Unreal Engine 4 (UE4) is a complete suite of game development tools made for game developers by game developers. A truly powerful tool for game development, there's never been a better time to use it for both commercial as well as independent projects.
Unreal Engine Game Development Cookbook explores the creation of real-time interactive simulations or games. Key aspects of UE4 will be explored to make UE4 more accessible to readers and gear them with the knowledge so that they can focus on creation, knowing where they need to go if they run into issues.
Chapter 1, Getting Acquainted with the UE4 Interface, starts you off with learning Unreal Engine 4's interface and explores the most commonly used aspects in development.
Chapter 2, Level Design – Building Out Levels or Greyboxing, puts readers in the shoes of a level designer, building rooms and using materials to make them look nicer.
Chapter 3, Creating Quality Interior Environments, shows how you can polish your levels using meshes and particle systems and teaches you how to mesh a map properly and work with groups.
Chapter 4, Building the Great Outdoors – Exterior Environments, teaches readers about how to work with terrain, add trees and rocks, build rivers, and stream multiple levels in the game at once.
Chapter 5, Lights, Camera, Action – Cinematics, shows readers how to create an opening cutscene, play matinees, and deal with player movements in videos.
Chapter 6, Lighting and Shadows, introduces different types of lights in Unreal Engine 4 and teaches you how to make them mobile like a flashlight the player can carry. It also explains how to create dynamic lighting with a day/night cycle.
Chapter 7, Art Pipeline – Working with Materials, explores Unreal's art pipeline, teaching you how to create a number of materials from a simple image and glowing mirrors, and makes you see through walls.
Chapter 8, Blueprint Scripting – Level Effects, shows you various ways to use blueprints, the visual scripting language of Unreal Engine 4. It teaches you how to build a number of things from flickering lights to doors and flashlights.
Chapter 9, C++ Programming – Gameplay, introduces C++ programming in Unreal Engine 4. It lets you create your own development environment and a basic gametype. It also explains you how to work with networking, save and load games with keyboard commands, and create custom blueprint nodes.
Chapter 10, User Interface, brings you some insight on Slate and the UMG Editor to create a number of UI elements, including health bars and an animated main menu to tie your whole game together.
Chapter 11, Publishing and Deployment, teaches you how to package your project and create an installer for it to get it out into the world for others to play.