Through this unit I have been tasked with creating my
own Assault course, or gauntlet if you will, in Unreal Engine 4 using
procedural programming methods provided through the blueprints within.
To be successful in
this task I must first gain an understanding of the principles of procedural
programming.
Procedural programming is a programming paradigm, a term
used simply to describe the way in which a program or application is written. At
its core, procedural programming has the aim of keeping the code as concisely
written as possible, to aid this even further some coders physically write the
intended code out using a more logical path of thought, giving themselves a
plan to follow, this can help not only coders who have dealt with procedural
programming for a long time, but especially people new to the system.
The programming paradigm is built around the structuring of
a sequence of linear commands and as I will be using Unreal Engine 4’s
blueprinting system through this project, I can take advantage of the
implementation of the code into a very user friendly interface to make coding
easier. Coupled with this I will be using and comparing my blueprints with
Pseudo code, which entails the aforementioned writing out of the coding or
blueprints, allowing me to become acquainted with programming through
potentially plain English.
As I have already started coding in some capacity before
beginning this blog, I feel understanding pseudo code will be somewhat simple
for me to understand, in the sense that writing out any exact event with
happenings consequential of that even to be triggered one after the other will
make more sense than diving into coding and not entirely understanding what
certain nodes, events or functions actually do.
Having used Unreal Development Kit prior to using Unreal 4 I have had some
minimal experience in the animation of meshes via coding strings, and so some
event instances and function strings thereafter I have encountered before.
In the implementation of pseudo code, I will be creating a
numbered list of nodes which I will be using to simply generate an outcome,
though the list may vary from event to event, for example;
To assign a mesh to swing on a pivot upon a trigger box
being entered;
- On Actor Begin Overlap
- Play
- Target – MatineeActor
- Set Looping
- Delay
- Revert to play
To remotely trigger a simulation of physics in-engine;
- On Actor Begin Overlap
- Delay
- Set Simulate Physics
- Target – Mesh
Ultimately, pseudo code and procedural programming within
blueprints feels like a much neater method to coding than anything I may have
imagined before, having envisaged a coder sat in front of a screen of nothing
but text. This will inevitably help me in making less mistakes as I go and allowing me to keep the coding as uniform as is necessary throughout, knowing where everything is placed through the coding and the user interface linking as one.
Whilst I am sure there are still 'screens of text' occurrences frequently in the games design industry, I feel more confident in my own abilities knowing that I have tackled some very basic features similar to this in the past, and knowing I’ll come out of this project having a lot more knowledge of coding.
I am sure there are flaws within my listings and this is one
thing I am to learn to implement correctly through this unit, with this in
place I hope to be able to effectively procedurally program a level myself,
something which will benefit me greatly going forward if I were to independently
create a game, or begin work within a small team in which extra coding work was
necessary.
This blog will be updated with each session to keep tabs on
my progress for my own future knowledge, and to serve as a point of reference
as to how far I have progressed.
