Somewhat shockingly (well, at least to me!) the most recent Unreal Engine release has come packaged with a complete overhaul of Epic’s old sample projects. This new suite of starter templates excitingly includes variations of top-down, side-scrolling, and vehicle-based games, as well as the expected third/first person combat examples.
This is all fantastic news, but as always when Epic releases new content for free it can have a collateral impact of those offering similar services.
This time it’s personal.
The First-Person Arena Shooter
Included with Unreal 5.6 is the First-Person Arena Shooter, a sample template intended to kickstart your journey to making your own shooter games. This is a goal it shares with the Shooter Sandbox, my own template that I’ve been chipping away on for some time.
When this kind of thing happens I always try my best to lean into the changes, and make sure I’m offering something new or different that can become a value add rather than a competitor. This case should be no exception, but I’m still figuring out how these projects can best compliment each other.
Laley to the rescue
This is a quick update to this article a few weeks after publication to let you all know that Ryan Laley has just started a new series on adding online multiplayer to the Arena Shooter.
Well worth the watch if you’re looking to take full advantage of the template!
First impressions
The Arena Shooter has a lot of awesome features going for it, but more than that I think it does an impressive job of presenting the basic features you expect from a shooter without overcomplicating its systems and overwhelming new developers. This is a tricky thing to get right, and it’s something Epic’s previous learning example, Lyra, fails to do.
This article isn’t going to cover the Arena Shooter’s features in any detail, but you can read more here. The bottom line is that this is an exciting step forward and I’d very much like the Sandbox to find its place alongside it.
The template is still a little rough around the edges. There are a few (very minor) graphical issues, unnamed variables, redirectors that need cleaning up, and at least one mandatory fix to the AI that the community has already identified. I get the impression that the template was shipped in a bit of a hurry, but these are tiny issues that shouldn’t detract from how impressive it looks.
Interestingly, much of the template’s core functionality is in C++, which does limit its utility for those who’re more comfortable working in Blueprint. This is perhaps the key point of difference between the Arena Shooter and the Sandbox.
Uncertain multiplayer
I got a lot of warnings/errors when trying to run multiple clients within the Editor to explore the Arena Shooter’s multiplayer capabilities. I’ve not had a lot of time to investigate it, so until I’m sure it’s not a skill issue on my part I’ll reserve my judgement.
What does this mean for the Sandbox?
The Shooter Sandbox has always had a very strong set of objectives which I think differentiate it from many of the other Shooter templates on the marketplace and elsewhere. In this respect I believe it fulfills a particular niche and shouldn’t directly compete with the Arena Shooter.
In an ideal world, developers looking to create their own first-person shooter games will be able to start with the Arena Shooter, and then borrow elements from the Sandbox to expand on their ideas.
Upgrading to Unreal Engine 5.6
The Shooter Sandbox is currently on version 5.5, and I came to regret jumping the gun on the update because I feel like sticking to the latest version of the engine excludes a lot of developers from making any use of my work. Downgrading can be a massive pain, and I don’t doubt those working in earlier versions of the engine just wouldn’t want to deal with it.
In this case there are two really compelling reasons to upgrade. The first is that 5.6 comes with new systems for dealing with weapons in the first-person perspective, allowing them to be rendered separately and not clip through the environment. The Sandbox is using an alternative solution at the moment which has had some drawbacks, and the Arena Shooter’s implementation looks like it’s solved those.
The second reason is far more important to me, and that’s because it concerns an ongoing struggle I’ve had since the Sandbox’s inception. It looks like Unreal Engine 5.6 has exposed more of the Gameplay Ability System to Blueprint, which if you’re familiar with my project’s history has been a big sticking point for me.
It goes against the grain to update to a new version of the engine so early, and I will need to investigate in more detail, but if GAS is starting to become more viable for blueprint-only projects then there is a really solid argument for upgrading and then sticking with 5.6 for the foreseeable future.
If you have strong thoughts on this, please reach out. This is especially important if you strongly disagree with a potential engine upgrade to your Sandbox-based projects. You can always find me here on techarthub, or in our community Discord server.
Chat soon!
