Epic Games to host AI MegaJam with $50,000 prize pool in November

Epic Games is hosting an AI MegaJam game jam running from November 12 to November 15, 2026, with a $50,000 prize pool. According to Shacknews, participants are encouraged to collaborate with other people and AI agents to create games for Unreal Engine. The itch.io event page describes a four-day contest that permits any AI tools and an unlimited number of agents, with teams ranging from one to five people.

The itch.io FAQ states that using artificial intelligence is not required to enter the AI MegaJam. Contestants may prepare tools, agents, and MCP, a protocol for connecting AI models to applications, before November 12 but must not begin building until the jam starts, and must declare any prompts, scripts, or assets created earlier. Entries may incorporate assets the entrant did not create, such as those from Fab, provided they hold the right license and list them in the submission, and gameplay must go beyond Epic’s starter templates.

The jam awards prizes in Best Overall, Best Overall UEFN, and Best Student Project categories, with first place receiving $7,500, second place $5,000, and third place $2,500. Standout Unreal Engine and UEFN entries can receive Development Continuation Grants of up to $50,000 to continue developing their games. Entrants retain ownership of their games under the jam’s Official Rules.

In-person sessions will take place at Digital Jungle in San Francisco on November 14–15, 2026, with sign-ups opening November 1 at 7 AM Pacific Time. Attendees at the San Francisco venue can work alongside staff from Anthropic, Google, Meshy, OpenAI, and SpaceXSI. Remote and on-site entries are judged equally, so travel to San Francisco is optional.

Teams must package submissions for Windows, macOS, Android, or iOS, keep them under 1 GB, and upload them by November 15 at 5:59 PM PST, or the jam disqualifies them. Games must run in either Unreal Engine or Unreal Editor for Fortnite (UEFN), and each team must choose one engine. UEFN entries require a private version code, a fixed island snapshot that teams cannot change after creation; live island and playtest codes are not accepted.

Tim Sweeney wrote on October 12, 2026 that Epic is retooling developers for maximum AI acceleration so everyone can build more and better things, not the same work with fewer people. On X, he said AI acceleration means a much faster time from idea to playtesting, and that a modest aim is to survive the AI revolution and make better code and content faster.

Bloomberg reported that Epic is using an “AI first” approach on an unannounced Disney-connected shooter featuring Star Wars and Marvel characters, with AI writing code and guiding artwork. A Bloomberg source said code and art on the Disney shooter would be AI-generated, with Claude among the tools, and cited an end to handwritten code. An Epic director told Bloomberg that progress is slower than expected. The $1.5 billion Epic-Disney deal announced in early 2024 had planned a Marvel- and Star Wars-themed shooter for March 2027, but the project is now delayed indefinitely.

An Epic spokesperson said the company is embracing AI-accelerated development led by Epic developers who remain the visionaries and creative drivers. Jake Jones, Epic’s communication director, said: “We’re embracing AI-accelerated development, led by Epic developers who are the visionaries and creative drivers for everything we do.” Epic’s June 22, 2026, roadmap says it recently opened broad usage of code generation and AI analysis across backend, engine, and game development engineering teams.

Epic’s March 24, 2026, employee note announced layoffs of more than 1,000 people amid a Fortnite engagement downturn that began in 2025. Sweeney said the layoffs were not related to AI. The note said Epic was spending more than it earned, with more than $500 million in identified cost savings. The March 24, 2026, layoff note said affected staff would get severance including base pay for at least four months and six months of Epic-paid health coverage in the U.S., plus accelerated vesting of stock options through January 2027 and equity exercise options extended for as long as two years.

Epic acquired Loci, an AI developer for 3D content understanding and tagging, on April 2, 2025, planning to use it for Fab search, UEFN asset indexing, and IP protection. Loci’s computer vision models tag 3D assets automatically, precisely, and at scale, replacing manual tagging that made content labor-intensive to categorize and difficult to discover. Lucia Specia, director of Epic’s Machine Learning Solutions team, said the company was looking for ways to automate artist workflows and improve content discoverability.

Epic’s June 22, 2026, roadmap plans to unify Unreal Engine 5 and UEFN into Unreal Engine 6 within two years, targeting Early Access by the end of 2027. The roadmap by Marcus Wassmer describes MCP integrations for Claude and Gemini as creativity and productivity multipliers, with Claude and Codex central to faster content creation. It says LLMs, or large language models, generative AI models, and tools such as Claude and Codex play a central role in building content faster while maintaining creative control. The roadmap also calls for improving the Epic Developer Assistant as an optional turnkey tool for all, and says model-assisted creation could tighten iteration loops and cut manual setup of levels, rigs, and lighting.

Epic said engineers use AI for custom tools, code indexing, incident response, crash and CIS failure analysis, tests, and backend development, though most uses do not yet generate mainline Unreal Engine code. Separately, Epic said it vibes coded a new version of the Epic Games launcher that runs faster than Steam.