Restless Souls/Wishlist

Oni 2 game

Engine

If we had a real option to create an Oni 2 with modern engine I would root for Unreal Engine 4.

It works on PC and Macs and it is free for non-commercial projects.

There's a big community, documentation and tutorials.

If the demo is going to be extended it would be better to work with original/free content from begin with, sparing us IP concerns. Old content is meant as placeholders.

It supports weapon and h2h combat. Of course Oni's unique fighting style would have be re-written. But everything else should be supported by the engine. Particle, trigger volumes, wide environments, details characters. What else could you wish for?

Features

Besides new levels, characters and story... How about new gameplay elements? Since the Daodan is an core element of the story it would be shame not to make use of it. It would add a strategical component and adds to the replay value.

Since the bio aspects would be hard to reinvent for a spiritual successor, one might more concentrate on good 'ol nanotech. "Omega days"? "Iron demons?"

Primary Daodan traits

Healing (stopping a heavy bleeding and recovery speed)
Power (stronger attacks, throwing or using heavy objects and enemies as weapons (e.g. using a skriker as Nunchaku with maxed out power))
Speed (faster attacks, running, reflexes (dodging, counters))
Adapting (mutation speed (biological computing by means of "Oni cluster" cells))
Mechanical resistance (adaptions to pressure and kinetic damage (e.g. graphene enhanced cells))
Physical resistance (VDG, plasma, phase stream projectors (electric isolation))
Chemical resistance (acid, poison (lead bullets, mercury bow bullets))
Biological resistance (screamer cells, infections by untreated wounds)
Thermal resistance (extreme heat - fire, extreme coldness)
Nuclear resistance (depleted uranium ammunition and surviving contaminated areas)

Basically you can "tank up" against weapons and don't need to worry about ammo.

To keep balance you could add more dangerous weapons as the game progresses.

Secondary Daodan traits

The Daodan is not almighty. It has certain weaknesses you should watch out for.

Your Daodan abilities depend on Daodan biomass which means you can either unlock new abilities or enhance existing ones. And there's a limit to your abilities, because your cell count is limited.
There should be one or two "ultimates" in Imago stage that depend on your evolution.
Your number of Daodan cells depend on taken damage and recovery that happen in the last level.
But too much damage can cause too high growth rates (temporary sudden pain and fever resulting in moments of reduced vision, shooting accuracy, "getting blocked" rate) or it simply kills you because you exceeded the maximal healing capacity of the daodan.
Sytropin can help you in lowering growth rates. Be aware of increasing drug resistance as the game progresses.
Reverting an existing mutation takes more "work" than establishing a new one. Basically your course of action is directed evolution.

Improved movement set and h2h

prone mode
sneaking at walls and through vent channels
throw foes over obstacles
extend h2h with Parkour elements (e.g. wall jump connectable to a flying knee)
use pickable objects as weapons (either throwable or usable as a club)
ledge grab (not a must-have)
swimming (not a must-have)

Miscellaneous

controllable drones, robots, mechs, vehicles
dynamic lighting, wearable lights (flash lights) for dark environments
temperature affects characters (not a must-have)
emotions affects characters (not a must-have, rage enhances Daodan powers to a limited degree)

Oni 2 game tech demo with Unreal Engine 4

Goal

There is big skepticism inside the community whether an Oni-like game can be accomplished with the Unreal 4 engine.

Therefore I seek to create a technical demo to proof feasibility of such project.

The availability of XML documentation for Oni 1 seem to have speeded up mod creation so I will pursue a similar route for this project. The documentation written here in the process shall serve as measure to lower the learning curve of other modders (or then programmers / content creators).

Since EdT joined I feel very confident that a community-based Oni 2 is possible. --paradox-01 (talk) 23:37, 20 February 2018 (CET)

Stuff that is probably coverd by the tech demo

Everyone could pickup one of these points and investigate how to implement it.

If successful that person would write down a mini-tutorial here on OniGalore so others could see progress and learn from the documentation to perhaps pickup the next, somewhat more complex point.

There could be project files on a cloud drive as long as there aren't too many people involved (otherwise a SVN). New files could be uploaded into a revision folder. Users could test the changes and then update the project in the cloud.

V - video

T - tutorial

D - documentation

Features the demo should include:

two levels (to test normal level load routine and level streaming (T))
skydome (V)
lightning
main menu
- So far I failed to add background music. This gave rise to the idea of having an own level for the main menu where you can spawn ambient music. Muro or another character could be previewed with their current movement set and equipment. Shooting the camera would make the game quit. This will be useful when the enemy takes over this HQ AI and he needs to shut it down. "Mission failed." "Screw you!" Pressing the "V" key would allow you to go into your training room or HQ testing new moves or doing investments.
HUD ("circular" health bar, item slots)
- inventory (T1) (T2)
background music (D) (T) (V)
save game state
read game state
text pages for diary, etc.
fbx import of old objects
- static
- pushable
- animated
animated objects with collision box to stand on
objects that can be thrown
CJBO equivalents (characters, console, door, trigger (laser), trigger volume, ...)
compass (objective)
LSI
FBX import and usage of old characters
...

