Epic Games has announced that the studio is beginning development on a brand new Unreal Tournament game for PC, Mac, and Linux that will be completely free and driven by its community members.

Epic’s Paul Meegan teased the news last week which now fully comes to light. The studio hopes to crowd source the project that will be co-developed by users with an Unreal Engine 4 subscription.

In the transparent development process, Unreal fans will be able to give away or sell their mods on an online marketplace, from which Unreal will take a cut that will contribute towards the cost of development.

The studio stresses that the new Unreal Tournament will be completely free, not “free-to-play” with micro-transactions. Stay tuned for more details!

Epic has published the full details on the studio’s official blog:

HERE’S THE PLAN

• We’ve created a small team of UT veterans that are beginning work on the project starting today.
• From the very first line of code, the very first art created and design decision made, development will happen in the open, as a collaboration between Epic, UT fans and UE4 developers. We’ll be using forums for discussion, and Twitch streams for regular updates.
• If you are a fan and you want to participate, create a free account and join the forum discussion.
• All code and content will be available live to UE4 developers on GitHub.
• The game will be true to its roots as a competitive FPS.
• Development will be focused on Windows, Mac and Linux.

SO WHAT’S THE CATCH?

• It will take many months until the game is playable by gamers. This is real development from scratch.
• When the game is playable, it will be free. Not free to play, just free.
• We’ll eventually create a marketplace where developers, modders, artists and gamers can give away, buy and sell mods and content. Earnings from the marketplace will be split between the mod/content developer, and Epic.  That’s how we plan to pay for the game.

WANT TO GET INVOLVED?

• Want more detail on the project? Read our wiki.
• Want to participate & give feedback? Check out the forums, and sign up for a free account here to join Unreal Engine 4 community.
• Just interested in getting updates? Subscribe to our newsletter here at the bottom right of our page.
• In case you want to check out the classic Unreal Tournament games, they will be on sale here starting tomorrow, for 50% off!