Made a decision today after enough testing. Because it's only a 2d game now and it's easier to solve stuff in code im now making point to not use sequencer for cinematics. I'll just reuse the 2d code I have and make all cinematics with it.
The sequencer will still be used for enemy ai bp sequencer and stuff like that. But using the player camera keeps the game seamless and feel more 2d authentic.
code crunch is complete. Got all the basic system in and working. Came up with a developer camera system that allows me to build environments how I want with the 2d camera and it will see through anything. It's a material trick. Once the look is right with foreground middle ground and background then I'll turn off the auto camera occlusion system and optimize the level by hand. This camera material trick saves me soooo much time in rework when it pertains to foreground middle ground background.
next code crunch, I'll add in the rest of the 2d camera system. Extend it to do cinematic more easily and change axis placement in the environment. Char has to walk forward in certain places and the camera axis must interp to new positions. Once thats complete, E1M1 is pretty much done with all hard code stuff and the rest is all gameplay abilities and enemies.
I'm going to add in multiplayer WarZone because the 2d system is replication friendly. But I wont add that in until I get the single player first episode complete... Shareware version. The purchased version has the remaining 2 other story episodes and multiplayer.
got more done pertaining to the the 2d camera system. The classes have settled and is all about elaboration from this point forward. It's a replication friendly system. So Multiplayer can be added as an afterthought.
It's has been over a week or 2 and the final official company logo has not changed. Big Brother Software logo is LOCKED !!!! I'm committed to name and logo.
Figured out the movement system and shooting. Instead of burst sprint being its own independent thing, it's contained in the left right and shoulder buttons. Feels responsive and natural. I'm using right shoulder to fire the guns and right trigger to throttle burst sprint. Right shoulder is better click for shotgun and machine gun.
One more button layout fix. Left shoulder double click toggle goes into aim and lock to one direction. This frees up the left trigger to also throttle run sprint like the right trigger. Right shoulder shoots the gun and double tap locks the shoulder cannon.
Now onto the melee. It's going to be a simple drop-kick. Run, jump, time it ,drop-kick, fly back.
I went ahead put in the placeholders for weapon swap and shoulder cannon control. I have top and right face button open for melee combat. The bottom face button is jump and left face button is dash. The going idea is to string together primitive actions to make melee combos. The face buttons are to allow a sandbox melee combat system.
After I get the basic melee system working, the next is wall bouncing and wall climbing.
test complete! Got a bit more time to work on it. I'm blending control rigs sooooo easily. No point to use canned animations. Procedural animation is DONE animation. Just need to add in the leg extension when unloading the attack.
It is far better to animate using code than linear canned method.
Pinned down the complete work flow with control rig.
Create the pose and intended animation function in control rig itself, then send only the working point controls. Handle the control rig no differently than a bake animation in anim bp. Use the character bp to do the timing. It's very clean.
My strategy is duplicated control rigs and make different poses and actions. Use code to get the timing and procedural greatness working.
Worked on the project some more on certain small things. Got everything over to one pipeline for animation with control rig, Before I was using a less optimal pipeline but I fixed it.
yup, this work flow is amazing! Simply make key poses with control rig and use oscillation and point interpolations to add in 2nd and 3rd movements.
Dosnt look like much now but I have the pipeline figured out and best of all it's easier to make changes of any kind while results always good and clean.
No more canned animations! Everything must be procedural animation answers!
Canned animations are best for cinematic, if even that. They are actually very hard to work with because it's all baked down. Code answers the small changes better than make changes then bake the animation down.
Control rig may take a little bit of practice to learn but once it's figured out in the midst of everything it's impossible to not use.
Make a fully dynamic pose and keep it in control rig. Use Unreal script to blend it. Now the jump into drop-kick has a clean and always instantly adjustable transition segment. Takes only a minute to set up but is always good results and can always be edited without stupid timeline bake animation nonsese.
use simple trigonometry concepts to layer in 2nd and 3rd motions.
I refuse to use Maya, 3dsmax and blender. Especially Maya. I had to pay off student loans using those god awful programs. The memories of those programs still haunts me.
The reason why the control rig is so genius is because the advantage large studios have is lots of people working on small things all at once.
Most the time in games it's about making sure the small things are done right. One major thing that is all about lots of small stuff is animation and most the time it's bulk of lots of small stuff
The control rig allows one person to do all the small things correctly but not need a large team.
got some more time work on it. So good how intuitive it is now to make animation from scratch and even them borderline real-time changes in game. Video includes how to do it.
hey, cool project. I dont quite understand what the benefit of control rig is exactly. I can understand that chopping a program out of the pipeline is usually good, but it looks like you do animations first by setting up a rather complicated rig in blueprint, and then you still basically keyframe the main poses, and have to program rules for the inbetweens? On the surface that seems like a big hassle compared to keyframe animation which, to me at least, is pretty intuitive and non-technical.
Sorry if it's a stupid question, i have not looked at control rig at all myself.
Added in more oscillation for more verity in the movements. I'm pushing for a more classic 2d looping look to everything. The whole world has to look like it's on a beat. Metal Slug is a good example of "the beat" look.
The control rig allows a procedural method to programming the animation for the game. To make the capsule component code with original animation at the same time is what I use it for.
I'm using only a ultra simple pipeline with control rig for this game. I first make a control rig with all it's features. Then duplicate it and make key frame poses with it. I use blending to act as tweening in the anim graph.
Because it's always has IK assigned to eash pose keyframe I at anytime can easily make a changes to its source. Like added in more controls, reparent controls and even expose the variables in the anim graph. There is no baking animations with it.
