RE Engine is a gaming engine developed by Capcom. Initially built for Resident Evil 7: Biohazard, it has since appeared in Devil May Cry 5 and the Resident Evil 2 remake. Contray to popular belief that the letters "RE" stands for "Resident Evil", they are actually the first two letters of the engine's full name, "Reach for the moon", which the logo appropriately shows.[1]
Overview
Unlike its predecessor, the MT Framework, the RE Engine includes a variety of new graphical and rendering techniques such as Subsurface Scatters (a shader method used to produce highly realistic human skin), Dynamic shadows, FXAA + TAA, Shadow cache, moreover, rendering techniques include the ability to output 4K Resolution, HDR, a VR specific mode, among others.
On the other hand, the RE Engine enabled the developers to have photorealistic rendering and realistic shading. Characters, clothing and objects are scanned via a 3D photoshoot. According to Capcom's 2018 Annual Report,[2] the latest facial technology developed by the Serbian company called 3Lateral was used for the character expressions in Devil May Cry 5. Also in the same game, models were cast in England for the main characters and real costumes were created from scratch, after makeup is applied, the models cast for each character are scanned as 3D objects while wearing the costumes.
For Devil May Cry 5, the clothing in particular were created in London and scanned in Serbia. Making Nero's new jacket alone cost as much as a small car,[3] however his accessories were not scanned.[4] The Devil May Cry van in the game took more than an year to make, the developers would even joke at the van feeling like a character due to how much time they spent on it, additionally, the writing on the van is the artist's own handwriting, including the blue neon sign.[4]
The engine itself differs from its predecessor in terms of file formats and the whole game data is packed into a .PAK archive, making modifications a bit less comfortable.
Trivia
- The RE Engine logo was registered in the EU in February 2017 and is set to expire in September 2026.[5]