Hi guys so i used to use a basic programming language called gml and only stopped when i heard about unreal engine and its blueprints system .I have recently watched a video from a guy on youtube that claimed that making complex games with blueprints is not possible .And that c++ is the only way forward .Now im not at the level that i would notice any limitations in the blueprint system but … I do not want to spend months and years learning blueprints if im going to end up feeling restricted in what i can ultimately create . Would my time be better spent learning c++ which is a whole different ball game to the language i am used of . I am in my early thirties so a career in game dev is pretty much never gonna happen and i simply want to make games for the sake of making them . Feeling very frustrated and confused guys Should i just get as good as i possibly can within the bp system or bite the bullet and learn something that is probably beyond me ?? lol
I would say if you are already good in C++ go for C++ with unreal.
But if you do not know C++, do not learn C++ and unreal engine api together, you will just get confused.
Instead learn Unreal api (and how things are done in unreal) by learning blueprints.
It is not like that time knowledge will be wasted when you move to C++. same stuff is there you just write it instead of dragging nodes and lines.
PS.
IMO that guy is right, blueprints theoretically allow you to make any game. But sometimes i have feeling that 1 screen of C++ code is equalkt to 10 screens of bluepritns. With small projects you save up tim by doing them in blueprints, but above certain size you waste a lot of time finding where that code you want to improve was in blueprints. It is much easier to see what C++ code does than blueprints, also comments are better in C++.
you can get same result with both, blueprints it’s definitively faster though
I’ve seen his video too (Sykoo) and I also wrote a lot of stuff in the comments section. Don’t listen to him. He is already hating the system as it is and never really delved into the system. So his point of view is pretty moot. That complex games can’t be made with blueprints is utter nonsense. It always depends on, how you structure and write your code. Is your code in either blueprint or C++ redudant, you will waste performance, which you could have used elsewhere. Blueprints are approximately 10x slower than C++ and it is nothing to worry about. You also have the ability to nativize complex and very heavy blueprint code, so it will run faster.
I would recommend you to try out the blueprint system. But I also would try to get around C++ programming with the Unreal Engine. Try both things and see, what you like best. Heck, minecraft was made on java and it is a god awful programming language. Try to be a good programmer/blueprinter with a good programming philosophy and you are good to go :).
Blueprints are simply awesome - it blows my mind that someone actually thinks you shouldn’t use them for a production game.
For any game with more than one person, you will find both blueprints and code.
After you have significant experience with both, it is blatantly obvious that they are both critically important tools at your disposal.
Use both. Don’t be afraid of either.
And learn Blueprints first - because you can see result faster and watch more videos.
Then start working with c++.
As you get more familiar with c++, you should spend some time learning the engine source code - it is invaluable.
BTW - Does that guy from the video really use c++ only? Like no blueprints at all?
It’s like saying, don’t use c++ … do all your coding in assembly.
Darkgodslair is spot on it was the guy named sykoo and im pretty sure he uses both blueprints and c++ But since i will be using 100 percent blueprints i took his comments to mean . “If you make a game with bp only its going to suck” The only language i ever used had a very simple sytax such as
create event
health = 100
step event
if health<1
restart room
that kind of simplistic coding …
And im assuming that c++ is far and a way more difficult than that lol .
This is the video im talking about
Thanks for the advice guys i will steer clear of that guy from now on
lol
Wrong. You can do almost everything in blueprints. What you can’t do can be exposed to blueprints or you can consult to a C++ programmer to do things for you which is what I am doing right now and happy with it.
It -is- hard to make good games alone, but blueprints are not the one to blame.
When I first saw it, I couldn’t just let it slide. I had to call him out about some things, because it genuinely (like the OP) scares people away from a system, which might get really powerful in the future. But without an audience to develop for, EPIC might drop the system at point and I absolutely don’t want that. I come from a coding background too and I gave the blueprint system a chance. I kept an open mind and I really like the system. It was just bloody obvious at the start that he was strongly against the blueprint system. This is never a good start to get into a topic, because it just doesn’t add to the discussion, but prevents an open dialogue to take place.
It should be obvious that the blueprint system won’t replace C++. It is made out of freaking C++ blocks of code.
However, as I see it, the blueprint system is an ever growing library (suprise, programming uses libraries too) of C++ code blocks (nodes). It’s strength lies not in the single note, but rather in the combination of several nodes. When nodes are combined, the complexity of a game can get much higher.
I am just happy that I’m not the only one sharing the sentiment that he is kinda talking out of his gluteus :).