adding animations (V)
- combining character parts to one model
- rigging the model
  - minimum TRAC-TRAM integration I (walk cycle and idle)
  - prone mode
keyboard and mouse controls
functional animations
- character h2h (force-sensitive) (a.k.a physical animation component)
  (V)
- character h2h
  (V)
- hit reaction
  (V)
  
  (V)
- minimum TRAC-TRAM integration II (combat idle, punch, kick, block, half-damage, unblockable, super)
- minimum TRAC-TRAM integration III (throws)
- minimum TRAC-TRAM integration IV (throwable objects)
- overlay animations
  - aiming
  - holstering
  - h2h weapons
- ledge climbing
  (V)
  
  (V)
  
  (V)
  
  (V)
  
  (V)
- cover
  (V)
  
  (V)
  
  (V)
- cover (AI)
  (V)
healing by hypo and level areas
particle (attachable to env, weap, char)
- weather (rain, snow, wind, dust, lightning)
two weapons
ammo type: ballistic ammo
ammo type: energy cell
AI
- patrol paths and pathfinding
- recreation of basic ONCC properties (incl. shooting inaccuracy)
- spawn AI
  (V)
h2h-specific animations
- startle
- stun
- knockdown
- blowup
- got hit animation
  - got hit animation (CBPM-specific)
- throws mechanics
- follow me command, stop command
- alarm behavior
CBPM-specific bullet hit behavior
add effects via ONIE-TMBD-MTRL mini complex
driving a truck
BSL equivalent ("Blueprint")
team support (easy methods to make project contributions)
levels of difficulty
- Easy: -20%? health for foes
- Normal
- Hard: +20%? health for foes, foe class upgrade?
- Extreme: shorter reaction times of AI ("killmequick")

powerups on the ground can be destroyed quite easily by projectiles or heavy h2h attacks

ammo -> blast damage and fire

cell -> blast damage and stun effect

hypo -> little blast damage and a cloud of healing gas

shield -> major blast damage

invis -> blinding

LSI -> mission failed ?

- YOLO: Extreme mode plus when player dies he cannot reload that savegame. He has to restart at level 1.
- YOLO +: YOLO plus the games has never been played before. first play after installation. This is a secrete achievement.

Besides from what all should be tested and made, here's a groundwork tutorial: Blueprint 3rd Person Game

It touches pretty much stuff in those 4 hours: getting a character into a level, setting him up as player, the controls, animations cycles, animation blending, animation overlay and attaching physics

You could probably split this thing into three parts: learning the basics, adding stuff from the long feature list (those not already covered by the basics), and tweaking animations controls to behave like Oni 1

Practice notes

Now then if you want to try this do the following.

For content creation you maybe want to use Blender since it is free and available for PC, Mac and Linux.
Install Visual Studio 2017 Community (to write C++ later)
Register at https://www.unrealengine.com/en-US/what-is-unreal-engine-4, while logged in you can download the installer from the upper right corner. (Blue button "DOWNLOAD".)
Start Installer and download Unreal Engine 4.17.1 (It will be about 6 GB. It extracts to 17 GB.)
Learn viewport navigation from the yellow flashing blue hat icon.
Then continue with the videos of the 3rd Person Game tutorials.

Tutorial summary: 3rd Person Game

Incomplete notes...

It seems like there aren't scripts anymore. Blueprint is Visual scripting, you are working with visualized functions, objects, etc. It's more what you can do with the C++ code which also gets compiled.

FBX can contain data for TRBS, TRIA, TRAC, multiple TRAM, materials, textures.

Video ?: Blend Parameter now on the left side.

Keybinding (equivalent to key_config.txt)

Input to move binding (equivalent to StNA)

Support for Keyboard, Mouse (and inverted control), Gamepads and touch

Player camera settings editable (distance holder named "Spring Arm")

Animations

Animation cycles (TRAM - shortcuts)

Transition rules (similar to those in TRAM headers <FromState>, <ToState>)

Blend Space is an heavily enhanced version of <Interpolation>

The animation gets adapted in length AND rotation values. When properly used, transition are nothing less than perfect.

Video 8: Anim Preview Editor is on the right now; Event Graph: right-click for context menu to add missing "Try Get Pawn Owner"

Video 12

Character Blueprint is sort of an ONCC. They aren't exactly equal.

It misses seeing, hearing, weapon skills and more. It has settings for jump, "air control", LOD, shadow, few CHAR events, collision box, tags, ONIE related stuff

EventGraph -> Component -> Mesh -> e.g. Get Material Index

[...]

Selected knowledge

Whenever you edited a Blueprint: compile (F7) and save (Ctrl + S).

