UDK Eventually Will Get Android Support

Mark Rein, vice-president of Epic Games, in phone interview to Gamasutra said that Unreal Development Kit eventually will get Android support and this feature is still in development, disproving the rumors that development of support for Google's mobile OS in UDK is stopped.

Accordingly to representative of Epic, Android is supported by Unreal Engine 3 for some time now, providing access to platform via engine's source code, but in UDK this feature isn't implemented yet. For example, first UE3 Android game was released in late 2010 ( Dungeon Defenders by Trendy Entertainment ). Some other game developer companies, like Gameloft, previously also claimed their plans on releasing own games on Android using Unreal Engine 3 as game engine for them.

Despite the fact that developers already can license UE3 source code and gain access to Android platform such way, in case of UDK conditions are different — it's somewhat difficult for indie and starter developers to create Android game with UE3 using all it's features and possibilities, because Unreal Engine is targeted to "big" and qualitative games, that in fact often become "heavy" in term of size. Also Android limitation in 50Mb for apps or games are additional barrier, because it's harder to create game with UDK, corresponding to this restriction.

So, as Mark Rein said, support for Android eventually will come to UDK, but when exactly this will happen is unknown. Google is working on solving the "size" restriction problem and platform fragmentation, enforcing their control over Android, and this will make it more attractive and easy to work with to developers, including game engine developers such as Epic Games with their Unreal Engine 3.