Hey all,
First of all, big thanks to Epic! I have been waiting for this day for a long time 
So my question is, how much customization is possible without going through the process to download the source code? Is there still a limited scripting ability (not counting blueprints) available without having to recompile the whole engine? Sort of like Unrealscript from UE3. Any light shed on this would be appreciated.
Thanks all,
Greg
Hello gregdumb.
Your choices at the moment are to play with C++, play with blueprints or play with both. There is no longer any scripting language built into the engine. I am nearly at a stable implementation of JavaScript (V8 like Chrome and Node.js) that is working with UE4, but it is not quite stable enough for consumption.
I havn’t gotten the new download yet. How it worked in Beta, you created gameplay C++ classes that compiled, but it didn’t compile the whole engine. Those files go in your project folder. The engine code is the the engine install location. I don’t imagine they would change that.
Okay, thanks! So does this mean that the c++ code that was being built in real time in that old GDC demo was the actual source code for the whole engine, the github source code?
There are actually two source workflows.
There is the full source of the engine on GitHub, and there are headers and other misc source bits that come with the default install so you can write your game on top of the engine without modifying/compiling it.
Be sure to take a look at the FPS tutorial which is goes more in depth on how C++ can be added to your project and should also answer some questions about compiling.
@mikepurvis Ah, so you don’t have to compile the whole engine every time… That sounds good, I imagine it would be much slower if you did.
Thanks for the help everybody!
@WesBunn Okay, I’ll take a look, thanks!
Unlike UDK, the engine and your project are installed in different locations, so no, you don’t recompile the engine, just your project. Unless of course, you want to as that’s now available.
Right, you can use Blueprints which are like using Unrealscript+Kismet, or you can code in C++. The source code is if you need to change deeper things about the engine. The majority of people won’t need to mess with the source code.
Thanks for all the info guys, it really helps. UE4 is sounding better and better
Hey everybody!
Just signed up and excited to see what this thing can do!
From my understanding (As i only some videos describing engine), same as you got UnrealScript and Kismet and one can make blocks for another in UDK, the same you got C++ and Blueprint and you can bland them together depending on your design and desired workflow divided between artist and programmer. You can also use each exclusively, here a video showing project entirely made of Blueprint because author don’t know how to code:
Hello. I’ve seen a lot of examples using the Blueprints / editor, however, I have some ideas which involve using the engine in a less traditional way. I think C++ is probably the way to go for me…
Is there a hello world (or simple project) implemented in C++ that I can use as a reference as I’m getting started? Something I can use to figure out how to setup the game loop and look at how the renderer is setup (top down vs. fps, ect.)
Thanks in advance!
Sorry - I was able to find what I was looking for in the “Required_2of2.zip” file under .\Templates*
Still familiarizing myself with the layout of the source-code and I had jumped right to the engine code first… 