A completely free Unreal Tournament 3 X just leaked on Steam

Epic has just closed some doors, but it could actually open a very attractive window. Today, it seems it has inadvertently announced a new one completely free version of the excellent Unreal tournament 3 that you’ll be able to cross-play with friends across Steam, the Epic Games Store, and even GOG (via Wario64).

It’s called Unreal Tournament 3 X, and according to the Steam page, there’s no catch — “No microtransactions and no strings attached. This is the full-featured, award-winning first-person shooter you fell in love with… completely free.”

And assuming the listing is accurate, the game will still include all the main modes, including the single player campaign from Unreal Tournament 3 Black and the Greed and Betrayal game modes originally introduced in the 2009 Titan Pack expansion.

We’re pretty sure this is all legit because you can see in SteamDB that these changes rolled out just hours ago – replaces the name, full description and assets for the previous one Unreal Tournament 3 Black with the ones you see above instead.

Another reason I suspect it’s legit: Epic wouldn’t confirm or deny some of this when we asked. The company wouldn’t tell us if it’s a bug, a rudimentary project, or give any other possible reason why the site has changed so significantly (like the Steam developer account was hacked or something).

Additionally, about an hour after we published this story, Epic notified us that the page has been updated. Now it also says: “This title is currently unavailable and will be available in the future. Stay tuned!” Sounds like confirmation to me.

Note that while the release date still confusingly reads “November 19, 2007,” SteamDB shows that it’s simply UT3’s original release date on the Windows platform, period. Technically, the original game didn’t hit Steam until 2009, but it’s been showing the 2007 release date ever since. You can also see the previous one Unreal Tournament 3 Black entry from Steam via the Wayback Machine, in case you’re curious.

There doesn’t seem to be any entry for the new one UT3X on GOG or the Epic Games Store yet — or any Unreal games on the Epic Games Store at all, for that matter. But we expect them to appear after Epic makes this game announcement official. And hopefully a release date.

Earlier today, Epic announced that it will shut down the servers for six other Unreal games, including UT3, UT2004, UT2003and the original OUT, among other titles. Although I wouldn’t say so UT3 was necessarily best – movement in 2004 and the original both have their own frenetic flavors that I like – I think I’ll be quite happy with this result. After all, I can always go back and play the others via LAN.

Update, 3:36 p.m. ET: Additionally, the game’s Steam listing has been updated to read: “This title is currently unavailable and will be available in the future. Stay tuned!”