Unreal Engine 5 Dedicated Servers with AWS and GameLift

Build Dedicated Servers with Cloud Backend - Databases, User Pools, Virtual Machine Hosting, all on the Free Tier!

What you'll learn
Compile Unreal Engine from source and package dedicated servers
Integrate your Unreal Engine game project with cloud backend services
Save persistent data to cloud databases from within Unreal Engine
Create secure user pools for your games so players can log in from within the game
Create Dedicated Server-hosted lobbies
Manage game sessions with Amazon GameLift
Learn cloud architecture and become an AWS cloud architect

Requirements
Must know the basics of Unreal Engine and C++
Must have 230+ GB of storage for an Unreal Engine source build

Description
This course uses the AWS Free Tier!Have you ever wondered how you can let your players launch your game, and connect directly with a server, playing in multiplayer with other players right away?Or perhaps how you can allow your players to create user accounts for your game, with username, password and email? How do games allow you to sign up for a new user account, receiving a 6 digit verification code in their email, allowing them verify their account for your game?Have you ever wondered how to save player data in databases, so they can see their achievements in the game, showing their progress, skill level, items, or stats from previous matches? Or how leaderboards are made, showing the top scoring players who play the game across the planet?How can you run dedicated servers that players can connect to? How can you set up servers in different regions around the globe, providing access to your game to players in different countries, allowing them to enjoy gameplay with the lowest possible ping times? And how to make competitive multiplayer games fair to all players, with an authoritative server optimized to manage server operations, reduce lag and provide a consistent and performant experience for everyone?This course is a masterclass for dedicated servers and cloud backend for unreal engine games.By the end of this course, you will be able to:Compile Unreal Engine from source, create client and server build targets, and package dedicated server and client builds of your gameIntegrate the GameLift Server SDK into your game to connect with GameLiftLearn how to make API calls with the AWS (command-line interface)Host dedicated servers, both on your own machine and on cloud-hosted virtual machines (and you’ll know what those are)Learn how to create serverless functions (in AWS Lambda) to access cloud resources and use AWS SDKsCreate secure user pools, where your game's players can create their own login/password, with email verification with Amazon CognitoImplement security, requiring temporary access tokens granted via user pool login in order to perform game actionsCreate your own REST API with endpoints that can be accessed via HTTP request, and secure them to require authentication tokens using Amazon API GatewayLearn about HTTP requests and how to send them from Unreal Engine C++ code, triggering serverless functions and accessing cloud resourcesLearn about formatting JSON data for HTTP requests, and Unreal's JSON utilities for conversion from JSON to USTRUCTs for ease of use of data retrieved from the cloudCreate NoSQL databases, storing persistent game data for players, including game stats, career, and leaderboard info using the DynamoDB, a high-speed, highly optimized system for storing data to databasesImplement game lobbies, managed by dedicated servers, displaying player names and efficiently replicating lobby data with Fast Array SerializersCreate a sign up/login menu with email verification for new users, and a game Access Portal where we can view Career and Leaderboard data, as well as launch the game lobbyLearn AWS best practices when it comes to security, Identity and Access Management, Identity Center, Roles, Policies, and PermissionsLearn how to access the AWS documentation for all AWS APIs and how to easily use them to create code to create, access, and manipulate data on the cloudCreate and manage Game Sessions and Player Sessions in Amazon GameLiftCreate Server and Client packaged builds of your game, and connect to the server from client builds without any external tools (just launch the game, sign-in in the game, connect in the game)Connect to cloud services without even being connected to a game server (single-player games)Closely monitor your aws billing and management console and setup billing alarmsAnd so much more!You’ll be creating an AWS account and learning how to manage it using recommended best practices for the cloud. All of the core features of this course use the free tier, aside from two optional lectures using advanced security features in AWS for custom access token scopes – which cost me less than .69 cents to implement for this course. But you can skip those two lectures if you wish to stay in the free tier.I’ve created and provided you with an FPS template project as a starting point, with shooter mechanics so we can have some stats to save to the cloud, but it’s not required – you can use your own game project, or a completely empty game project if you want! This course is about creating and hosting servers and setting up the cloud backend for your games.We’ll be downloading and compiling Unreal Engine from source – which means you will need at least 230 GB of storage for this course. You must know the basics of Unreal Engine C++. You must use an Unreal source build of at least UE5.4 or above. (You can use the latest version of the engine, everything works).You do NOT need any experience or knowledge of cloud architecture.It’s time to take your games to the next level, and learn how shipped games manage their users, data, and their game servers.Are you ready to upgrade your game development skills? I’ll see you in the course!