The Unreal Engine (UE) game engine in 2016 brought Epic Games twice as much money as the year before. Thanks to UE, game developers earned over $10 billion last year.
In 2015, Epic Games made Unreal Engine and updates for it free. Instead of selling the engine itself, the company began to receive royalties from the commercial use of the product.
According to Epic Games DIRECTOR Tim Sweeney, this decision already brought the company significant revenue from the implementation of UE.
In 2016, revenue doubled. Sweeney did not give exact figures, but noted that of the 25 sales leaders on Steam over the past year, 10 projects use Unreal Engine 4. He added that thanks to UE, game developers earned over $10 billion in 2016.
The latest version of Unreal Engine 4.15 was released on February 15, 2017.
Source: Polygon