Customer Reviews

Mastering Unreal Technology, Volume II: Advanced Level Design Concepts with Unreal Engine 3

5 star:		(5)
4 star:		(2)
3 star:		(3)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

First, let me address some complaints written about this book by other reviewers:
1. "The book isn't in color and it really should be because the cost for color is negligible." The cost for color in books is astronomical! And this book has TONS of screen captures through it's pages. In fact, I estimate at least 1/3 of the book's contents are nothing but screen captures. Yes the quality isn't all that great, but if they were in color this book would rarely sell because it would cost around $80 if not more.
2. "It's written for the Unreal Tournament 3 game editor and doesn't work with UDK." This is completely false. While it is true that the UT3 game editor and UDK are not the same tools, UDK CAN read UT3 level and package files - you just have to insert a *.* into the file name field to force it to show you all files (UDK is programmed to open only UDK files by default) - presto! There are the UT3 files available and they work fine. It could be in future versions of UDK this might not be the case, but as of September 2010, they work just fine.

These "Mastering Unreal Tech" books from 3D Buzz are really great tools for those looking to learn how to develop with Unreal 3 technology. Quite often they can be used as reference material as well. The authors do a fantastic job of giving you more information than you ever thought existed on the subjects they cover, leaving me wondering quite often "How do they KNOW that?" They even tell you when a certain feature included in the tools is non-functional. They must work side-by-side with Epic when making these books, is the only conclusion I can come to.

The problems I've run into with following their tutorials usually come down to missing assets from their packages - they sometimes reference levels or packages that just don't exist on the DVD. If you go to the website mentioned in the introduction (informit.com) you can download the missing files for chapter 2 after registering an account and your book.

The only other problem isn't their fault at all. The book was written back when Unreal Tech 3 was available only in the editor that comes with Unreal Tournament 3 - back in Sept 2009. Since then Epic has continued to update their engine through their toolset called UDK (www.udk.com). The Unreal Tourn 3 editor has remained frozen in time and has been replaced by UDK, slowly making the screen captures and files become outdated. But rest assured even if the files are using an old format, they still work in UDK; and their methods are still iron-clad and transition to UDK very well.

I am a game developer, I needed this book in my learning process, it covers a lot of things that are "not covered" in other tutorials!
The book requires the basic understanding of unreal engine 3 and its editor, so it takes you in detail, explaining many of the advanced features of unreal engine 3, I learned a lot from this book, I was especialy happy with parts about working with UI interfaces,faceFX , cinematics and postprocessing, etc!

Overall I must say I "love" the book, and the price was low for such a gem,
I think this book is a must have for all Unreal Engine game designers!
I cant wait for the release of Volume 3, which will cover unreal script,I am sure it will be a great succes and will teach me a lot!
Tnx for this great book!!!

This covers UDK technology that is almost 3-5 years old. This book needs to be updated to adhere with the new UDK engine. Alot of features in this book are outdated but you can still learn the essentials. Good beginners book.

Don't listen to the other reviewer who said this book is not for UDK. This book is perfect for UDK. It doesn't get anymore in depth than this. SpecialFX, particle systems, material creation, Kismet, etc.!!! Armed with volumes 1 & 2 you'll be ready for the big leagues.

There is so much great and useful information in this book, that I am developing a game with the Unreal Engine, and plan to put all the money made from this game into my retirement. This book does take time to read, there is a lot of information, so if you want to make a great game, this book can help you along the way!

I ordered these for a very talented friend who has the tough work of trying to break into the gaming industry. He's commented that the books are easy to understand, and I see that his confidence has been boosted. Coincidentally, just today, he sent me his first rendering since receiving the books that he was very proud to say couldn't have been possible without having learned it from the books. His pride is not unfounded or biased, and there is a nice obvious positive jump in quality from previous builds. We both hope he will gain the understanding he needs to impress future employers and have him hit the ground running in crafting video games.

As far as I know, he received the books in good shape, and I do know they were delivered in a timely fashion without any delays. Thanks!

I purchased Volume 1 of this series because I wanted to develop a good understanding of the Unreal Engine 3. I use the UDK, rather than UT3 Editor, because I like the licensing that the UDK offers. I really enjoyed that book, and I was able to use most of the techniques described in Volume 1 with the UDK. So I purchased Volume 2.

However, this book is not relevant if you are using the UDK. The examples work when you download the 8G UT3 game and editor. But if you are using the UDK, you are going to have a lot of trouble with this book. I had to stop half way through, and download the UT3 game and editor from steam and start over.

So use the UT3 Editor with this book and you will not be disappointed. But whatever you learn, it will not be very helpful if you want to move to the UDK.

The book is excellent and detailed. However i only gave it 4 stars because the print quality and iilustrations are a very light blk and white hard on the eyes.
All computer graphics books should be reqired to have color illustrations. This book does not include a pdf like most other graphic books to off set this problem and allow for portability. Authors should stop listening to book editors and use color. The price difference is mute because the booksellers discount the books quickly,so you do not profit from this cost cut and only disappoint customers.

This book is not current to udk, and therefore alot of what is inside it does not work in any newer version of udk. I'm working with it right now and i keep running into problems because content was either taken out or changed, and i have no idea of when. I'm using the august of 2010 version of udk (this post was written in august of 2011) because of this problem and I am still running into problems with content that's in the book being taken out of udk, and i have no idea what version to use to be able to follow some of the tutorials in the book. The book does have some useful tips on certain features of any UDK, but the fact that so much of it is irevelent makes this book just plain frustrating and sometimes useless. A newer, updated version of this book needs to be written asap. I would gladly spend 60 bucks for a version of this book that is useful, but trying to follow a tutorial on a program that doesn't work the same way in insane and ungodly frustrating. Epic, please write a newer book on UDK, in the meantime nobody should buy this book unless you know nothing about udk and want to get a very general idea of how some of it works. But keep in mind that alot of this book DOES NOT WORK with any version of udk made in the past year. This is stupid and i am very frustrated.

the product was a massive help in me understanding the more advanced features of unreal tournement 3 editor. However, they dont get stocked in the UK so the waiting time for this was soo long that by the time i got it was at the end of my univerity siemesta.

So if you are interested GET IT NOW!