Epic Games unveils Unreal Engine 6, and its first footage is here

Rocket League, the vehicle-based competitive soccer game, was first released in 2015 powered by Unreal Engine 3. The developer Psyonix, which was acquired by Epic Games in 2019, has been delivering updates to the game for over 10 years now, adding new arenas, vehicles, game modes, and more to its massive playerbase. However, the community's requests for an engine upgrade have gone unanswered until today.

During the Rocket League Championship Series Paris Major tournament, the company gave a look at an engine upgrade that nobody suspected. Instead of giving players the Unreal Engine 5 upgrade they were asking for, the studio will be skipping it and heading straight to Unreal Engine 6, which developer Epic Games hadn't announced until today. Catch the teaser below, which features footage captured in real-time from the upcoming Rocket League upgrade running on Unreal Engine 5.

It's a rather small teaser, first showing off almost a photorealistic pitch that should be very familiar to fans of the game. A car and the Rocket League ball show up next, showing off the texture and model upgrades players can expect. Soon after, an air shot from the popular Octane displays the new boost trail effects. The footage ends with what looks to be a shot of the car customization system, which hints at a major upgrade for what players will be able to achieve in-game with their paints and parts.

Unfortunately, a release date was not announced today for Unreal Engine 6 nor for this "new era" of Rocket League.

Unreal Engine 5 was first unveiled in 2020 before it arrived to Fortnite in 2021 with an early access program for developers. A year after that, the engine was released in full. If Epic Games follows the same pattern, Rocket League may get this Unreal Engine 6 upgrade in 2026, before a full release happens later. Epic may announce the tech for its smash hit Fortnite soon too, before it rolls out to other game developers.