This is my first GOG game so it may be that I'm just not familiar with the platform to troubleshoot but basically I set it to software mode cause it seems to be the only one that has my resolution (2560x1440) so I set it to that and mess with some other settings but there's no dedicated save settings button so I close and then I check to make sure it worked and it defaults to 1920x1200 and changes some other settings. I tried editing the ini but it didn't work. Any advice?

Edit: now it just crashes when trying to boot. Apparently I can't post links yet and the file is too big to post uggggggh.

Which UnReal game? There are a few.

Unreal Gold. I realized I didn't apply the patches and stuff but I was hoping I wouldn't need to set the res. After I applied the fan patch I got my res working. Problem is now that the text is waaay too small and the HUD is too.

Look here:
https://www.pcgamingwiki.com/wiki/Unreal
Always a good place to look.

I tried the Pexoto Patch and didn't work. I'm a lil scared to use DGVoodo, isn't like kinda jank to use?

Not at all. And it upscales HUD elements automatically. I just played through Unreal 1 at 1920x1440 (highest 4:3 res that fits on my display) with HUD size the same as in 800x600.

However, if you want undistorted widescreen, you have to find an actual mod to do that. If you just force 16:9 in a game made for 4:3, bad things are gonna happen (bad FOV, cropped image etc.). Also, SW rendering is fine, but lacks a lot of features of the other renderers (reflective surfaces, worse lighting etc.).

But for playing in 4:3, using Glide with dgVoodoo is perfect. nGlide is also a good alternative if dgVoodoo refuses to cooperate.

Not sure if this is posted elsewhere in this forum, but

https://kentie.net/article/d3d10drv/

Has the thing for video issues on my end. Game runs inconsistently fast for me before applying this new renderer.
Now it runs at the intended speed. Go give it a look.