Free Unreal Engine passes 800,000 installs

The freemium edition of the Unreal Engine is racing towards its millionth download and install, Epic Games has said.

The engine vendor’s vice president, Mark Rein, said Unread Development Kit (UDK) has been installed more than 800,000 times since its launch.

UDK, which is free for non-commercial use, was released late in 2009.

Rein told Gamasutra that the figure represents the number of unique installations the company has tracked since launch.

PC and iOS devices are currently supported by UDK, though Epic eventually wants to support Android devices.

Commercial use of UDK costs a $99 registration and operates on a revenue share model, where Epic takes a 25 per cent cut of wholesale revenues after a game generates $50,000.

A developer using UDK would only pay Epic $700 from a game that makes $75,000, according to the current royalty rules.

More details on the royalty rate can be found here.