Code management

In order to sort things and avoid code duplication I'm trying to spit things for now the following way:

game related code such as a level loading function and menu references goes to the Game Instance
level reladed code such as a Slash Screen fuction goes to the Level blueprint
player realted code such as keyboard inputs go to a custom Player Controller (changeable in the Game Mode)
AI related code goes to the ONCC component blueprint

Videos

Show Intro video: Settings > Project Settings > (Project section) Movies; Wait for Movies to Complete [x] (prevent bug from closing video automatically right after start); Movies Are Skippable [x]; Add element to array, insert an MP4 video with 25 frames per second; Bug: On Windows the mouse cursor will be shown during video playback.

An animated intro would be nice but that's unfeasible for us. Instead ingame cutscenes could be used.

Display video in fullscreen (e.g. for Outro): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W_nSACYTIvY

Icon and Splash Screen

It's not a level splash screen. It's shown when the game starts.

Settings > Project Settings > Platforms > Windows > Splash

Editor Splash, Game Splash

Beneath the Game Icon can be set however I couldn't spot its used location yet. Maybe it will show up later when the game gets "cooked".

Game instance

When we store information in an game instance it won't disappear after loading the next level.

Let's say there is a menu button or hotkey in a pause menu widget to disable hint texts.

Using variables in a widget is a dead end. They are destroyed as soon as we close the widget.

We could save our choice of showing the hint text in the level blueprint but as soon as we proceed to the next level the hint text would be shown again.

So, we go up in the hierarchy and store the information in the game instance.

To make the information really persistent (between game starts or when loading a save game) all we would need to do is saving the information from the game instance to a save game.

Main func

Equivalent to Oni's main func can be found / created in the "Level Blueprint".

Blueprints > Open Level Bluprints

Right-click to open context menu. Search for and add node "Event BeginPlay"

At this point it's empty.

Maybe for testing or learning purposes add another node: "Play Sound 2D".

Change its Sound source to a Sound Cue you made.

Connect the nodes Event BeginPlay with Play Sound 2D.

Blueprints

You can copy-paste blueprints and share them with others in plain text.

Example of an exit function. (In the actual game use Escape key to exit.)

