Unreal Engine 5.5 Cyberpunk Demo Launches

A groundbreaking new tech demo built on Unreal Engine 5.5.3 is now available, inviting players to explore a richly detailed futuristic cyberpunk metropolis. Created by artist Sciontidesign, this project takes cues from the Samaritan UE3 demo, the Blade Runner series, and the wider visual style of Cyberpunk 2077. It was demoed on a high-performance system using an NVIDIA RTX 5090 graphics card, an AMD Ryzen 9 7950X3D processor, and 32GB of DDR5 memory running at 6000MHz.

The demonstration utilizes dynamic lighting exclusively, demonstrating the power of Nanite with Distance Field Meshes and Ambient Occlusion paired with Screen Space Reflections. Significantly, it omits higher-end techniques like Lumen, Path Tracing, RTX, DLSS, or precomputed lighting—proving what UE5 can accomplish without its most advanced features.

Although the rain effect looks slightly unnatural, the rendering of wet surfaces is remarkably intricate, enhancing the city's atmosphere. A drawback is the frequent occurrence of invisible barriers, which break the sense of immersion. While Unreal Engine 5 tech demos continually offer breathtaking visuals, actual game releases using the engine often face performance challenges in practical applications.