Benefits of using c++ instead of blueprints to make games in unreal engine?

Started by
2 comments, last by Crocodile99 3 years, 4 months ago

I currently learn to use blueprints in unreal. I also plan to learn to code in c++. My question is, are there any benefits making games writing code in c++ instead of just using blueprints and why?

Advertisement

To be able to differentiate between Blueprint and “plain” C+, you need to understand Blueprint first. Blueprint is a technique of the Visual Scripting family. This means that you create code paths in a visual editor which has some benefits like having a wider overview over the code you write and you don't have to know the underlaying language that much because everything is in convenient blocks.

So now, how does this visual code is processed by Unreal to run on the machine? Unreal has a tool in it's pipeline that transpiles every node of Blueprint into C++ code already. This means that your visual Blueprint is translated into written C++ code and then compiled like every other game and engine code. So there is no difference on the first look.

So why don't every programmer loose their jobs? Because Blueprint is as is, a machine generated C++ code file. This can have issues, it might not be as optimized as an experienced C++ dev would write it and it has limits. It is limited to the number and kind of Blueprint blocks. Writing plain C++ on the other hand has the benefits of the full environment that Unreal offers, all macros, all systems, everything and even more can be used from pure plain code.

So TL;DR: Blueprint is nice for quick prototyping and small features, it has also the benefits of being able to let non-programming people do some game scripting but it is on the other hand only as good as the C++ code generator it belongs to. If you want to use every system in Unreal or just have full access to all the C++ features, you better write your game code from hand. There is by the way no reason to not combine both!

@undefined i realized that this question was answered again in the past many times sorry for asking this again here. Your answer was very helpful thank you very much for your time to answer this. That means no shortcuts for me ?

This topic is closed to new replies.

Advertisement