Begin Object Class=/Script/BlueprintGraph.K2Node_InputKey Name="K2Node_InputKey_0"
   InputKey=Escape
   NodePosX=864
   NodePosY=-832
   NodeGuid=99076AC847F4C36E70B54AA78927F135
   CustomProperties Pin (PinId=92DEBC9A43D657DB995617849A0B7927,PinName="Pressed",Direction="EGPD_Output",PinType.PinCategory="exec",PinType.PinSubCategory="",PinType.PinSubCategoryObject=None,PinType.PinSubCategoryMemberReference=(),PinType.PinValueType=(),PinType.ContainerType=None,PinType.bIsMap=False,PinType.bIsSet=False,PinType.bIsArray=False,PinType.bIsReference=False,PinType.bIsConst=False,PinType.bIsWeakPointer=False,LinkedTo=(K2Node_CallFunction_44 BC9E715842362EDD413EF8A39B14F625,),PersistentGuid=00000000000000000000000000000000,bHidden=False,bNotConnectable=False,bDefaultValueIsReadOnly=False,bDefaultValueIsIgnored=False,bAdvancedView=False,bOrphanedPin=False,)
   CustomProperties Pin (PinId=3CDB2A9D40427A0CCFDABF8F090CE41F,PinName="Released",Direction="EGPD_Output",PinType.PinCategory="exec",PinType.PinSubCategory="",PinType.PinSubCategoryObject=None,PinType.PinSubCategoryMemberReference=(),PinType.PinValueType=(),PinType.ContainerType=None,PinType.bIsMap=False,PinType.bIsSet=False,PinType.bIsArray=False,PinType.bIsReference=False,PinType.bIsConst=False,PinType.bIsWeakPointer=False,PersistentGuid=00000000000000000000000000000000,bHidden=False,bNotConnectable=False,bDefaultValueIsReadOnly=False,bDefaultValueIsIgnored=False,bAdvancedView=False,bOrphanedPin=False,)
   CustomProperties Pin (PinId=02AB461F46584F140257A5BC03E90865,PinName="Key",Direction="EGPD_Output",PinType.PinCategory="struct",PinType.PinSubCategory="",PinType.PinSubCategoryObject=ScriptStruct'/Script/InputCore.Key',PinType.PinSubCategoryMemberReference=(),PinType.PinValueType=(),PinType.ContainerType=None,PinType.bIsMap=False,PinType.bIsSet=False,PinType.bIsArray=False,PinType.bIsReference=False,PinType.bIsConst=False,PinType.bIsWeakPointer=False,PersistentGuid=00000000000000000000000000000000,bHidden=False,bNotConnectable=False,bDefaultValueIsReadOnly=False,bDefaultValueIsIgnored=False,bAdvancedView=False,bOrphanedPin=False,)
End Object
Begin Object Class=/Script/BlueprintGraph.K2Node_CallFunction Name="K2Node_CallFunction_44"
   FunctionReference=(MemberParent=Class'/Script/Engine.KismetSystemLibrary',MemberName="QuitGame")
   NodePosX=992
   NodePosY=-832
   NodeGuid=F926936F4422AC469B38B3B6EBAB12BE
   CustomProperties Pin (PinId=BC9E715842362EDD413EF8A39B14F625,PinName="execute",PinToolTip="\nExec",PinType.PinCategory="exec",PinType.PinSubCategory="",PinType.PinSubCategoryObject=None,PinType.PinSubCategoryMemberReference=(),PinType.PinValueType=(),PinType.ContainerType=None,PinType.bIsMap=False,PinType.bIsSet=False,PinType.bIsArray=False,PinType.bIsReference=False,PinType.bIsConst=False,PinType.bIsWeakPointer=False,LinkedTo=(K2Node_InputKey_0 92DEBC9A43D657DB995617849A0B7927,),PersistentGuid=00000000000000000000000000000000,bHidden=False,bNotConnectable=False,bDefaultValueIsReadOnly=False,bDefaultValueIsIgnored=False,bAdvancedView=False,bOrphanedPin=False,)
   CustomProperties Pin (PinId=308342D741456EB59283E7A1B0C7183D,PinName="then",PinToolTip="\nExec",Direction="EGPD_Output",PinType.PinCategory="exec",PinType.PinSubCategory="",PinType.PinSubCategoryObject=None,PinType.PinSubCategoryMemberReference=(),PinType.PinValueType=(),PinType.ContainerType=None,PinType.bIsMap=False,PinType.bIsSet=False,PinType.bIsArray=False,PinType.bIsReference=False,PinType.bIsConst=False,PinType.bIsWeakPointer=False,PersistentGuid=00000000000000000000000000000000,bHidden=False,bNotConnectable=False,bDefaultValueIsReadOnly=False,bDefaultValueIsIgnored=False,bAdvancedView=False,bOrphanedPin=False,)
   CustomProperties Pin (PinId=2EF7797B47E79A543E0AEAB9F7914F98,PinName="self",PinFriendlyName=NSLOCTEXT("K2Node", "Target", "Target"),PinToolTip="Target\nKismet System Library Object Reference",PinType.PinCategory="object",PinType.PinSubCategory="",PinType.PinSubCategoryObject=Class'/Script/Engine.KismetSystemLibrary',PinType.PinSubCategoryMemberReference=(),PinType.PinValueType=(),PinType.ContainerType=None,PinType.bIsMap=False,PinType.bIsSet=False,PinType.bIsArray=False,PinType.bIsReference=False,PinType.bIsConst=False,PinType.bIsWeakPointer=False,DefaultObject="/Script/Engine.Default__KismetSystemLibrary",PersistentGuid=00000000000000000000000000000000,bHidden=True,bNotConnectable=False,bDefaultValueIsReadOnly=False,bDefaultValueIsIgnored=False,bAdvancedView=False,bOrphanedPin=False,)
   CustomProperties Pin (PinId=E5668388474ABD86D0C505AE22C65ECB,PinName="WorldContextObject",PinToolTip="World Context Object\nObject Object Reference",PinType.PinCategory="object",PinType.PinSubCategory="",PinType.PinSubCategoryObject=Class'/Script/CoreUObject.Object',PinType.PinSubCategoryMemberReference=(),PinType.PinValueType=(),PinType.ContainerType=None,PinType.bIsMap=False,PinType.bIsSet=False,PinType.bIsArray=False,PinType.bIsReference=False,PinType.bIsConst=False,PinType.bIsWeakPointer=False,PersistentGuid=00000000000000000000000000000000,bHidden=True,bNotConnectable=False,bDefaultValueIsReadOnly=False,bDefaultValueIsIgnored=False,bAdvancedView=False,bOrphanedPin=False,)
   CustomProperties Pin (PinId=8E90ECF5471A7E7EA51527B95CA238F9,PinName="SpecificPlayer",PinToolTip="Specific Player\nPlayer Controller Object Reference\n\nThe specific player to quit the game. If not specified, player 0 will quit.",PinType.PinCategory="object",PinType.PinSubCategory="",PinType.PinSubCategoryObject=Class'/Script/Engine.PlayerController',PinType.PinSubCategoryMemberReference=(),PinType.PinValueType=(),PinType.ContainerType=None,PinType.bIsMap=False,PinType.bIsSet=False,PinType.bIsArray=False,PinType.bIsReference=False,PinType.bIsConst=False,PinType.bIsWeakPointer=False,PersistentGuid=00000000000000000000000000000000,bHidden=False,bNotConnectable=False,bDefaultValueIsReadOnly=False,bDefaultValueIsIgnored=False,bAdvancedView=False,bOrphanedPin=False,)
   CustomProperties Pin (PinId=FDCA728E4AFA5A2ABEA52A88B5B79FEA,PinName="QuitPreference",PinToolTip="Quit Preference\nEQuitPreference Enum",PinType.PinCategory="byte",PinType.PinSubCategory="",PinType.PinSubCategoryObject=Enum'/Script/Engine.EQuitPreference',PinType.PinSubCategoryMemberReference=(),PinType.PinValueType=(),PinType.ContainerType=None,PinType.bIsMap=False,PinType.bIsSet=False,PinType.bIsArray=False,PinType.bIsReference=False,PinType.bIsConst=False,PinType.bIsWeakPointer=False,DefaultValue="Quit",PersistentGuid=00000000000000000000000000000000,bHidden=False,bNotConnectable=False,bDefaultValueIsReadOnly=False,bDefaultValueIsIgnored=False,bAdvancedView=False,bOrphanedPin=False,)
End Object
Begin Object Class=/Script/UnrealEd.EdGraphNode_Comment Name="EdGraphNode_Comment_7"
   NodePosX=816
   NodePosY=-880
   NodeWidth=490
   NodeHeight=230
   NodeComment="Exit"
   NodeGuid=92DC2D0B492925CE0957EB865A535520
End Object

