The Unreal Engine and the gaming industry

[eezstreet]

Maybe we could make our own game dev team. o.o

[CrimsonStrife]

errr...that might have iffy results.... lol

[eezstreet]

Indeed. Either way, I'm hoping to get a certification from MS on web stuff soon, that way I can spend my volunteer hours making web pages for the local funny farm. Florida has something called a Bright Futures scholarship, and if you have a 28 or better on the ACT (I got a 28) and spend 100 volunteer hours, you get a huge tuition cut (almost 100%)

[CrimsonStrife]

Sounds like a plan.

[The One and Only]

I thought the point of UDK was to cut down on technical difficulty involved in creating a game. If you have to take two courses to use it effectively then they've obviously failed.

[CrimsonStrife]

The courses are not a requirement...you could learn to do everything on you own. The classes I took were actually for UE3 which is the exact same interface as UDK, and I wasn't taking them to learn to use it, but because that is the engine my school uses for the degree, the point I was making was that I am more comfortable with it, because I have spent so much time with it.

It does dramatically cut down on difficulty because it comes with essentially all the technical tools you would need built in, but it also relies entirely on what you as an individual are either already capable of when you pick it up or what you are willing to research. Not to mention it is still a beta product, so they have not yet released much in the way of documentation.

 

Quoted from the UDK FAQ

Q: How much knowledge is required for someone to make a project with UDK?

A: Users who are new to Unreal Engine 3 should visit Getting Started with UDK on the Unreal Developer Network (UDN). There are also new “Mastering Unreal Technology” books, authored by 3D Buzz and published by Sams:

• Mastering Unreal Technology, Volume I: Introduction to Level Design with Unreal Engine 3
  
• Mastering Unreal Technology, Volume II: Advanced Level Design Concepts with Unreal Engine 3
  

[minilogoguy18]

Indeed. Either way, I'm hoping to get a certification from MS on web stuff soon, that way I can spend my volunteer hours making web pages for the local funny farm. Florida has something called a Bright Futures scholarship, and if you have a 28 or better on the ACT (I got a 28) and spend 100 volunteer hours, you get a huge tuition cut (almost 100%)

 

My GF had that scholarship, payed for everything, about to graduate to become an RN.

 

I'd like to try to get into the industry but couldn't go back to school for a degree relating to it, see too many people come out of school with skills that seem not so great, seems like the former game modders make the better game artists just from having tons of more hands on experience.

[CrimsonStrife]

I'd like to try to get into the industry but couldn't go back to school for a degree relating to it, see too many people come out of school with skills that seem not so great, seems like the former game modders make the better game artists just from having tons of more hands on experience.

 

Actually very true...I was self-teaching myself to model and animate for a good 2 years prior to even taking classes so I have about 5 years of experience in all, decided to hit the program for it, for both extra practice, and to learn some programming. The big problem is, while these classes are engineered to teach new people, a lot of the people I see come in, have 0 experience prior, and hell a lot of them seem to have little computer experience in general <.< which for this field, is just sad. But I also am not strictly relying on this degree for getting a job either, after I finish I will be doing Web Design at a 4-year school and be taking a brief animation course there, that will earn me an additional certificate.

 

My recent trip to Durham, NC last month gave me a chance to meet with good portion of the development team from Insomniac, specifically the ones making Ratchet and Clank : Full Frontal Assault. Among some of the things I learned from speaking with them (getting to see their animation and even overall design pipelines, as well as some of their character rigs) was that, in all reality, while YES a degree in things like animation will help designers, that they personally would be far happier just seeing someone with another degree, but who has a fantastic portfolio of things they made from self-teaching.

 

But the thing is, game design is really like any other field out there (cept for like, medicine), where you do not absolutely need THAT degree to get in the field, if you can show that you know what you are doing. However at the same time, unless they just happen to stumble upon you online, they are not going to even consider someone who doesn't have at least SOME kind of college degree.

[minilogoguy18]

Well I'd say I have around 6 or so years with Softimage alone and more like 10 overall with 3d modeling since I started out with programs like Milkshape 3d and 3ds Max before moving to Softimage. I don't know if I could land a job since I don't even find myself having the time lately to even pick at some models that I have that are half finished let alone put together some sort of portfolio.