I feel a lot better about my current direction in learning unreal now guys thank you.Im also (very slowly) learning c++ but only in reading material .Its much more effective than counting sheep lol
If your time is valuable, and you wan’t to really learn game play through blueprints. I really suggest going through the marketplace, and picking up some of the larger assets like a kit. If you don’t have one already. Your age has nothing to do with your career. There are people in their 70’s that are still in kindergarten. If your trying to make something super advanced than blueprints are going to be hard, but most things are possible. The people that say these things don’t usually give “Real World Examples” of what isn’t possible with blueprints. Blueprinting is a type of logic, and while nothing is efficient as pure code. People have done some pretty advanced things with blueprints. I can tell you that I’ve learned a ton from the marketplace content, and Epic’s assets. I don’t know what type of game your trying to create, but If you search marketplace for “Kit.” You can pick up an entire game play style through BP’s. There are shooters, top down, side scroller, third persons, shooters, multiplayers, and 2d platformers. Plus many others. I’ve bought some of them, and I consider it far cheaper than an education. They are the best learning instrument’s, and the marketplace has tons of A+ quality content. A word to the wise is try to stay away from purchases outside of the marketplace. Some of them are extremely non functional, and poor quality.
I can vouch for the quality standards of the marketplace, you can’t really go wrong buying an asset that is advertised for the use you are looking for.
Blueprints will teach you a lot about how the engine works, and you can certainly make full games with them. I have been working on a game mainly (95%) in Blueprints for the last (about) 2 years, and I can’t complain too much. The things that I have done in C++ are pretty much just defining all Structs and Enums there, for added stability throughout the game.
I’m a pure BP and don’t C++. So what I really want to know is what is the limitation to BP? I understand that BP is slower in terms of processing, but what is its limitation? I never had an issue where I couldn’t make what I wanted with BPing and I been using UE4 since 4.5. So I really like to know what is the limitation of BP compare to C++ other then processing power.
Hey guys, I thought I’d be stepping by to throw my two cents.
I’ve been working on the Unreal Engine 4 for 2 years now, working almost entirely in Blueprints.
I have a programming background as well and I could go for both C++ or Blueprints but I’ve decided to go all-in on Blueprints.
Here is the main project I’ve worked in 2016, 99% of it is in Blueprint.
As you can see you can go pretty far with Blueprints. But you are restricted to what is currently exposed to Blueprints and sometimes you can’t work around C++ (I had to create 2 systems in C++ for this Action RPG Prototype: generating custom actor components and switching Input Keys).
But the main point for me is the optimization / organization. Having a clean and optimized setup in Blueprints is far more complicated than having one clean architecture in C++. Wires all around the place, unconventional ways of doing things / unoptimized calculations.
Shipping a full fledged and optimized game is far more complicated in Blueprint than it is in C++ and would demand a certain amount of skills in programmation. And if you have these skills, you’re not thinking about building it in Blueprint in the first place anyway.
But you can do it with Blueprints, your code is just going to be a real mess (if you don’t have the necessary skill to do something as robust as a C++ architecture).
To really use Unreal 4 efficiently I think you have to use both C++ and Blueprints.
Blueprints are fine for everything that comes down to prefabs / interface / scripting and you build the roots in C++.
To give you an example, we made an entire weapon system in C++ and we’re just overriding some stuff in the Blueprint childs of that class.
I think you should go for Blueprint if you consider game development to be a hobby. You’ll get faster result and learn quicker.
Well after seeing your game and knowing that it is 99 percent blueprints i am infused with optimism …That game looks amazing and by far more advanced than anything i would even attempt to create .Its obvious from your post that you are by far and away further along in knowledge than i am and it will be many years before i even approach your level .But seeing what can be done with nearly exclusive blueprinting is awesome …Thank you guys ! Just became your 600th subscriber yun . watching your vids on my third screen whilst i dev
I did a lot of prototyping including local networking and a local 4 player brawl type game. I haven’t actually tried split screen but I swear you can set it up in the project setting.
IMO I think online RPG can be donem but if you mean MMORPG then I agree with you there as it requires lots of custom library/nodes. Also for online RTS, the only problem I see is connecting two matched ELO(rating) players into another server. I haven’t tested it before and not sure if its possible with BP, but I feel like there is a way around it. Though a part of me is telling me that it wouldn’t be a secured way to go. This is just my theory as I haven’t actually done it.
Blueprints is an amazing system.
is it a waste of time to learn something with virtually no learning curve?.. no, not really
I have a multiplayer shooting game on Steam that was done with Blueprints and now I am making templates to sell on marketplace.
Blueprint system is the best thing happened to game engines 
i think i read somewhere that benchmarks between games built with UE4 using blueprints, and identical games built on unity with all the same assets, just the scripts converted manually into C# showed blueprints to be just as fast as C# used by unity, cryengine, etc… im coding a game in blueprints right now… if i run into issues with it, it doesnt really require a huge amount of efforts to convert what you already have into a function C++ script… but i’ll cross that road if i ever come to it