Cameras

Third Person View

Right after testing the vanilla Third Person Character template in UE you will notice that the camera can be fully moved around the player character.

In Oni the orbiting is limited. IMO this added to Oni's unique vibe. Hand-to-hand combat felt more realistic because you can't really see behind your back.

Part I

To reproduce the same behavior you have to silent the mouse controls on some conditions.

In theory the core function would hold these parts:

check for camera's rotation relative to the character (if rotation exceeds limits the input gets nullified)
check for left turn mouse rotation to get out of camera's right side maximum
check for right turn mouse rotation to get out of camera's left side maximum

In practice I tweaked the facing value so that is always below 180 degrees (e.g. -270 becomes 90). That way following code only needs the later 2 of 3 checks.

https://1drv.ms/t/s!Asn4fV_yvODigUAfQ-spWYnvi1pV

Part II

During the BeginPlay Event you can set nodes to limit the camera pitch (up and down movement).

https://1drv.ms/t/s!Asn4fV_yvODigT8xJ35jXaxFlD35

Part III

Oni's second unique feature of its Third Person View is the look mode. It shifts the mouse rotation control from the body to the head.

By that you can look to the side while keep running forward.

Part IV

The limited mouse controls feel clumsy as long as the character can turn around by pressing the "walk backwards" key.

We need changes so that the character actually walks backwards and does NOT turn around.

Music

Sound files extracted with OniSplit aren't compatible, you have to convert them to 16-bit PCM wav again. Audacity works well for that.

The OSBD properties can be recreated by turning the sound into a cue and then adding BluePrint logic to it.

UE4 is unable to seamlessly loop sound parts which is a requirement for playing permutations. However, almost every Oni modder imports complete soundtracks, so it's not that much of a loss.

Example:

Import two wav files to the content browser. Right-click one to "Create Cue". Double-click that created Cue.

Add "Wave Player", "Enveloper", "Random", and "Looping" nodes.

Set a wave file for each new Wave Player.

Select all and press "C" to group them in a comment. That way you better remember what it does and can move the stuff around all at once.

Meshes

Custom collision boxes

In an 3D editor create collision objects and name it beginning with "UCX_". Save objects and collision objects together in one FBX file.

On import, uncheck "Auto Generate Collision".

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YxVFChB3oxY

Reimports

Since OniSplit outputs 3D meshes mostly as Collada (DAE) - and few as Wavefront (OBJ) - you cannot transfer objects from Oni to UE4 directly.

You either need the FBX converter or Blender to convert the Collada to FBX file format.

Also the scaling is too small. Use a factor of 10 to fix it. If we wanted to do a mass-import we would need a tool or a Blender script that alters the DAE (XML) data in advance. Also boxes do only have 5 sides. Writing a macro to fix that would be more spicy. I'm not sure if it is worth the effort to write one.

Tips and tricks:

Reset pivot of meshes (V)

Sockets

You can't socket static meshes. Set them to be "movable".

For now each socket will need its own bool variable to keep track whether it is in use or not.

Problem: when we use this node "get overlapping actors" then also actors stored in sockets will be counted. We would need to subtract the ones from the others. To differentiate the items we could check for a new variable "UsedInSocket". If the number is higher than -1 we can subtract it from the overlapping items because we already have this one collected.

Powerups

Tested in 4.18

If powerups don't spam the area they should fall to the ground after use. They should be throwable and kickable to attract the attention of foes.

Maybe there should be a weight penalty to motivate h2h combat. As less items you carry around as faster, powerful and agile you are. Reminded to Ultra saiyan vs Super saiyan?

