Introduction

So far, we've been using blueprints in order to generate gameplay. This has been great and has worked well, but one of the main advantages that Unreal has over its competition, such as Unity and Cry Engine, is the fact that you can get access to the full source code of the engine and rework it to fit exactly what you're looking for.

It would be quite easy for me to write an entire book just about programming, and within these few pages, I can't possibly cover everything you need to know to write code. Rather, in this chapter, we are going to cover how to set up your development environment and some of the possibilities of programming in C++ for UE4.

Tip

If you are interested in taking this further and learning how to program C++ using UE4, read Learning C++ by Creating Games with UE4 by Packt Publishing.

When to use C++/Blueprints

One of the things that I often hear people asking is whether to use C++ or Blueprints within their projects, or which one is better. As it currently stands...