Hi, i finished my first project, and now i wonder the best practices to package and upload an UE4.24 PC game to Steam, for now i use:
- Use pak file
- Create compressed cooked packages
- List of maps to include in package build (maps specified, if not UE takes days to make a hudge package, with unnecessary content)
- If project has code, or running a locally built editor (also sometimes “always” works well)
- Development (i tried Shipping in the past, but it caused package to fail sometimes)
- For Distribution
- Supported all platforms
- Windows; Targeted RHIS (Directx 11 & 12 SM5 check)
Is this right?
Steam takes weeks to verify projects, to avoid a reject or avoid issues in the future with builds i want to ask for advice… evendo: “someone told me once, that Steams does not play the games, just verifies documents like W8Ben, verifies some API things you need to implement to your project (wich some devs say its a pain, even youtubers) and finally checks the Store, description and pics” not sure if this is true…; but during verification, i plan to continue adding content and make a new build before release, i guess inside Steam this is considered a new build, not sure if i need to pay $100 per build, or only first time?.. hope not, I think each new build is a separated repositorie or build (If there is any difference, i´m still confused), and customers overwrite changes; i want to avoid players downloading the whole game each time, just changes, not sure if UE4 settings have some impact. No idea what “Localizations to Package” languages are too.
UE Builds seem to never include savegame files, as part of Builds, wich is good, but I still need to include graphics and buttons savegame, if not, the game starts at Epic… and not many PC´s are good for this, but as new builds (updates) this is going to overwrite players savegames, right? i discovered also that each time I make a build, lots of cook files and build files are also created inside my project, and i have to delete them, if not, a second packaging process tends to get confused, tries to compare data and fails; also before package, i removed “console command” button, to avoid people to try to hack the game LOL… not sure if works. In the future i want to continue updating the game, maybe add extra content (DLC) but no idea how for now… i guess Devs hide this content inside game updates, to simply unlock them after people buy, still not sure how this works…
So, what is your best practice, and what do you recommend?