Done stuff

All powerup "glowtex" textures has been recreated in higher resolution.
Pickup materials use emissive color to be actual "glowtex".
Pickup event executes a preflight to check for valid objects. For example it will determine whether your pickup slots for hypos are all full or not. In a second step only one of the valid pickups is added to the inventory.
Slots in the character skeleton will be used for further experiments. Pickups will be stored in belt and chest pockets. (Short one-hand weapons (e.g. pistols) are going to be holstered at the legs while rifles are put on the back.)
Powerups in sockets are scaled down and their glowtex becomes disabled.

Possible improvements

If powerups use the same names for their inner components (TV, glowtex plane, item mesh) then the code could maybe be simplified with an "interface blueprint" which take some inputs and gives them to all powerups that are bound to that interface. That would be useful when adding more items and weapons.

Glowtex functionality

In Powerup BP: Custom event with boolean input parameter

Other nodes:

Set Visibility (New Visibility) (target: glowtex Plane object)

Static Mesh Component-> AddLocalOffset

Powerup Item -> Add local Rotation, Set World Scale 3D

Swappable Glowtex

In order to indicate ammo state of weapon a dynamic material can be used.

right-click texture node to turn it into a parameterized node
code to changed texture at runtime
ingame result

Hyposprays

Object creation

In this attempt the glow texture was applied to a plane that is attached to the hypo mesh. Right now the actual hypo mesh is just a placeholder made of a cuboid with green ellipses. The transparency seemed to make it darker than expected so I added some input to the material's emissive color. See gallery below.

hypo material blueprint
hypo object blueprint
ingame result

Functionality implementation

In the following there is code that let's you pickup Hyposprays (1 + 2) and use them to regain health (3 + 4).

Caution: This script is different from the others as the the pickup key press event is located in the level blueprint. Normally key press events are found in the the character blueprint. We will probably want to change that in a future version though I don't know how yet. --paradox-01 (talk) 21:03, 16 December 2017 (CET)

If you add a trigger volume to your hypospray object it will act like a new collision box. This can be used to adds some tolerance to the pickup distance. Otherwise the character has to be not just really close but to actually overlap the object.

Code: Press key to pickup hypo
Code: Adds hypo to inventory
Code: Press key to apply hypo
Code: Increases health via hypo

Youtube: Oni UE4 Test #2 - picking up hyposprays and using them

Todo

new hypo object mesh
pickup animations (kneel and take, take, "roll-take")
condition to prevent pickup with certain animations
new sounds ("cannot pickup more", "usage")
health bar interaction
- flashing animation
- start red health area with a higher health value
- improve code where HypoRegenerationRate adds in to avoid rounding errors

HUD

Mouse cursor

Tested in v4.18

You need three things for a custom mouse cursor:

a texture, likewise with transparency, ergo in PNG format
a widget blueprint with and image element where you plug in that texture
a change in the project settings

In the project settings go to Engine > User Interface > Software Cursors.

Add a new software cursor with "Default" option and pick your newly create cursor widget as map element.

The cursor might act strange in the editor's play mode. This should go away as soon as you test it via Lunch.

Finetune the widget image by moving it in the upper left corner. If its size is 32x32 then use the half (16) for the X and Y positioning.

Note of warning: DPI scaling doesn't seem to affect the mouse cursor at all.

Health bar

Tested in 4.18

Observation from Oni 1 vanilla health bar. If base health is 200 points...

remaining health is flashing at 60 points every 2s one time
remaining health is flashing at 1 point every 1s two times
critical health sound loop at 39 points (minimum sound volume)
critical health sound loop at 1 point (max. sound volume)
health drain animation from 200 to 1 health points takes 5s
health gain animation speed is determined by HypoRegenerationRate in ONCC
overpower health gain animation has an overpower sound of an approximate volume of 75% while overpower sound is played at 100% volume once overpower gain ended and drops again

Health calculation

An applied hypo gives you points equal to your full normal health health. At this point of time these points should be considered a "potential" because they aren't multiplied yet with hypo factors and can increase or decrease by additional healing and damage events.

As long as you regenerate normal health you regenerate from your potential multiplied by 0.25 (Oni 1 default).

As soon as you reach overhealth you multiply one point of potential by 1 (Oni 1 default).

Let's say your maximum health is 1000 and with overhealth you are at 2000.

Taking 2 hypos at health 750 will regenerate you 250 points of normal health and then - because reaching overhealth - you get another 1000 points. So taking 2 hypos at 750 health points will let you reach 2000.

A calculation with "potential" give you the advantage to stack hypos more easily.

Color mapping

health bar material where color, shape and progress merge

integrating a color zone on the health bar

UE4's progress bar has a fixed range of 0 to 1. In order to realize overpower values (float 1.0 to 2.0) we have to scale everything down to fit into a 0 to 100 percentage range.

If we think of the different colors as milestones on a road whereby each milestone is named red, yellow and so on then each two stones span their own area of interpolated colors. So for UE4's "Lerp (LineraColor)" we would will need several alpha ranges, always float values from 0 to 1.

