Book Image

Game Development Projects with Unreal Engine

By : Hammad Fozi, Gonçalo Marques, David Pereira, Devin Sherry
Book Image

Game Development Projects with Unreal Engine

By: Hammad Fozi, Gonçalo Marques, David Pereira, Devin Sherry

Overview of this book

Game development can be both a creatively fulfilling hobby and a full-time career path. It's also an exciting way to improve your C++ skills and apply them in engaging and challenging projects. Game Development Projects with Unreal Engine starts with the basic skills you'll need to get started as a game developer. The fundamentals of game design will be explained clearly and demonstrated practically with realistic exercises. You’ll then apply what you’ve learned with challenging activities. The book starts with an introduction to the Unreal Editor and key concepts such as actors, blueprints, animations, inheritance, and player input. You'll then move on to the first of three projects: building a dodgeball game. In this project, you'll explore line traces, collisions, projectiles, user interface, and sound effects, combining these concepts to showcase your new skills. You'll then move on to the second project; a side-scroller game, where you'll implement concepts including animation blending, enemy AI, spawning objects, and collectibles. The final project is an FPS game, where you will cover the key concepts behind creating a multiplayer environment. By the end of this Unreal Engine 4 game development book, you'll have the confidence and knowledge to get started on your own creative UE4 projects and bring your ideas to life.

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Table of Contents (19 chapters)
Preface
About the Book
1
1. Unreal Engine Introduction
1. Unreal Engine Introduction
Introduction
Getting to Know Unreal
Editor Windows
Viewport Navigation
Manipulating Actors
Blueprint Actors
The Blueprint Editor
Event Graph
The Float Multiplication Node
BeginPlay and Tick
ThirdPersonCharacter Blueprint Class
Meshes and Materials
Manipulating Materials in UE4
Summary
Free Chapter
2
2. Working with Unreal Engine
2. Working with Unreal Engine
Introduction
Creating and Setting Up a Blank C++ Project
Content Folder Structure in Unreal Engine
Working with the Visual Studio Solution
Importing the Required Assets
The Unreal Game Mode Class
Levels
Animations
Summary
3
3. Character Class Components and Blueprint Setup
3. Character Class Components and Blueprint Setup
Introduction
The Unreal Character Class
Extending the C++ Class with Blueprints
Summary
4
4. Player Input
4. Player Input
Introduction
Input Actions and Axes
Processing Player Input
DefaultInput.ini
Turning the camera around the character
Summary
5
5. Line Traces
5. Line Traces
Introduction
Collision
Project Setup
Line Traces
Creating the EnemyCharacter C++ class
Visualizing the Line Trace
Creating the EnemyCharacter Blueprint Class
Sweep Traces
Summary
6
6. Collision Objects
6. Collision Objects
Introduction
Object Collision in UE4
Collision Components
Collision Events
Collision Channels
Collision Properties
Physical Materials
Timers
Spawning Actors
Walls
Victory Box
Summary
7
7. UE4 Utilities
7. UE4 Utilities
Introduction
Blueprint Function Libraries
Actor Components
Interfaces
Blueprint Native Events
Summary
8
8. User Interfaces
8. User Interfaces
Introduction
Game UI
UMG Basics
Anchors
Progress Bars
Summary
9
9. Audio-Visual Elements
9. Audio-Visual Elements
Introduction
Audio in UE4
Sound Attenuation
Particle Systems
Level Design
Extra Features
Summary
10
10. Creating a SuperSideScroller Game
10. Creating a SuperSideScroller Game
Introduction
Project Breakdown
The Player Character
Features of Our Side-Scroller Game
Steps in Animation
Character Animation Pipeline
Animations in Unreal Engine 4
Summary
11
11. Blend Spaces 1D, Key Bindings, and State Machines
11. Blend Spaces 1D, Key Bindings, and State Machines
Introduction
Blend Spaces
Main Character Animation Blueprint
Velocity Vectors
Input Bindings
Animation State Machines
Summary
12
12. Animation Blending and Montages
12. Animation Blending and Montages
Introduction
Animation Blending, Anim Slots, and Animation Montages
Animation Montages
Anim Slot Manager
Save Cached Pose
Layered blend per bone
The Throw Animation
The Super Side Scroller Game Enemy
Materials and Material Instances
Summary
13
13. Enemy Artificial Intelligence
13. Enemy Artificial Intelligence
Introduction
Enemy AI
AI Controller
Navigation Mesh
Recasting the Nav Mesh
Behavior Trees and Blackboards
Vector Transformation
Player Projectile
Summary
14
14. Spawning the Player Projectile
14. Spawning the Player Projectile
Introduction
Anim Notifies and Anim Notify States
Playing Animation Montages
Game World and Spawning Objects
Destroying Actors
Visual and Audio Effects
Summary
15
15. Collectibles, Power-Ups, and Pickups
15. Collectibles, Power-Ups, and Pickups
Introduction
URotatingMovementComponent
Logging Variables Using UE_LOG
UMG
Text Widget
Adding and Creating UMG User Widgets
Timers
Summary
16
16. Multiplayer Basics
16. Multiplayer Basics
Introduction
Multiplayer Basics
Servers
Clients
The Packaged Version
Connections and Ownership
Roles
Variable Replication
2D Blend Spaces
Transform (Modify) Bone
Summary
17
17. Remote Procedure Calls
17. Remote Procedure Calls
Introduction
Remote Procedure Calls
Enumerations
Bi-Directional Circular Array Indexing
Summary
18
18. Gameplay Framework Classes in Multiplayer
18. Gameplay Framework Classes in Multiplayer
Introduction
Gameplay Framework Classes in Multiplayer
Game Mode, Player State, and Game State
Summary

Behavior Trees and Blackboards

Behavior trees and Blackboards work together to allow our AI to follow different logical paths and make decisions based on a variety of conditions and variables.

A behavior tree (BT) is a visual scripting tool that allows you to tell a pawn what to do based on certain factors and parameters. For example, a BT can tell an AI to move to a certain location based on whether the AI can see the player.

To give an example of how BTs and Blackboards are used in games, let's look at the game Gears of War 5, which was developed with Unreal Engine 4. The AI in Gears of War 5, and throughout the Gears of War series, always try to flank the player, or force the player out of cover. In order to do this, a key component of the AI logic is to know who the player is, and where the player is. A reference variable to the player, and a location vector to store the location of the player, exist in the Blackboard. The logic that determines how these variables are...

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