Over 10 weeks, I learned a lot about Unreal Engine 5, focusing mainly on Blueprints, the engine’s visual scripting system. I used it to create gameplay mechanics, interactions, and logic. I also explored tools for level design, animation, and optimization, which helped me understand the engine’s capabilities.

One of the challenges I faced was getting animations to work correctly with specific character models. This involved issues like mismatched skeletons, retargeting animations, and ensuring the models behaved as expected during gameplay. These problems required me to troubleshoot and dive deeper into Unreal's animation tools, including the Animation Blueprint system and the retargeting process.

I focused on multiplayer programming using Steamworks to handle networking. This setup involved a host/server system, where one player acted as the server, and others joined as clients. I learned how to manage player connections, synchronize gameplay events, and handle data transfer between the host and clients using replication.

I also had to manage player states. In multiplayer this is very important because you need to ensure that all players’ states are synchronized across the server and clients. I learned how to use replication to keep track of each player’s state, making sure that when one player changes their state (e.g., aiming down sights, reloading, jumping etc.), the change is reflected on other players’ screens in real-time.

One thing I was struggling with is making sure everything is properly synchronized. Another thing I struggled with is understanding who executes what code.