Unreal Engine 4 Overview

Ron Bresett
Jan 20, 2016
3 min read

As an aspiring game designer I have strived to perfect and round out my skills. Currently I am using Unity 5 as it is required for my studies. To ensure that I am a viable candidate for any studio I have turned my attention to Unity’s competition. Unreal Engine 4 was created by Epic Games and has recently been released as a free product to download and use. It has some significant differences from Unity as well as some shortcomings (Unreal Engine 4, About Overview, 2015).

The Unreal Engine’s key features allow for a beautifully and quickly created game. It uses advance DirectX 11 and 12 for the rendering. The Cascade Visual FX creates stunning particle details. The Blueprint Visual Scripting allows for quick prototyping and building of games without the need to touch a single line of code. The Persona Animation and Matinee Cinematics give the user extreme control over the games animations and cut scenes (Unreal Engine Features, 2015).

The user also has full access to the Source Code with the base version and allows the user to customize and extend the editors tools and subsystems. The C++ Code View makes it easy for users to browse C++ functions directly on game objects and jump straight to the source code lines. The Hot Reload Function allows the user to view their changes immediately without needing to stop gameplay. The engines Artificial Intelligence gives your AI characters increased spatial awareness and enables them to make smarter movements (Unreal Engine Features, 2015).

The Simulate and Immersive Views allow the user to run the game logic and inspect AI as it performs without loading the game. This combined with the Instant Game Preview that allows you to spawn a player and play anywhere in the game without having to wait for the files to save make for fast testing of your features. Another great testing feature is the Possess and Eject Feature that allows you play the game and “eject” from the player’s perspective and take control of the camera to inspect anything you wish (Unreal Engine Features, 2015).

All of these features combine to make stunningly crafted games. While Unity and Unreal do share many features, it is still up for grabs as to which is the better tool. Unity has been around longer and has a stronger community base and a much fuller and cheaper asset store. However, from my personal experience Unreal creates better graphics. It is also easier to work with if you do not know anything about code. This also makes it faster to prototype and test with.

Currently, Unity still holds as the worlds most preferred game creation Engine dominating at 47% of developers using it. Unreal falls at the bottom of the list with only 13% of the worldwide developers using the engine (The Leading Global Game Industry Software, 2016).

As for my preference, it is still too soon to tell. I will continue to work with both engines until my skills are perfected. Once I begin to ship my own products, I will determine which engine suites my needs the best. Until then, I will strive to be the best and most rounded developer that I can.