Uploaded September 2021 | Updated September 2026, 3 weeks ago

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I’ve been getting a lot of comments and DMs about doing tutorials. This is ... not … that. Good tutorials are hard, OK? And I wouldn’t feel super comfortable trying to teach people when I’m still learning and getting a grip of UE5 myself … So. How about a speed-build of an environment scene, set to some relaxing airport jazz instead?

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This is for my ‘Thedas Magic Mystery World Tour’ where I’m re-creating ... spiritual re-imaginings in the form of little cinematics from the game Dragon Age: Inquisition (originally Frostbite 3) in Unreal Engine 5! Mostly because it’s a more fun way of learning UE5 and getting the hang of the new features like Lumen and Nanite.

This scene in particular is one of the dragon-infested-colosseums in Emprise du Lion – specifically the last one: ‘Leontine's Ring’. Some artistic license was also taken to give it an increased sense of grandeur and scale – also to give Lumen a bit more to play with in terms of atmosphere.

This is sped up of course – in non-flashtime, this took just over one hour to put together. Although, it should be said that this is specifically only the environmental build itself – there’s a lot of the process that this doesn’t show – mostly because I forgot to record it and also because building material shaders and UV unwrapping models for two hours just isn’t that interesting. Although maybe you’re into that – I dunno. I don’t judge. Point is – there was a lot of legwork before even beginning a scene like this.

Something to note, also is that this is done on the Early Access 2 version the engine - well before the offical Unreal Engine 5 release date. As such, things are subject to change - along with bugs etc...

This scene is mostly kitbashed from Quixel Megascans and Epic Marketplace content – although there’s a sprinkling of my own personal modelling and a smattering of re-textured free models that I’ve come across online. Blender 2.93 was used to clean up and texture some models.

I’ve left this mostly un-edited – so you’re going to see plenty of mistakes and some questionable design and layout decisions every now and then – because that’s the reality of it – no matter how good you are – mistakes happen. I like that saying: ‘Make your mistakes early and quickly’. But also don’t be afraid to try things out. Hey – maybe it’ll actually work! Granted – this scene is designed for a very specific purpose – a cinematic – so it’s more akin to a movie set than a proper game level – the workflow for the latter would be much less … chaotic. But then again – that’s part of it – you have to know your output and not waste time getting bogged down in details that no-one’s ever going to see.

I'm running this on a single Nvidia 1060 Max-Q graphics card - well below spec for UE5 - even the game engine editor - but perfectly serviceable with some decent workflow and optimisations.

The proper animation scene will be coming … at some point. Read: When I get around to it. I’m still trying to figure out the Windwalker Echo asset – hopefully I can work out how to get some character animation going… And as always, wrestle the many, many bugs that inevitably rear their ugly heads - because we wouldn't want to make it too easy...

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If you enjoyed this content and want to see more - please consider giving me a like and subscribe to see the rest of this series! Please NOTE: I am not affiliated with Bioware in any way. This is a FANMADE cinematic tech DEMO inspired by Dragon Age Inquisition - it is not a remaster - it does not use any assets from the game itself, and as such, does not - and is not supposed to - match up one-to-one to the original.

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0:00 Blocking Out Scene
8:55 Ground Detailing
19:35 Set Dressing
28:20 Final Piece