UI and UX (2024)

For this university module, I needed to create a working prototype for player UI and UX. Along with researching and creating the assets myself as well as their basic functional implementation. For this, I created a prototype for the UI of a fighting game - as I had been playing a lot of the Tekken series. I created a research document and that outlined what I would be doing, my inspirations and how I would be achieving my goals of making a functional UI.

This module taught me a surprising amount, even if UI and UX did not particularly interest me as an area of design. It allowed me to better develop my visual blueprinting skills - as it gave the task solely on me to make it functional. I was able to use my previous understanding a lot and hone it, allowing me to learn how to make menus work within each other, proper use of features like progress bars and how to connect them with values that are tied to the player character and how to relay information to the HUD so that it can be displayed for the player.

I got familiar with a aspect that I did not know existed in Unreal Engine. That being, creating animations in the engine itself. I used these to smoothly transition between screens and, for a person who has never really done anything akin to this, I found that it had worked out quite well. Allowing for a much smoother process overall in terms of the navigation and presenting information to the player.