Gameplay Programmer
Rails Shooter
Technology
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UE4
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C++
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Blueprint
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Genre Single player, Rails Shooter
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Platform PC
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Development Time 2 Months
Table of Contents
Game Summary
Summarized Bullet Points:
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Game is a Starfox-Like (Rails Shooter)
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Goal of project was to use as much C++ code as possible, in order to learn how to use UE4's C++ side.
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This game is a simple rails shooter that operates similarly to how Starfox does. The goal of the project was to explore some of the foundations of C++ in UE4, and see some of the best practices for making the game use as much C++ code as possible.
Blueprints, C++, and Hybridization
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UE4 C++ was not as kind as blueprint in regards to spawning a camera, seemed as though it did not start with the correct view settings.
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Thus the camera, and the places where spawn the explosion particle effects are the only places that are hybrids of C++ and Blueprint
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At points had experimented with making the ship run on C++ code, but swapped it to full blueprint somewhere in the mists of getting the camera to work.
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However it is possible to get player pawns to move completely from C++ code, most of the blueprint code can be converted to C++ code.
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The only bits that can not be converted are the areas that involve spawning anything.
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Blueprint and C++ Hybrids: Blueprint side
Part 1 of 4 BP_EnemyShip. This class inherits from the C++ "EnemyShip" class. The reason that Blueprint has to be used for the following chunks is in order to handle spawning bullets of different patterns.
Part 2 of 4 BP_EnemyShip. This class inherits from the C++ "EnemyShip" class. The reason that Blueprint has to be used for the following chunks is in order to handle spawning bullets of different patterns.
The second part to the Basic Bullet blueprint, it inherits form the C++ Bullet class. Part 2 of 2.
Part 1 of 4 BP_EnemyShip. This class inherits from the C++ "EnemyShip" class. The reason that Blueprint has to be used for the following chunks is in order to handle spawning bullets of different patterns.
Blueprint and C++ Hybrids: EnemyShip Header file
Collision via C++ in UE4
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.Pretty simple to set up:
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First need to have a member variable that is your collision (for the mines/bullets, they use a USphereComponent)
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They will also need a declaration of the functions "OnOverlapBegin" and "OnOverlapEnd", which are preceded by "UFUNCTION()"
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Then in the constructor for the class, need to instantiate the collision component, set the variables to what want, and also assign the OnOverlapBegin and OnOverlapEnd functions to it.
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After all that, do whatever calclulations or otherwise that want within the OnOverlapBegin and End methods.
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C++ Mine Header File
C++ Mine CPP File, important methods only.
Declaring Blueprint Usable Functions and Variables in C++
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Also pretty straight forward to set up
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For Variables:
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Just before the regular declaration of the Property type and name, type:
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"UPROPERTY(BlueprintReadWrite, EditAnywhere)"
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BlueprintReadWrite makes it to where it can be read from or written to via blueprint.
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EditAnywhere makes it to where the variable can be edited in property windows, archetypes and instances.
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other properties that could be used:
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"BlueprintReadOnly" - marks the variable as only able to be read when in blueprint.
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"BlueprintWriteOnly" - marks the variable as only able to be written to when in blueprint.
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"SaveGame" - used to mark a variable as something that could be saved in checkpoints or Savegames
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For Functions/Methods:
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just before the return type of the function, type:
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"UFUNCTION(BlueprintNativeEvent)" to make it an event
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"UFUNCTION(BlueprintPure)" to make it a pure method/function
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To note, the part you declare for Blueprints as a BlueprintNativeEvent CAN NOT have a declaration in C++ code.
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Instead write another method that is not view able in blueprint and do your local calculations there.
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C++ Mine header File, except only a couple valid examples.