Health mapping

Health and overhealth points have different densities which results in different grow speeds on the artwork.

To recreate a similar behavior we can let the normals health points fill the health bar with a speed of 1.5 while overpower is the sum of normal health * 1.5 plus health over 100% * 0.5. Since the the health bar isn't a full circle we tweaking the second factor to about 0.44.

Animations

Anywhere from 0 to 20% health the bar is flashing to indicate damage.
While regenerating the health bar is slowly increasing while a transparent area indicates how much the regeneration will be. That zone is color-interpolated on current health.
Taken damage is indicated by instantly dropped health while a transparent area is melting to the new health value.

So, both - present and past/future health - use animations.

To deal with the transparent areas it might be the easiest to add another object to the health bar. In total we have then three: a frame texture, a "future/past health" material, and a "present health" material.

How to increase values over time? It looks like "timeline" don't have inputs for start and end time and timers don't work in character BP. Even loops are problematic: if they contain a delay node it is simply ignored. The solution seems to be a custom event. Once triggered it will increase or decrease the health value and call itself again if the certain conditions are still true. The animation seem smooth enough with a 0.1 second delay.

Health bar recreation

There are two options to create a mask: a computed texture (vector) or a real texture designed in a image editor.

For color changes we would need a dynamic material in any case.

In the following sub section there are the required steps to achieve a health display meter.

Texture

Basically the mask (shape) of the health display meter.

This will be used as a node inside the material.

[...]

Material

Create Material Blueprint, Set output node to Material Domain: User interface (!), create a constant 4 Vector, right-click to turn it into a Parameter and name it Color, connect to output node

Widget

Right-click in assets folder to create a new widget (User Interface > Widget Blueprint).
Place an image into your Designer. This is going to be the health display meter.
Under Appearance choose your Material.

Turning the Material in a dynamic one and setting initial color... Create variable of type "Material Instance Dynamic", create 2 vector variables (rgb red, rgb green, use 0 to 1 range). Then in In your widget goto Graph and add these nodes to your Construct and Custom event...

Construct event -> Get HealthImage, Get Dynamic Material, set Dynamic Material variable, Get Player Character, Cast to ThirdPersonCharacter, Target MaxHealth, Set Progress (call function)

Custom event -> Set Progress (with a float input), Get Dynamic Material, Set Vector Parameter Value (Parameter name ("Color") from your material), add lerp(linearColor) to SVPV node, add vector color variables to lerp node (here we can add more logic to recreate ONGS' <Color> tags)

Displaying the widget to screen and creating a reference ...

In your Character BP create or add these to the BeginPlay event node:
- Get Player Controller, Create Widget (your health bar widget), Add to Viewport, set output Create Widget to a public variable (object) (use search to find widget)

Setting progress on the HUD... In Character PB ...

event ..., get widget object variable, Set Progress (Target: var, Input: Health Percentage)

[...]

Widgets

For testing purposes H key is used to show the pause menu. F1 will let the Unreal Editor switch wireframe mode.

Any key can be used to open a menu. But when the game gets paused too then pressing the same key again cannot close the menu.

You need to set the key's property "Execute when Paused" to true.

Also, in theory a "Flipflop" node would work but has proven unreliable. Instead, a reference to the menu instead, an "Is Visible" and a "Branch" (if) node will do the trick. Additionally, an Is Valid node is placed to catch an error when the reference is used for the very first time.

We can capture the mouse within the game application if we place an "Set Input Mode Game And UI" node with "Lock Always" option.

Button and section images

Styles

Buttons have 4 styles: Normal, Hovered, Pressed, Disabled.

For now lets use only 2 textures: one for Normal, one for Hovered and Pressed.

The Disabled style just uses a tint color on the Normal texture with an RGBA of 000000FF.

Buttons can be disabled via Set Is Enabled (Target is Widget). You can get button references from the Graph window.

Scaling

When you place a Grid Panel into the widget you can define columns and rows. Buttons and other elements can adapt to their given space.

You probably want to set button texture property Draw As to Image.

For standalone images Draw As Border can be used if the image is big enough. This will work like Oni's XML:PSpc where only specific sections of the image are scaled.

For extreme different resolutions we might need to bind different textures so Draw As Border won't produce empty spaces in the center.

Text pages

For now I see 3 major flaws with text items:

no richtext support (you are limited to one font color, unless you use a C++ plugin)
text warping is not accurately working
space for an image has to be planned in advance

Text vs text box

Because of the multiline feature I rushed to use a text box for static text.

Reminder: While "Text" is for static text, "Text box" is for letting the user type his own text.

It turns out the font color of "Text box" cannot be changed at runtime and a simple "Text" object does also has the multi-line feature.

Dynamic text content

We can either use

A) the "Set Text" node with a reference to the object or

B) bind the object to a text variable or function, making the code a bit shorter

// ------------------------------------ move this to Pause Menu section at a later time

When you insert text you have to compile (F7) before you see the result.

