Unreal® Development Kit is the free version of the award-winning Unreal® Engine 3, the software development framework used to create computer and video games, 3D simulations, TV shows, films and more.
What is in the UDK?
The Unreal Editor toolset, complete with fully integrated game editing environment.
Unreal Gemini multithreaded rendering system, including a powerful material system for creating complex real-time shaders on the fly.
Unreal Lightmass global illumination solver for high-quality static lighting.
State-of-the-art physics system, Unreal PhAT, powered by NVIDIA PhysX.
Unreal Kismet, an advanced visual scripting solution that facilitates rapid prototyping of ideas and gameplay mechanics.
AnimSet Viewer and AnimTree Editor, which give animators precise control over every muscle and bone movement.
Unreal Matinee, which includes movie director-class tools for creating in-game cut scenes and gorgeous cinematics.
UnrealScript, a fully integrated, high-level object-oriented programming language.
Built-in Internet and LAN networking support for up to 64 players.
Audio control through UnrealEd’s Visual Sound Cue Editor, plus support for major audio compression schemes; 3D sound positioning, spatialization and attenuation; multi-channel playback, and much more.
Unreal Cascade particle effects system for implementing explosions, fog, fire and smoke. Module-based system gives real-time previews of visual effects.
Terrain building tool for placing and customizing vegetation, structures and countless in-game points of interest.
Integrations with leading game development middleware including PhysX, SpeedTree, FaceFX and Bink Video.
Getting UDK
UDK is free for noncommercial and educational use. Licensing terms are available to those who wish to sell UDK-powered games or to create commercial products for business use at www.udk.com/licensing.
UDK ships demo content from Unreal Tournament 3 consisting of four maps; deathmatch, team deathmatch, and vehicle capture the flag gametypes; one robot character; three weapons; and four vehicles. In UT Demo, human opponents, blood and gore have been removed. Levels have been enhanced to showcase recent upgrades to UE3 technology. See udk.com/showcase-ut-game.html.
The UT3 editor is widely used for learning Unreal Engine 3, and now UDK provides all of UT3’s game creation tools in addition to high-level engine features developed since the game’s release. UT Demo is an excellent starting point for those looking to develop their own first-person shooter experience.
The Ball
The Ball is an award-winning, episodic, puzzle-based action game for PC. Developed by Toltec Studios, it has been ported to UDK and is available here in a free, standalone version. Click here for the free download. You can learn more about The Ball game at http://theball.toltecstudios.com.
Whizzle is a UDK proof-of-concept game from Psyonix Studios that was created using the Unreal Development Kit. In this underwater 2D perspective game, players control a character named Whizzle who swims around collecting eggs and rescuing his fellow Fizzles. This development document describes the process Psyonix used to create the world using UDK.
At the bottom of this page, you can see how Dave Hagewood and his team at Phyonix developed Whizzle using UDK.
