Stage Zero – Shader Pre-Compile Plugin (5.5, 5.6, 5.7)VIP 

Stage Zero is a plug and play shader compile plugin that you can setup in less than 5minutes, compiles your project’s shaders before play to deliver seamless loading, smoother frame-rates, and a polished player experience from the very first frame, with an optional Cache feature so seconds runs are faster, and many more customization features.

Preload shaders, assets, and levels on launch, with custom UI, music, and debug overrides, for truly hitch-free transitions.

Everything runs off timers and async requests, no blocking the game thread, so your first frame is smooth, your levels are ready, and your players stay immersed.

Key Features

• Automatic Shader Pre-Compilation: Polls and displays real-time compile progress, with options to force or skip checks and to simulate progress for rapid iteration.
• Asset Dependency Preloading: Scans MapsToWarmUp plus Primary/Secondary levels for /Game assets and preloads textures, materials, and effects.
• Async Level Streaming: Warm up multiple levels then cleanly unload when done.
• Custom UMG Loading Widget: Blueprint-driven progress bar, build-info display, completion & transition messages, all configurable at runtime.
• Seamless Level Transition: Automatic fade-out of background music, on-screen message triggers, and then OpenLevel to your PrimaryLevel.
• Blueprint & C++ Hooks: Expose GetShaderProgress() and ForceTransitionNow() to your Blueprints, receive progress updates via delegates in your own widgets.
• Audio Support: Play looping background music with fade controls, all set up through the Details panel.
• Fine-Tuned Timing Controls: Set minimum splash screen time, post-compile delay, and max wait before forcing a transition.
• Comprehensive Debug Options: Override progress (100 jobs), skip shader checks, show build timestamps, and fall back to simulated progress—all without touching code.

Technical details

Features

• Shader Pre-Compilation TrackingAutomatically polls and waits for Unreal Engine’s shader compile jobs to finish before loading the primary map.
• Asynchronous Level Streaming & CleanupDynamically loads and pre-streams multiple levels with proper unload/cleanup logic and transition.
• Asset Dependency Preloading

Code Modules

Module NameTypeStageZeroRuntime

Note: The plugin contains only one runtime module for simplicity and plug-and-play integration.

Number of Blueprints: 1

(Example: WB_StageZero_LoadingWidget provided as a sample UMG implementation)Number of C++ Classes: 2

• AStageZeroLoader
• UStageZeroLoadingWidget (interface expected from user-defined Blueprint)

Supported Development Platforms:

Windows✅

Mac✅

Tested on both platforms; however, development should always ensure shaders are compiled per target.

Supported Target Build Platforms:

• Windows
• MacOS

The plugin prepares content for any supported UE5 platform, as long as shader formats are properly cooked.

Original_Link: https://www.fab.com/listings/65d47dde-ec15-48ea-aa7c-8cc58ccf1725

Download Links:

Asset Version (5.5, 5.6, 5.7)