Lastly, it's kindah fun and clean to build keyframe posses this ways. It's better than even snapshot anim because it has all the controls and ik all the time.
For instance, I'm currently building the weapon swap. It's has to look good, be this simple and able to change easily at anytime for what it is right now.
Anything more than this would either prevent or delay building the weapon swap.
back to the game project again. A deer hit my car a few months back on only just recovered from it. I'm picking up where I left off.
with some fresh eyes on the project it's clear I need to rethink the graphics. Going to build out some 3dconcept in zbrush to see what I'm looking for in target models.
I may need to make the graphics simple and stress complete gameplay more. I'm not sure I alone can make sense of the graphics I want. It will be easier to add advanced graphics later but I need a simpler 3d graphics answer.
if you're going to invest a lot of time into something as big as a game project, why do anything quick and dirty? Doing things properly will give you better results and be faster. IMO the earlier iterations with lighting and textures are a lot nicer. Nanite is not equipped to handle characters yet, iirc
It's all in 3d but with Toon shader regardless. Can be iterated on. It would be nice to afford better more complete graphics. But getting the game done is more improatant.
Pinned down the new look for the game. Has to be budget friendly and look good. I'm going for a ghost in the Shell type of look. Simple toon shader and some dynamic post-processing effects.
got the toon shader done and working with all the lighting. I have strategy and workflow for this game's look. Basically I have created atoon shder with all the controls I need but has no color. Instead of coloring each object I will just "paint with lights". My toon shader is designed to work with the Unreal lighting systems, including lumin.
I start with dark image with the toon shader that is white gray black. Then....
Paint with lights.
It's very flexible toon shader. Easy to light and it all works .
by painting with lights I can get a far more interesting and dynamic image that is always moving. It also allows me to be extra fast with zbrush models.
Figured out how to get the emissive working in the toon shader. All answers are easy for any effect and style. I may use outlines eventually but time dosnt allow it right now.
Replies
The sequencer will still be used for enemy ai bp sequencer and stuff like that. But using the player camera keeps the game seamless and feel more 2d authentic.
I'm going to add in multiplayer WarZone because the 2d system is replication friendly. But I wont add that in until I get the single player first episode complete... Shareware version. The purchased version has the remaining 2 other story episodes and multiplayer.
One more button layout fix. Left shoulder double click toggle goes into aim and lock to one direction. This frees up the left trigger to also throttle run sprint like the right trigger. Right shoulder shoots the gun and double tap locks the shoulder cannon.
Now onto the melee. It's going to be a simple drop-kick. Run, jump, time it ,drop-kick, fly back.
After I get the basic melee system working, the next is wall bouncing and wall climbing.
going to be away from the project for a weeks or 2. Have to make money.
It is far better to animate using code than linear canned method.
Create the pose and intended animation function in control rig itself, then send only the working point controls. Handle the control rig no differently than a bake animation in anim bp. Use the character bp to do the timing. It's very clean.
My strategy is duplicated control rigs and make different poses and actions. Use code to get the timing and procedural greatness working.
Very exciting animation system!
I'm using control rig and sin for everything.
Dosnt look like much now but I have the pipeline figured out and best of all it's easier to make changes of any kind while results always good and clean.
No more canned animations! Everything must be procedural animation answers!
Control rig may take a little bit of practice to learn but once it's figured out in the midst of everything it's impossible to not use.
Make a fully dynamic pose and keep it in control rig. Use Unreal script to blend it. Now the jump into drop-kick has a clean and always instantly adjustable transition segment. Takes only a minute to set up but is always good results and can always be edited without stupid timeline bake animation nonsese.
use simple trigonometry concepts to layer in 2nd and 3rd motions.
There is no reason at all to use it...
My going game project is actually going to get done!!!
I spent so much money on store animation assets that are basically useless now. Whatever.
Most the time in games it's about making sure the small things are done right. One major thing that is all about lots of small stuff is animation and most the time it's bulk of lots of small stuff
The control rig allows one person to do all the small things correctly but not need a large team.
I dont quite understand what the benefit of control rig is exactly.
I can understand that chopping a program out of the pipeline is usually good, but it looks like you do animations first by setting up a rather complicated rig in blueprint, and then you still basically keyframe the main poses, and have to program rules for the inbetweens? On the surface that seems like a big hassle compared to keyframe animation which, to me at least, is pretty intuitive and non-technical.
Sorry if it's a stupid question, i have not looked at control rig at all myself.
The control rig allows a procedural method to programming the animation for the game. To make the capsule component code with original animation at the same time is what I use it for.
I'm using only a ultra simple pipeline with control rig for this game. I first make a control rig with all it's features. Then duplicate it and make key frame poses with it. I use blending to act as tweening in the anim graph.
Because it's always has IK assigned to eash pose keyframe I at anytime can easily make a changes to its source. Like added in more controls, reparent controls and even expose the variables in the anim graph. There is no baking animations with it.
Lastly, it's kindah fun and clean to build keyframe posses this ways. It's better than even snapshot anim because it has all the controls and ik all the time.
Anything more than this would either prevent or delay building the weapon swap.
It's the genius of procedural animations.
with some fresh eyes on the project it's clear I need to rethink the graphics. Going to build out some 3dconcept in zbrush to see what I'm looking for in target models.
I start with dark image with the toon shader that is white gray black. Then....
Paint with lights.
It's very flexible toon shader. Easy to light and it all works .
by painting with lights I can get a far more interesting and dynamic image that is always moving. It also allows me to be extra fast with zbrush models.
Hit effect and all other super eye candy stuff is easy and works well.