 

My cousin on my moms side has been doing it for over years, I think I need to just get a hold of her, been a long time but she may be able to fill me in on whats needed since shes at the point where shes doing the hiring.

[eezstreet]

MS unfortunately doesn't offer C++ certification anymore, only C# (what has the world come to, srsly). That's a moot point anyway, since you need to be in a classroom setting in order to become certified.

[spior]

MS unfortunately doesn't offer C++ certification anymore, only C# (what has the world come to, srsly). That's a moot point anyway, since you need to be in a classroom setting in order to become certified.

Are you fucking kidding me? Next thing you know they're not giving out ones for C.

That'd be hilarious, right...RIGHT?

[Astral Serpent]

UE is terrible, you can't strafejump.

[eezstreet]

Are you fucking kidding me? Next thing you know they're not giving out ones for C.

That'd be hilarious, right...RIGHT?

Can't even use C for Metro apps, so not really surprising.

[CrimsonStrife]

UE is terrible, you can't strafejump.

Only because it isn't programmed in <.< could be added into any game through UDK.

 

-Edit-

Just checked and at least as of Unreal Editor 3, strafejump is there.

[Astral Serpent]

Only because it isn't programmed in <.< could be added into any game through UDK.

 

-Edit-

Just checked and at least as of Unreal Editor 3, strafejump is there.

What, they blatantly coded a bug into UE3?

[CrimsonStrife]

If you are referring to the ability to strafe and jump simultaneously then yes.

[Astral Serpent]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Strafe-jumping

[CrimsonStrife]

Yeah that is plenty possible...in fact the controls in Unreal Tournament are almost identical to Quake.

 

And it's nothing new, they've had that in UT since the early ones. But now the Unreal Engine does not have that by default, because it doesn't just come with a game...the Unreal Editor, which ships with any copy of UT, does.

[CrimsonStrife]

Soo I have this, thought one of you guys might find it interesting...it is basically a graphic of an overall Game Design Pipeline.

 

[CrimsonStrife]

First of what I think will be several videos in a series in which I teach @@Caelum to use the Unity game engine.

 

[DT.]

Referring to the first post, UDK's tools are actually much easier than any other engine's I've used. It's so easy to get models, animation and get textures into. Plus, the compiling of the script is so easy anyone can do it.

[Milamber]

Tree editor in Unity was a bish I had so much trouble adding my own leaf mesh to it, kept going off axis, I always fixed it but it was kind of random refreshing and retries that did it, no solid process.

 

Was working on this with Scoop:

 

 

 

 

Scoop only ever got around to making the character control script though For the actual game that is, he made some advanced stuff on the side which was gonna get put into it at a later time. And yeah we never completed it, currently that game is on hold, or canceled, depends if we wanna pick it up again later or not.

 

So with that being said, Got some experience with both Unity and Unreal editor (Unreal Tournament 3 editor actually) And imo, choosing between the two, Unreal is the better one to work with, but unity is quite nice as well (definitely beats working with Ogre3D)

[Raz0r]

If you do pick it up again, I'll probably lurk the shit out of it.

[CrimsonStrife]

Tree editor in Unity was a bish I had so much trouble adding my own leaf mesh to it, kept going off axis, I always fixed it but it was kind of random refreshing and retries that did it, no solid process.

 

Was working on this with Scoop:

 

 

 

 

Scoop only ever got around to making the character control script though For the actual game that is, he made some advanced stuff on the side which was gonna get put into it at a later time. And yeah we never completed it, currently that game is on hold, or canceled, depends if we wanna pick it up again later or not.

 

So with that being said, Got some experience with both Unity and Unreal editor (Unreal Tournament 3 editor actually) And imo, choosing between the two, Unreal is the better one to work with, but unity is quite nice as well (definitely beats working with Ogre3D)

 

If you can use UE then the UDK would be a wet dream for you.

Unity is nice for some projects, my main issue with it, is it is just soo expensive to license. If I want to sell a product, why would I pay roughly $1000 when I can pay $100 for an engine that can do more, is more powerful, and is more user-friendly.

[Milamber]

Well because Unity is a 1 time payment and Unreal takes royalties? That'd be the main reason for most people to pick Unity over Unreal I think. But yeah Unreal is the better engine of the two, no doubt.