Unreal Engine 5 is currently in early access, but we’re widely expected to see it powering the next generation of games. It offers a powerful suite of features like Nanite and Lumen that makes creating high-fidelity environments and models a breeze.
For example, here’s what Skyrim’s Riverwood would look like if it were an Unreal Engine 5 game. Environment artist Christian Gomm of Myrkur Games recently posted several images and a video tour of Riverwood that were largely created using photogrammetry assets in Unreal Engine 5.
Photogrammetry is basically taking a scan of the environment and then using it to create a new 3D model. It's more commonly used to recreate real-life environments virtually, but there's technically nothing stopping you from using the same software to translate one virtual environment into a new one.
Besides scanning the original, Gomm's rendition of Riverwood also contains "Megascans assets, and Substance materials created by the artist," according to 80LV. The pine trees were made using a program called SpeedTree while the spruce trees were downloaded as part of an Unreal market asset pack. Almost everything you see has UE5's Nanite enabled, which enables polycounts upwards of 15 million triangles per object.
"The majority of the environment was made in a few days," said Gomm, "but I've been slowly adding to it as I create new photo scans, including many of the stumps and logs, all but one of the stone surfaces, some bark materials, and foliage pieces."
You can take a virtual tour of Riverwood in UE5 in the above video. Gomm has also recreated the Western Watchtower and Oblivion's Kvatch Gate in Unreal Engine 5, which can view over on his ArtStation page.
Remaking Skyrim is cool and all, but if you really want to see what Unreal Engine 5 can do, check out this brief game demo that was made a few months ago. Just be sure you've got a relatively modern PC for best results.
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