Epic Games CEO Tim Sweeney is getting backlash after attacking Gabe Newell following the Steam Deck OLED price hike and saying he needs the money to buy more superyachts. Valve says the increases are due to rising RAM and SSD component costs, but Sweeney wasn’t buying it. “Valve needs the extra revenue to continue maintaining its megayachts.”

Epic Games is working to make Unreal Engine 5.8 run better and faster so games can reach higher frame rates while keeping nice lighting. A new Lumen Medium Quality mode is now in testing and runs about twice as fast as the high quality mode, making high frame rates easier on handheld consoles and other devices. MegaLights is now ready for full use with less noise and better performance for smooth 60 frames per second gameplay, and the preview also adds new tools to help developers test and improve their game scenes.

Epic Games is exploring new AI tools to help make its games, including in the art department. Fortnite manager Stephanie Arnette shared this at Gamescom Latam and explained that Epic is testing AI to support its games because many workers worry it will take their jobs, but they claim that want to make teams work faster and easier, not to replace people. Remember that Epic cut more than 1,000 jobs recently to save money. She added that Epic keeps full control over AI in Fortnite, so outside partners cannot use their own AI tools without approval. Epic CEO Tim Sweeney said earlier that AI will be part of almost every new game, so special labels like "Made with AI" are not needed, and the company already has an AI tool called Developer Assistant to help with Unreal Engine and Fortnite Creative.

Russia has fined Epic Games approximately $27,000 through its internet regulator Roskomnadzor. The penalty is due to the company’s failure to store personal data of Russian users on domestic servers, as required by local data localization laws. This is part of a broader enforcement effort that includes lawsuits against major studios such as Electronic Arts and Take-Two Interactive. Courts have issued similar 2-million-ruble fines to several firms since early 2026, with additional cases pending against companies like Embracer Group and Digital Extremes. There are more affected titles like Red Dead Redemption 2, Cyberpunk 2077, The Sims 4, and Fall Guys.

Tim Sweeney, CEO of Epic Games, is criticizing Steam again over court documents claiming Valve pressured Ubisoft over a cheaper version of Rainbow Six Siege sold on its own store. Sweeney says a dominant store taking a 30% cut can bully developers into not passing savings to customers on competing platforms with lower fees. “Is this the ‘fair competition’ praised by recent articles? If a store with dominant market share taking a 30% cut can bully developers into not passing on savings to customers on competing stores with lower fees, then competition doesn’t stand a chance.”

🚨 do you understand what just happened to Rocket League.. Epic Games just chose an 11-year-old soccer-car game - not Fortnite, not the new Witcher - to be the very first game on Unreal Engine 6. the engine that will power the next decade of AAA games was unveiled.. with Rocket League. → still runs on Unreal Engine 3 - the engine that launched in 2006 → skipped UE5 entirely → first UE6 game ever announced → no release date - likely 2028+ Psyonix just out-leveraged Rockstar without saying a word.

CI Games has ended its publishing deal with Epic Games for Lords of the Fallen 2. The Polish company announced the news today in an official report. The old deal gave Epic exclusive rights to sell the game on PC forever, but now CI Games will publish the PC version itself. The game is no longer locked to the Epic Games Store and is expected to launch on Steam as well. This is very good news for PC players, especially after the first Lords of the Fallen did well on Steam in 2023.

Tides of Annihilation devs say they’ve been working directly with NVIDIA and Epic Games to fix heavy frame drops during the game’s huge “Giant Knight” battles ahead of the summer demo. The team explained that the game struggles to handle massive enemies, detailed environments, and intense combat effects simultaneously in Unreal Engine 5. Earlier gameplay clips worried many players about optimization and performance. NVIDIA is helping with DLSS and GPU optimization, while Epic engineers assisted with improving animation and gameplay systems. The devs are trying to keep visuals intact while boosting performance. Producer Kun Fu previously described the world: “Our game world reimagines London as a sprawling battleground where modern ruins coexist with echoes of a medieval past.” A public demo is expected later this summer, so players can see the performance improvements.

Guerrilla Games co-founder Arjan Brussee, a longtime Epic Games veteran who previously served as global director of product management for Unreal Engine, is developing The Immense Engine. The new engine is made in the Netherlands as a European choice instead of Unreal Engine or Unity and follows all EU rules and keeps data inside Europe. The Immense Engine introduces new native AI integration from the outset. Brussee explains that AI agents can fundamentally change devs work with small teams making games faster It will be used for video games and also for 3D simulations in areas like defense and logistics The project, announced today via a Dutch podcast interview, is still in early development