Blueprints Visual Scripting for Unreal Engine

Blueprints Visual Scripting for Unreal Engine

by Brenden Sewell
Released July 2015
Publisher(s): Packt Publishing
ISBN: 9781785286018

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Book description

Build professional 3D games with Unreal Engine 4's Visual Scripting system

In Detail

Blueprints Visual Scripting for Unreal Engine is a step-by-step approach to building a fully functional game, one system at a time. Starting with a basic First Person Shooter template, each chapter will extend the prototype to create an increasingly complex and robust game experience. You will progress from creating basic shooting mechanics to gradually more complex systems that will generate user interface elements and intelligent enemy behavior. Focusing on universally applicable skills, the expertise you will develop in utilizing Blueprints can translate to other types of genres.

By the time you finish the book, you will have a fully functional First Person Shooter game and the skills necessary to expand on the game to develop an entertaining, memorable experience for your players.

From making customizations to player movement to creating new AI and game mechanics from scratch, you will discover everything you need to know to get started with game development using Blueprints and Unreal Engine 4.

What You Will Learn

  • Prototype and iterate new game mechanics rapidly

  • Customize the player's abilities and controls

  • Build user interface elements, including health bars and objective counters

  • Set up interactions between player actions and game objects in the world

  • Create complex enemy AI that can sense the world around it and attack the player

  • Design menus that will allow your players to load, pause, and quit the game

  • Deploy your game to multiple platforms and share it with the world

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    Table of contents

    1. Blueprints Visual Scripting for Unreal Engine
      1. Table of Contents
      2. Blueprints Visual Scripting for Unreal Engine
      3. Credits
      4. About the Author
      5. About the Reviewers
      6. www.PacktPub.com
        1. Support files, eBooks, discount offers, and more
          1. Why subscribe?
          2. Free access for Packt account holders
      7. Preface
        1. What this book covers
        2. What you need for this book
        3. Who this book is for
        4. Conventions
        5. Reader feedback
        6. Customer support
          1. Downloading the example code
          2. Downloading the color images of this book
          3. Errata
          4. Piracy
          5. Questions
      8. 1. Object Interaction with Blueprints
        1. Creating a project and the first level
          1. Setting a template for a new project
          2. Making sense of the project settings
          3. Creating the project
        2. Adding objects to our level
        3. Exploring materials
          1. Creating materials
          2. Material properties and Blueprint nodes
          3. Adding substance to our material
        4. Creating our first Blueprint
          1. Exploring the Event Graph panel
          2. Detecting a hit
          3. Swapping a material
          4. Improving the Blueprint
        5. Adding movement
          1. Changing actor mobility and collision
          2. Breaking down our goal
          3. Storing data with variables
          4. Readying direction for calculations
          5. Getting relative speed using delta time
          6. Translating the existing location
          7. Updating location
        6. Changing direction
          1. Testing moving targets
        7. Summary
      9. 2. Enhancing Player Abilities
        1. Adding the running functionality by extending a Blueprint
          1. Breaking down the Blueprint character movement
          2. Customizing control inputs
          3. Adding a sprint ability
        2. Animating a zoom view
          1. Using a timeline to smooth transitions
          2. Increasing the projectile's speed
        3. Adding sound and particle effects
          1. Giving our targets state with branches
          2. Triggering sound effects, explosions, and destruction
        4. Summary
      10. 3. Creating Screen UI Elements
        1. Creating simple UI meters with UMG
          1. Drawing shapes with widget Blueprints
          2. Customizing the meter's appearance
          3. Creating ammo and enemy counters
          4. Displaying the HUD
        2. Connecting UI values to player variables
          1. Creating bindings for health and stamina
          2. Making text bindings
        3. Tracking the ammo and eliminated targets
          1. Reducing the ammo counter
          2. Increasing the targets eliminated counter
        4. Summary
      11. 4. Creating Constraints and Gameplay Objectives
        1. Constraining player actions
          1. Draining stamina while sprinting
          2. Using looping timers to repeat actions
          3. Blocking actions with branches
          4. Regenerating stamina
          5. Preventing firing actions when out of ammo
        2. Creating collectable objects
          1. Setting up collection logic
        3. Setting a gameplay win condition
          1. Displaying a target goal in the HUD
          2. Creating a win menu screen
          3. Displaying the menu
          4. Triggering a win
        4. Summary
      12. 5. Making Moving Enemies with AI
        1. Setting up the enemy actor to navigate
          1. Importing from the marketplace
          2. Expanding the play area
          3. Making the level traversable with a NavMesh
          4. Setting the stage for intelligence with AI assets
        2. Creating navigation behavior
          1. Setting up patrol points
          2. Enabling communication between assets
          3. Teaching our AI to walk with the Behavior Tree
        3. Making the AI chase the player
          1. Giving the enemy sight with Pawn Sensing
          2. Adding conditions to the Behavior Tree
          3. Creating chasing behavior
        4. Summary
      13. 6. Upgrading the AI Enemies
        1. Creating an enemy attack
          1. Making an attack task
          2. Updating the health meter
        2. Making enemies hear and investigate sounds
          1. Adding hearing to the Behavior Tree
          2. Setting up the investigating tasks
          3. Interpreting and storing the noise event data
          4. Adding noise to the player's actions
        3. Making the enemies destructible
          1. Saving time by reusing existing Blueprint content
        4. Spawning more enemies during gameplay
          1. Choosing a spawn point where enemies will appear
          2. Managing spawn rates and limits with variables
          3. Spawning new enemies in the Level Blueprint
        5. Creating enemy wandering behavior
          1. Identifying a wander point with a custom task
          2. Adding wandering to the Behavior Tree
        6. Summary
      14. 7. Tracking Game States and Applying Finishing Touches
        1. Making danger real with player death
        2. Setting up a lose screen
        3. Creating round-based scaling with saved games
          1. Storing game information using a SaveGame object
          2. Storing and loading the saved data when starting the game
          3. Increasing the enemy target goal
          4. Create a transition screen to be shown between rounds
          5. Transitioning to a new round when the current round is won
        4. Pausing the game and resetting the save file
          1. Creating a pause menu
          2. Resuming and resetting the save file
          3. Triggering the pause menu
        5. Summary
      15. 8. Building and Publishing
        1. Optimizing your graphics settings
        2. Setting up our game to be played by others
          1. Packaging the game into a build
        3. Steps for further learning
          1. Finish and share as many games as you can
          2. Stretch out of your comfort zone
          3. Resources for additional learning and support
        4. Summary
      16. Index

    Product information

    • Title: Blueprints Visual Scripting for Unreal Engine
    • Author(s): Brenden Sewell
    • Release date: July 2015
    • Publisher(s): Packt Publishing
    • ISBN: 9781785286018