something you'd observe to yourself in the warmup phase of an Unreal Tournament match, or a massive gunfight that made you feel all clever in BioShock.

But somewhere along the way, as Unreal Engine's industry position changed from an option to the option, the quirk became a problem. Although it's not the case, it feels like every game we play was made on either Unreal Engine 4 or, in the most exotic cases, Unreal Engine 5. 'That Unreal Engine look' has started to become 'that videogame look'.

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