A new Unreal Engine 5 tech demo featuring a spooky train station showcases the realistic capabilities of the software, and the results are impressive.
The project was created by solo developer Lorenzo Drago who shared it on YouTube, with it based on the real-life train station, Etchū-Daimon, located in Toyama, Japan. The creator notes at the end of the video that the environment is running in Unreal Engine 5, lit with Lumen technology, but they didn’t use the Nanite geometry system.
Drago worked on all modelling, texturing, lighting, and animation for the video, while the featured foliage was created by Quixel Megascans. You can check out the video below:
The developer used VR control to simulate a handheld camera movement, making the footage look even more realistic. Straight away the video gives off the impression that the footage should belong to a first-person horror game, and it only gets spookier.
Midway through the video, the train station lighting shuts off and the environment is immediately cast in dark shadows and eery noises. The way the VR camera is positioned, as well as the fact that there are footstep sounds, makes it look like a playable section of a survival horror game.
Many viewers have compared the aesthetic and style of the tech demo to P.T., the Silent Hill playable teaser from Kojima Productions.
Dargo answered some questions in the comments, stating it took around a month to create and clarifying that the tech demo was not running in real-time, but at around seven frames per second on a high-res render. “I can run it in real-time (30-50 fps 1440p for daytime), but image quality is worse. It’s not particularly optimised anyway, you could get better performance with a little more work,” the developer explained.
In other news, the first official Gotham Knights gameplay featuring Nightwing and Red Hood has been revealed.
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