Book excerpt: Over 40 recipes to accelerate the process of learning game design and solving development problems using Unreal Engine About This Book Explore the quickest way to tackle common challenges faced in Unreal Engine Create your own content, levels, light scenes, and materials, and work with Blueprints and C++ scripting An intermediate, fast-paced Unreal Engine guide with targeted recipes to design games within its framework Who This Book Is For This book is for those who are relatively experienced with Unreal Engine 4 and have knowledge of its fundamentals. Working knowledge of C++ is required. What You Will Learn Discover editor functionalities for an in-depth insight into game design Develop environments using terrain for outdoor areas and a workflow for interiors as well using brushes Design various kinds of materials with unique features, such as mirrors and glows Explore the various ways that lighting can be used in the engine Build various level effects using Blueprints, Unreal's visual scripting system Set up a development environment and develop custom functionality with C++ for your games Create healthbars and main menus with animations using Slate, Unreal's UI solution, through the UMG Editor Package and create an installer to get your project out into the world In Detail Unreal Engine is powerful tool with rich functionalities to create games. It equips you with the skills to easily build mobile and desktop games from scratch without worrying about which platform they will run on. You can focus on the individual complexities of game development such as animation and rendering. This book takes you on a journey to jumpstart your game design efforts. You will learn various aspects of the Unreal engine commonly encountered with practical examples of how it can be used, with numerous references for further study. You will start by getting acquainted with Unreal Engine 4 and building out levels for your game. This will be followed by recipes to help you create environments, place meshes, and implement your characters. You will then learn to work with lights, camera, and shadows to include special effects in your game. Moving on, you'll learn Blueprint scripting and C++ programming to enable you to achieve trigger effects and add simple functionalities. By the end of the book, you will see how to create a healthbar and main menu, and then get your game ready to be deployed and published. Style and approach This book offers detailed, easy-to-follow recipes that will help you master a wide range of Unreal Engine 4's features. Every recipe provides step-by-step instructions, with explanations of how these features work, and alternative approaches and research materials so you can learn even more.