Playing a video on an in-game TV

Something that amazed me back when I started to play video games was the fact that it was possible to display videos within those same games; it felt like the designers had woven another layer of interactivity to trick our brains into thinking that the worlds they had created were truly real. Videos within videos – that’s something that left me starstruck back in the day!

Honoring that memory, we’ll now proceed to tackle how to create a working television display and how to play back any videos that you might want to show using Unreal Engine’s media player capabilities, which allow us to use videos as textures. Buckle up for the ride!

Getting ready

Seeing as the main goal of this recipe is going to be streaming a video on an in-game TV, the two things that we are going to need are a 3D model of a screen and a video file. As always, you have the option to use the assets provided alongside the Unreal Engine project...