High-level concept explanations, detailed tutorials, performance considerations, shortcuts and other useful content that aims to improve your Unreal Engine 4 development journey.
Some core elements are generally required when creating a new level. These include:
A new level is created without any assets.
Be sure to add some meshes so that something is rendered in the level.
Levels are physics based, thus a light source is required to view anything in the level.
Adding a Directional Light from the Lights section of the Modes panel will render your level.
Set the Location of the directional light to 0, 0, 100 to have the light hover above the level origin.
When tiling your level with meshes, the process can be sped up for drafting sake.
Increase the snap size to something relative to the ground tile.
Duplicate and place new tiles using Alt + Left Click and drag to the required location.
Select a number of tiles to duplicate multiple tiles at a time.
Starting the game will result in the character spawning in the corner of the map and possibly infinitely falling if no tiles are present at that location.
Add a Player Start from the Modes panel.
Change the Location of the player start to [0, 0, 100] to have the spawn point at the level origin.
Meshes are currently being rendered, but the sky is still filled with darkness.
Add an Atmospheric Fog from the Modes panel to illuminate the sky.
Set the Location of the atmospheric fog to [0, 0, 300] to have the fog source hover above the level origin.
Currently, the sun is seen to be lying on the horizon in the distance.
The sun can be controlled by attached it to the directional light in the level.
Select the Directional Light from the World Outliner.
Search for Fog in the Details Panel Search bar.
Check the box for Atmosphere / Fog Sun Light.
The fog colour show now change to the sky light colour.
The sun spot can now be rotated to cast shadows in the level.
A realistic reflection profile needs to be present within the level.
Add a Sphere Reflection Capture from the Modes panel.
Set the Location to [0, 0, 500] to hover the reflection capture above the level origin.
Select the Build dropdown then select Build Reflection Captures.
The level is now ready for meshes to be added and the level design to be realised.
Be sure to make use of Filters in the content browser to easily identify all available meshes within the project.