Unity 5 Announced

Updating as more info becomes available.

Official Unity 5 site (not available yet): http://unity3d.com/5

Polygon (Atricle has since been taken down - no details on why. Full article posted and linked a few posts down):
http://www.polygon.com/2014/3/17/5518114/unity-5-massive-update-game-development

Joystiq (thanks kenlem!)
http://www.joystiq.com/2014/03/17/unity-5-revealed-includes-improved-lighting-audio/

VentureBeat (thanks bigzer!)
http://venturebeat.com/2014/03/17/u...to-make-thousands-of-3d-games-more-realistic/

Real-time lightmap previews by PowerVR OpenRL (thanks VIC20!)
http://www.imgtec.com/powervr/powervr_raytracing.asp

Mozilla and Unity Bring Unity Game Engine to WebGL (thanks kryptopath2!)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cWIRUaR9G4w

 

I am very curious as to:

1) When it will be released.

2) What the upgrade costs will be. We just bought a bunch of Unity 4 licenses recently and a whole ton of cost upgrading would be pretty brutal.

 

your link resolves to a 404 so..

 

That's odd, it didn't do.. Someone been asked to pull the plug?

 

That would be most welcome.

 

Unity 5? Already? Jeez.

 

Interesting - it's gone from the polygon main page now as well. It was the top story on Polygon - they must have been asked to pull it?

 

Goddammit, so I'll have to upgrade to have 64 bit support?

 

from the 404'd article

 

Thanks brianruggieri - was trying to find a cached version of the article.

 

Welcomed improvements, curious about the planned live date though.

 

Interesting.
I also did not realise Unity 4 was 2 years old already.

 

Google cache: http://webcache.googleusercontent.c...18114/unity-5-massive-update-game-development

 

Time flies when you're having fun!

 

Lol I thought the same!

I still can't help to get hyped!

 

I think it was december 2012 - I doubt Unity 5 will be released before the 4th quarter but I guess there will be a beta starting in summer.
Funny thing is no word about a new GUI system. Maybe it will really find its way into 4.5?

 

here is a cached version:

http://webcache.googleusercontent.c...18114/unity-5-massive-update-game-development

 

It probably needs to be said:

This is from an article on a single, random website, with no attribution to where they got the information. It could be that they know something that everybody else around here doesn't, or it could easily be that they heard a rumour and wrote an article without checking it, or even that they just decided they wanted some extra web traffic and made the whole thing up.

Remember: rumours are a dime a dozen.

 

OMG it's really true and it will be released in April: http://goo.gl/QiZ4Mv

 

Always possible - Polygon is usually pretty good about only reporting real things, but nobody is perfect. It's also possible it was a behind-closed-doors thing their source was shown at GDC, or something they got the scoop on that isn't slated to be officially announced until later this week.

 

Really hope (if it's true) that this is referring to 4.5 and not 5.0. Just bought it a few months ago; I don't want to have to buy it again yet!

 

Hopefully it includes good support for HiDPI displays, i.e. rMBP and the litany of HiDPI windows notebooks coming out this year such as the 2014 Razer 14 and a bunch of others by lenovo, MSI, Dell, etc..

 

I was expecting an update around GDC but not 5. gawdammitsomuch...

 

Well at least they didn't promise a new GUI this time around... or better GC/new Mono...

The features sound promising though 64bit is very welcome and I wonder what's changed with the lighting engine.

 

Hopefully they call that 4.5, audio and shader isn't enough to justify upgrade cost.

 

Take whatever it says with a few grains of salt. It obviously wasn't supposed to be published yet so it is not a final draft and they pulled it right away. They may have talked to someone at Unity to get an idea of what to expect and wrote up an early version of the announcement to have something ready to publish quickly. Once the real announcement goes live they would add or change details as necessary.

Obviously Unity will be making some announcements at GDC, but I wouldn't get too worked up about the details until official word comes out.

