Creating User Interface in Unreal Development Kit (almost no scripting)

UPDATE: What I didn't know at the moment of writing this post is that, even though the technology is supported by UDK Mobile, it won't work on iOS. 


Hey there! UI (user interface) is very important in every piece of software and you can be sure that a game is almost impossible without a UI. Creating a good one isn't easy and takes a lot of knowledge and talent in my opinion. There is this great book about it, if u're interested, it's called Game Development Essentials: Game Interface Design. I couldn't make myself read it all, just because I have to limit how much information I consume... I might go crazy because of an overload of information soon ;)) I hope I'll finish the book some day. But I can say it's worth reading if you're serious about Game Development.


In my process of developing/studying I've reached the stage where I need to create a UI and a HUD. (heads up display - the thing that displays all the needed information during a game) I was trying to not jump into it as long as I could. Because programming a UI is fun and a bit familiar thing for me. I was sure there will be no difficulty in studying it.

I heard about the fact that Adobe Flash technology can be used for creating UI in UDK and today I watched a tutorial explaining how to do that. It's called Scaleform and it's super simple if you know Flash and just simple if you don't.

I'm really happy about the fact, because (long time ago) Macromedia Flash was the first animation software I studied, being a 8 grader. I have this weird warm feelings about the soft :) It's simple and elegant in many ways.

You can find the tutorial I mentioned on VoxHouseStudio's YouTube channel. It explains creation of a simple menu scene with usage of really basic Kismet functions (GFxUI). Even though the tutorial gives you really essential knowledge of the so called Scaleform technology, it's absolutely enough to understand the workflow, if you ask me.

Mougli on his blog shows us how to do the GUI and HUD using UnrealScript. You might want to check out these too.