Some hard-core gamers are turned off by the Nintendo system because the games are too casual. Well, Nintendo is about to do some epic stuff this time.
About 20 games running on Unreal Engine 4 are reportedly under development for the Nintendo Switch. Unreal Engine 4 is the proprietary technology of Epic Games, developer of games like Gears of War and Paragon. Among the popular games that run Unreal Engine 4 are Tekken 7 and the upcoming Final Fantasy VII Remake.
Nintendo Switch Getting Unreal
In an interview with Japanese site Automaton, Epic Games Japan representative Takayuki Kawasaki said that games running on Unreal Engine 4 are being developed for the Switch.
"In Japan, there are about 20 titles being developed that use Unreal Engine, so I think that they'll be announced gradually from here on," said Kawasaki [translation via Gematsu]. He lamented that there were no titles at launch that run Unreal engine, but he mentioned about Snake Pass, which launched a little later on March 29.
Kawasaki added that these upcoming titles will utilize Unreal Engine, and they are currently made in Japan. He also added that Nintendo is taking strides with Switch support for the free version of Unreal Engine 4.
"That way, as long as you have a Switch development license, you will be able to develop for Switch even with the free version," he said.
Currently, there are only few announced Japanese titles that will utilize Unreal Engine 4. These are Bloodstained: Ritual of the Night, the so-called spiritual successor to the Castlevania series; Shin Megami Tensei, an HD remake project; and Dragon Quest XI, the upcoming sequel to the classic Dragon Quest series by Square Enix.
Unreal Engine 4 Games
Unreal Engine 4 is a graphics technology developed by Epic Games for its Unreal game launched in 1998. Since then, the engine has been used by many successful games, with the engine itself receiving several improvements and iterations. It is so successful and widely used that it was dubbed by Guinness Book of World Records as the "most successful gaming engine."
For Japanese titles running/will run on this engine, notable titles include Tekken 7 (Namco), Kingdom Hearts III (Square Enix), Let It Die (Grasshopper Manufacture), Cyber Dimension Neptunia (Tamsoft), and Marvel vs. Capcom: Infinite (Capcom).
For Western studios, there's the aforementioned Unreal first-person shooter, action shooter Gears of War 4 (Epic Games), underwater exploration adventure Abzu (505 Games), open-world shooter Crackdown 3 (Microsoft Studios), adventure puzzler Obduction (Cyan, Inc.), and adventure platformer Pscychonauts 2 (Double Fine Productions).
