Microsoft’s first party studios have been steadily jumping aboard the Unreal Engine 5 train, with a number of developers already having confirmed that they’ll be using the new engine for their upcoming projects, and it seems Obsidian Entertainment is the next in line to do the same- at least that’s what a recent job ad suggests.
Asspotted by @klobrille on Twitter, a job ad published by the studio for the position of Houdini Technical Artist includes mention of Unreal Engine 5, with one of the bullet points under the “pluses” section reading: “An understanding of the material editor in Unreal Engine, as well as an understanding of new features coming in UE5.” Meanwhile, the engine is also mentioned under the responsibilities section.
Obsidian Entertainment is currently working on two large-scale RPGs (that we know of), but of the two, it’s likely that The Outer Worlds 2 is the one that’s going to use the new engine. Development on Avowed is in full swing and has been going on for a while, so it’s unlikely that Obsidian will switch engines in the middle of production. The Outer Worlds 2, on the other hand, is clearly just beginning development.
A number of other Microsoft first party studios are using Unreal Engine 5 for their next games, including the likes of The Coalition, inXile Entertainment, Ninja Theory, and Undead Labs.