 

Hahahahahaha

Edit: Obviously there will at least be a 4.5 before the 5.0 release. Certain training material, as well as some GDC sessions simply suggest that. Those GDC sessions also explicitly mention the new GUI, so I believe we'll get our hands on 4.5 pretty soon.

As for 5.0, I believe it won't come before 4th quarter, if not early 2015. However, don't take this single article for granted. The feature list is certainly incomplete and they took that article down for a reason.

 

reminds me.. are there streams tomorrow? (unity - gdc)

 

Wish they would have waited another year. Felt like Unity 3 saw a lot more progress before 4 came out.

Also, the chance of Polygon getting this wrong are pretty slim. They almost certainly broke the embargo date on accident, but chances are you'll see the article pop back up by the end of the week.

 

I want to know more about this new "cross-promotion neetwork"!

It sounds, uh... neat!

 

http://www.joystiq.com/2014/03/17/unity-5-revealed-includes-improved-lighting-audio/


Another article...


Unity Technologies has unveiled the next iteration of its increasingly ubiquitous cross-platform game engine, appropriately dubbed "Unity 5."

Described as a "massive update," Unity 5 features a "completely overhauled audio system," physical shaders and enhanced real-time lighting. Additionally, the update delivers an ad-sharing network that should make it simpler for developers using Unity 5 to cross-promote mobile games. Unity Technologies also hopes to expand the engine's already massive reach with the addition of support for the WebGL graphics API.

Unity 5 will be available for pre-order from the Unity Technologies store at some point tomorrow. Helpfully, paying for the engine early also grants users access to Unity 4 and all of that engine's remaining updates.

 

Joystiq just put up a blurb too. Seems suspicious, since there's no source, no real details, and nothing on the Unity site. I guess we'll see "at some point tomorrow."

http://www.joystiq.com/2014/03/17/unity-5-revealed-includes-improved-lighting-audio/

UPDATE: Hehe, oops, beat me to it.

 

64-bit support? I will start crying of pure joy!

 

64-bit editor with update to mono runtime would be really great

 

Some specifics would be nice, I guess we have to wait for Unity to drop them or wait for the stream to hit the Tube.

 

Aye, and up to date Mono runtime would be fantastic indeed.

 

@LaneFox

i guess tomorrow we will find out!

 

I would bet money that the neither the mono runtime or physics system will see any updates in 4.5 or 5.

 

Hmm, I am equal parts suspicious, happy, and annoyed. I guess we'll see tomorrow.

 

XD Luckily my volume wasnt blasted too much

 

I'm excited. Very excited. VERY.

 

Yeah although we will we able to pre-order Unity 5 soon, Unity 4 updates are not over and should bridge the gap until the release of 5.

I think the release of Unity 5 will be at this year's Unite.

 

It's a joke if they still don't update Mono. If they truly can't reach a deal with Xamarin, they need to provide a comprehensive C API at least to Pro users.

Unity does a good enough job of exploiting the GPU, but any game that makes serious use of CPU and memory suffers badly because of the ancient Mono version. People talk a lot about garbage collection because of the direct impact on responsiveness, and that's certainly part of it, but Unity is also completely unsuitable for a game that involves complex simulation. That'd include any serious Minecraft clone, for example.

 

Aye, that Joystiq article gave us some more insight. Really exciting if true!

I second this. It's about time, can't keep on grinding on that ancient version much longer...

 

Agreed, anything they can do is a distant, distant second on my wish list, compared to getting a mono update,

 

So this is what he meant when he said that the new gui will not come in unity 4.5 but shortly after.

 

Not sure I understand what you are saying….The new gui will be in a 4.x update, so before 5.0.

 

I wonder how Unity will defend our code in WebGL and if it will support touch devices.

 

If that is the case, and Unity releases 4.6 as the last 4.x series, that still means 1-1.5 years of development. Isn't that a bit early for accepting pre-orders?

 

Wait, how did you come up with 1-1.5 years of development ?