Unreal Engine 5 is awesome for what it provides. But the cost for that is a requirement for higher end machines that’s we are currently targeting for players. The work to port stuff over is highly dependent on multiple factors.

If a plug-in we use isn’t configured for UE5 it won’t work at all.

Their map system is very different for how they handle level designs at base, which would require redoing all our maps.

Another issue is actually working with the engine in editor mode requires more resources. Machines that work decently now in UE4 can chug along in UE5 but it would be terrible to try and test and work with large amounts of assets in without stripping everything down to bare bones.

Epic has talked about tools being made to help the game be more backwards compatible later down the line.

For example, their baby, Fortnite isn’t slated to be UE5 ready until at least around summer time next year. They have a fairly low end user base playing in smart phones that they will not want to alienate too many of those players.

Grimfox wrote:

It's interesting to hear that about UE5. I thought their whole thing was allowing devs to use high end "movie quality" assets that were dynamically "down sampled" for lower end machines. I would have thought that would work as well in game as it would in engine.

On the other hand UE5 needs to be geared for a future of support that might extend as much as 10-15 years from now. It really can't hold on to supporting the lowest end machines (as defined today) and still be relevant that far into the future even if it wanted to.