Game Development Student trying to learn more about BP/programming
polycounter lvl 6
I tried to make the title rather obvious, but here's the dilemma:
I am in the Game Development program of a pretty good Art School in the US (Top 10 in Undergrad/Grad for Video Games). The problem, however, is that the program is MORE Art oriented (Ha, who would have thought that going to an Art School, huh?!
)
I've gone through quite a bit of my Core Classes already, I am in my second quarter as a Junior.
I finished up a Game Tech class in May, which covered the basics of UE4 Blueprints. On my own time, I have subbed to Digital Tutors and have done their UE4 classes (which are great, but still not enough). I've scoured through the Unreal forums, Youtube videos, and some text about Blueprints.
I guess I should have started with, (I had no programming experience, until last Fall, and it was Processing 2.0), and while I am familiar with the basics of programming. I really want to learn the meat and potatoes and extend my knowledge greatly (and if it's easier to do so through Blueprints, then so be it), but no matter what, when I try to start something brand new, without a tutorial, I seem to be at a loss at how to proceed writing gameplay mechanics.
I know it's not something that can be learned overnight, but pretty much, I would like to know if there are any helpful advice/tutorials that I may have missed, so that Blueprints is easier on me.
OR, should I just take the rest of the summer and concentrate on learning C# (which seems to be the programming language of choice for indies) as much as I can?
Basically, I would love to create my own game in the very near future, and while I would love to development something in Unreal, even an all blueprint game, I don't mind doing something in Unity (which I haven't touched yet)
So bottom line:
What I have:
Basics of programming (Processing 2.0)
Basics, maybe close to Intermediate level of understanding of Blueprints in UE4
What I need:
To be able to produce a game by myself, being able to write all the underlying gameplay mechanics that I need.
Thank you very much everyone for your time.
Victor
I am in the Game Development program of a pretty good Art School in the US (Top 10 in Undergrad/Grad for Video Games). The problem, however, is that the program is MORE Art oriented (Ha, who would have thought that going to an Art School, huh?!
)I've gone through quite a bit of my Core Classes already, I am in my second quarter as a Junior.
I finished up a Game Tech class in May, which covered the basics of UE4 Blueprints. On my own time, I have subbed to Digital Tutors and have done their UE4 classes (which are great, but still not enough). I've scoured through the Unreal forums, Youtube videos, and some text about Blueprints.
I guess I should have started with, (I had no programming experience, until last Fall, and it was Processing 2.0), and while I am familiar with the basics of programming. I really want to learn the meat and potatoes and extend my knowledge greatly (and if it's easier to do so through Blueprints, then so be it), but no matter what, when I try to start something brand new, without a tutorial, I seem to be at a loss at how to proceed writing gameplay mechanics.
I know it's not something that can be learned overnight, but pretty much, I would like to know if there are any helpful advice/tutorials that I may have missed, so that Blueprints is easier on me.
OR, should I just take the rest of the summer and concentrate on learning C# (which seems to be the programming language of choice for indies) as much as I can?
Basically, I would love to create my own game in the very near future, and while I would love to development something in Unreal, even an all blueprint game, I don't mind doing something in Unity (which I haven't touched yet)
So bottom line:
What I have:
Basics of programming (Processing 2.0)
Basics, maybe close to Intermediate level of understanding of Blueprints in UE4
What I need:
To be able to produce a game by myself, being able to write all the underlying gameplay mechanics that I need.
Thank you very much everyone for your time.
Victor
Replies
1) Understand what Gameplay Framework blueprint classes are available, what they do, and what they are supposed to do if you expand their functionality. Everything from Game Mode, Level Blueprint, Pawn, Actor, Controllers, etc.
https://docs.unrealengine.com/latest/INT/Gameplay/index.html
2) Understand different types of Blueprint communication with their pros and cons. First, you need to understand the basic direct communication between blueprints, and events. Once you know those, you can dive deeper with interfaces, event dispatchers etc.
https://docs.unrealengine.com/latest/INT/Engine/Blueprints/index.html
Practice, practice, practice. Best way to learn blueprints is to get your head around the basics and start practicing. Think of gameplay elements you like and start prototyping them. You will be overwhelmed at first, but put the time in and you can do anything. UE4 is super fun too.
Also, check out https://www.youtube.com/user/UnrealDevelopmentKit
Its the official unreal engine youtube channel. They have a number of video series walking through doing things in blueprint including creating basic games.