starting from the bare metal ..

[Blade[UG]]

Is it possible with UDK to actually recompile the base classes, or are you limited to only using the Mod architecture? Just curious, I haven't had a look at anything in it yet, and probably won't get to it for a couple days..

[byteasc]

The Mod architecture IS the Engine. You can start on your own classes and such, without using UTGame (which would be the "game", although I find it a great starting point for alot of stuff). Theres a post on here somewhere which Steven Polge posted some information about how to "strip" out portions of it.

You will however not be able to do anything with Native classes or to make your own native classes

[Blaaguuu]

I just tried, and you can recompile the UT related classes... Though it would probably be best to just extend them wherever possible.

[immortius]

Assuming that there may possibly be new versions of UDK in the future, it would be easiest to update if you don't mess with any of the existing packages.

[Blade[UG]]

I think I'd find that throwing out everything that doesn't directly reference native code might be the best option for certain things. :) I know it was actually possible to recompile the base packages in UT04, even without the native headers. I'll check into it some more, though.

[Solid Snake]

The point of Unreal Engine has always been to provide a good starting platform to create games with. I don't quite understand why people would want to discard all the work Epic has put in, to make it easier for their end users? You gain a lot of extra work, for next to no benefits.