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This news comes as part of Epic Games announcing Unreal Engine 5, the latest and greatest version of its popular game engine. In addition to showing off an impressive-looking tech demo for the new game engine, running on a PlayStation 5, Epic Games confirmed that Fortnite will itself move to Unreal Engine in mid-2021. So, given that both the PlayStation 5 and Xbox Series X are launching at the end of this year, the popular video game will still be on Unreal Engine 4 when it comes to next-gen consoles, but not for too long.
“While we can’t share specifics at the moment, more powerful hardware will allow us to improve performance and visuals,” Fortnite‘s official announcement reads in part. “At launch, the version of Fortnite we release on next-gen consoles will be built with Unreal Engine 4. We will migrate Fortnite to Unreal Engine 5 in mid-2021.”
Further details about the next-gen launch of Fortnite are sparse, but Epic Games did note that cross-play across all platforms will be supported and progression and such will carry over as well. This all makes sense, of course, given that basically everyone else can play together regardless of which platform they are on, and it would be a shame to see next-gen players off in their own walled garden. It would also mean a relatively low number of available players at launch, which seems like the opposite of what Epic Games might want.
Fortnite Chapter 2 Season 2 is currently ongoing, and Season 3 is set to launch on June 4th. The popular video game is available on PlayStation 4, Xbox One, Nintendo Switch, PC, and mobile devices, and according to today’s reveal, it will be available on both the PlayStation 5 and Xbox Series X at launch. There is currently no definitive launch date for either of the next-gen consoles beyond Holidays 2020. You can check out all of our previous coverage of Fortnite right here.
What do you think about Fortnite coming to the PS5 and Xbox Series X at launch? Are you excited to see the improvements from Unreal Engine 5? Let us know in the comments, or hit me up directly on Twitter at @rollinbishop to talk all things gaming!
