It is curious how easily we often emulate Tex Avery cartoons by turning our eyes into dollar symbols whenever an opportunity is planted before us. The last to cause this reaction in a large part of the gaming community has been the Creative 2.0 mode of Fortnite.
The ability to access an editor Unreal adapted for the Epic game in which creating our own experiences was quickly equated with Roblox due to the potential of the idea, but from said to fact there is a long way, so we have spoken with a professional developer so that he can tell us how he sees it the industry from the other side of the barrier.
A developer’s take on Unreal Editor in Fortnite
On the other side of the screen is javier gutierrez, game designer with a more than considerable journey through the Spanish industry and a curriculum that goes from indie to big companies that day after day make headlines. Is it as revolutionary as it seems to us from the outside?
Javier recognizes that he will always see it “like a front door”, the perfect excuse for those who want to shape a small project, can carry it out with relative ease and, from there, that people can find it.
“I will always see it as a gateway. I wish I had these little toys when I was young. It’s kind of the idea that people are drawn to try and have a gateway that isn’t a total “get this programming billet” panic. The engines have become much more open, but this is another step, it is to put a step in the middle of “come on, even smoother.”
Until the arrival of something with more face and eyes, as well as accessible, the designer assures that, when asked by someone close about how to enter the world of level design, his answer was always to go to Super Mario Maker.
Have an idea, translate it, see how it works, to what extent you can make it grow… But as they arrive new toolsnew possibilities land: “It’s like a stripped down version of what the full Unreal Engine would be like, so to speak.”.
The programming barrier
I take this opportunity to ask Javier about the decision to include a new programming language instead of clinging to something he already had Unreal Engine and was giving excellent results as a gateway, the Blueprints.
“I imagine that they are going for the same shots as the issue of simplifying and making it simple and we will see where it goes. Maybe not right now, but in a year they’ll put in the Blueprints, in two they’ll let you tinker with it bareback or do C++. It’s a big jump.”
The idea behind the Blueprint is to nest a series of little boxes with specific actions in which, in a much more visual way than in a piece of code, you can tell the editor: “when the player gets here let this happen”. It can be very useful for people who don’t know how to program, but the barrier will always be there as soon as you want to twist the objective a bit.
The arrival of Fortnite Creative 2.0 and the staging of the Verse language arrives just in time so that here, as a gift, we can also introduce the theme of the IA. Is there a possibility that tomorrow an artificial intelligence will help us program in this type of editor based on simplified phrases?
AI, Fortnite and the future of amateur development
“I have a clash with the AI issue, because on the one hand, code things, yes, simplifying and facilitating in the end is fine, but you will always have to review and correct. On the other hand, why am I going to mince all this if the function already exists. The same programmers are the first to go to a website and say, “hey, I need to do this, I already have the chunk of code here”, cut, paste, maybe I’ll put my moves, and onward”.
Javier takes the opportunity to also comment on what happened with the IA of Ubisoft from a few days ago and the cry in the sky that many put ahead of time. He ensures that screenwriters and writers cannot write everything and reaching a new level of excellence inevitably comes through ideas like this.
“They can’t write all those kinds of permutations and variations of dialogue depending on what you’ve done, what you’ve left to do or moves like that, and that’s why in games the NPCs are dumb and and say what’s the weather like today.
What they really do then we’ll see and we’ll grunt at them if necessary, but today this works on a database in which the writers have to put the base and then the AI does the puzzle and shows you builds depending on the four things an NPC can react to.”
The note, in any case, puts it on everything that is happening in the world of art and modeling, where transparency is conspicuous by its absence and you don’t know “Where did you get this from, what did you create this drawing from?”. A system too “opaque” as to blindly trust its characteristics.
Earn money with Fortnite… To what extent is it possible?
And with all this we come to the crux of the matter. To the point where many young creators of Creativeor players interested in making the leap to something other than playing, they consider the possibility that this ends up becoming the new Roblox and can be a source of income.
“There are huge possibilities here, especially after that 40% of Fortnite profits that will go to the creators, and it’s even higher, I think 80% or so, in the sale of pure and hard assets. For developers of “hey, look, well, I’m going from killing myself to creating something from scratch, and if I can throw money from here, well, that’s what I’ll take with me.”
In any case, I see it as an opportunity to grow, to try and learn, but as an option to “I want to make a living with this“What is going to happen, that in no time it is going to be ultra saturated as it happens with Roblox. As it happens with people on Twitch, that he says “I’m going to make a living with this“But why are they going to buy yours and not one of the other two million games that will be there”
The idea, according to Javier, is to see how it works and from there continue to grow, but he believes that the typical mentality of “I’m going to cover” seems very dangerous for people who are starting out, especially if they fall prey to what has also happened with Robloxfirst with the companies that hire three kids and then keep the large amount of money, and then with how easily tomorrow they could change the monetization system to end up paying you in turkeys instead of in real money.
He recommends taking it for what it is, a tool to learn and start growing. From something more restricted like Mario Maker a Fortnite and, from there, from course in progress and from YouTube tutorial to YouTube tutorial, to be encouraged to make the leap to Unreal Engine to get to where the rest of the platforms would not let you.
“You have to follow the steps of the stairs. What someone cannot do is think that they are going to get here and become rich and succeed, because that is not how it really works. It is to play it. Like casting the lottery.
In ExtraLife | How to create your own video game from scratch: free, without knowing programming and without ever having created a 3D object
In ExtraLife | The influence of Escape From Tarkov’s gameplay on the shooter genre: the next step after Battle Royale?
Table of Contents
