Unreal Engine Introduction.  

The VR Design Labs unit we have this term is focused, along with us building our own virtual experiences, on exploring a wide range of VR tools, projects and possibilities the technology can be utilized.    

We normally work on Unity 3d game engine, but at the beginning of this semester we had two introductory lectures/workshops to the Unreal Engine game engine developed by Epic Games, so we could learn a bit about another industry standard option available on the market.   

During the first session we were told how to set up a project to build a game with a first-person perspective. The next task was to create an asset folder and import buildings and props needed for this particular project (they were placed in separate subfolders to keep the project clear and organized).   

Building the actual game environment was the next step. We started with having a plane where we placed cubes at various heights as if they were buildings along the street; we built both sides of the road.   

At the next stage we replaced cubes with the assets from our folder and assigned materials to the buildings. We also added other elements of the infrastructure such as street lamps, bins, electricity wires and posts etc.  

After we had our scene built, we played with the light and other effects, such as fog. We spent the rest of the session playing around with our own scenes and testing out available options.  

The session following week was based on the scene we had built previously. This time we concentrated on adding people/characters and animations.  

We introduced people to the scene (ready assets from Mixamo – animated 3d models). We were taught how to place people/groups of people in the game scene to create a natural street crowd.  

After that we worked on animations. We animated the camera in a few separate ways, so created several animations that were then brought together in one final animation.   

Getting to know Unreal was exciting as even though in principle it is the same tool to develop a game as Unity 3d, its interface is quite distinct and therefore, working in there felt different. I would definitely like to spend some time on learning and understanding Unreal Engine more, most likely over the summer holidays as my own upskilling goal.