Hello. Some time ago I started learning basics of Unreal Engine 4. As with every editor/program it’s easier for me to learn something when I have a particular thing I want to achieve. In case of Unreal Engine I would like to make a very small, very simple game that would play and feel like old 1990s games, like Tomb Raider or Redguard(especially this one). Would it be possible to lower graphics of Unreal Engine to the point when it would resemble these old classics? Would it be moderately easy to do or maybe that’s something for advanced users?
Use low resolution textures and low poly models, this is the main thing that sets them apart. You can also disable many of the added features like lens flares, bloom effects and many post process effects. You can take a look at this link text and see the different console commands that can reduce the graphics settings.
With progress and advancement in today’s graphics, going backwards can be a challenge. It is certainly possible and I wouldn’t say its an advanced topic. Maybe between beginner and intermediate. You can’t just turn off some things to lower the quality you will have to tailor all your designs to the standard of what was done back then. Simple color schemes. No AA. Keep your shaders basic because they didn’t have them. So do some searching on how they used to make diffuse, normal and spec maps for your textures. Good luck!
If it would be possible I’d love to just disable shaders and complex lighting entirely, or keep them at minimum. I also wonder if there’s a possiblity to turn off shadows or at least change them to baked shadows(like in Gothic or World of Warcraft). I have changed graphics mode of the editor from Pixel Shader 5 to Android(because I’m interested in mobile/handheld platforms) and lowered quality but it seems some shadows just don’t want to go.
Also I wonder if it would be possible to change texture filtering from anistropic/bilinear to nearest neighbour?
You can disable shadows in the rendering options of editor settings, this will restart the editor. When making your texture maps include baked AO with your diffuse. Just plug that into base color of the shader with a normal map and that will approximate the look. Also keeping colors pretty simple. I think we were still using 256k so don’t go too deep into the variance of color. Overwatch04 also makes the point of low poly models. Best to keep complex models like characters to around 400-500 tris (ya that low)
As for lighting, quake was the first game to employ pre-baked lightmaps. Before that all textures were “hand painted.”
Also for a little help search jamin shoulet on YouTube he is an artist that worked on the w.o.w and other games and has a two part video on hand painted texture process.