Text pages can be grouped in the Designer with a Widget Switcher. However, each text should have an Overlay as parent so they aren't all shown simultaneously.

-- WidgetSwitcher (master section, e.g. for "Main content")
 +-- WidgetSwitcher (section, e.g. for powerup items)
   +-- Overlay 
     +-- Text (e.g. hypospray text)
     +-- Image (e.g. hypospray icon)
-- WidgetSwitcher (master section, e.g. for "hint text")
 +-- WidgetSwitcher (section, e.g. for powerup item hints)
   +-- Overlay
     +-- Text (e.g. hypospray hint text)

Count direct children of WidgetSwitcher by using the its reference connected to a Get Num Widget node.

It's possibly a good idea to count all sections during the construction event and save the results in an array via Make Array node.

In theory we could create many copies of Overlay nodes. But doing so and future update would mean more work than necessary. Instead a single overlay with its children can be do the job by assigning data to them from a data table.

Variables that track active pages are destroyed as the widget is closed. If we want to resume reading after reopening a menu the variable values should have been copied to somewhere else. If we put them into character variable then we can easily restore those values even after a level loading.

// ---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Bulk import

HTF do I? Import a CSV File into a Data Table ( UE4 )

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nMy6H1o1zO0

Summary:

if you need a free spreadsheet program you can download Calc, it is part of LibreOffice, or use Google Sheets
create a csv file with the first cell of first column (A1) being empty and the other lower cells (A2, A3, ...) to be unique in name
Calc: save file, check "edit filter settings", save csv with comma as field delimiter
in ue4 goto "Add New" > Blueprints > Structure
open that Struct and add for all columns (except for A) a variable, assign a type for each
be sure Struct's variables have the same name as the csv column headers
import the csv and assign the Struc to it
data tabes can be updated by reimporting the csv

CSV file for the data table to import. LevelNumber makes it possible to bookmark pages for levels.

Example:

for now diary (DPge) will have this structure

levelNumber = Integer
pageNumber = Integer
isLearnedMove = Integer
caption = String
image = Texture 2D
diaryText = String

Stuff that might be useful later...

Importing data tables is cool but unfortunately I haven't see a way to create text and image fields programmatically to the editor. --paradox-01 (talk) 22:52, 11 February 2018 (CET)

Then again maybe this will do: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e8MPDnVX1h4

If not I will try to just use one text field for diaryText, etc.

If textures aren't found in the data table, open them once from the asset browser. It seems there's a bug which prevents new textures from being registered properly until they were accessed for the first time.

Pause menu

Objective pages

Objective pages are level specific.

Optional small image.

Main and hint section holds green text (todo) and red text (done).

Item pages

Main section: Small image plus orange text.

Image
Name .............. Function
Text

Hint section: orange text.

Weapon pages

Main section: Small image plus orange text.

Image
Attribute .......... value
Text

Hint section: orange text.

Diary page

Diary pages are global -- in a manner that the latest date would get you all other diary pages as well.

Sub types:

"New move" page: main window for orange caption and a big image. Explanation in the hint section, white text.
"Regular diary" page: main section only, white text.

Help page

Green text for main section and explanation. Hint section not shown. "Controls" Action .............. Mouse/Key

And explanation overlaying the UI.

Animations

Key binding

Every key can be used in blueprints. In order to allow key remapping by the player keys should be mapped in the setting instead of using detecting their real key stroke.

Goto Project Settings > Engine > Input.

Name your action or axis, then bind a key to it.

Interaction

Requirements: typically a variable in the Character BP. For example you can set "IsPickingUp?" to true with a "Q" button "Pressed" action and setting it to false with the "Released" action.

Then in Character Animation BP > EventGraph there should be a "Event Blueprint Update Animation". There you retrieve "IsPickingUp?" and save it in a local variable. You can retrieve variables from other blueprints by getting the object holding them, passing it to a cast node, pulling a wire out of the right side and search for it in the popping up context menu.

Then in Character Animation BP > Anim Graph > Default State Machine you pull out from Idle/Run a wire and create a new state.

In the transition rule for Idle to Pickup create two nodes: The local variable IsPickingUp and the "Result - Can Enter Transition".

In the transition rule for Pickup to Idle create three nodes: The local variable IsPickingUp, a boolean "NOT" and the "Result - Can Enter Transition".

Now the character plays the animation as long as you press the key. If you want to play the full animation just by pressing the button firmly you have to use a slightly different setup. Use these three nodes instead: "Time Remaining (ratio)"(Animation name), float > float node, Result node.

The float 0 to 1 means how much of the animation will play before it is aborted if the key wasn't longer pressed. In this case, the lower check float the more of the animation is played. Use a number greater than 0 like 0.001

To disable other input you have to create another variable in the Character BP with is also retrieved in the Character Animation BP by casting.

In this example it was named "Movement Allowed". The event that sets and resets the variable was created in the Animation.

Every animation can have Notifies events. Right-click notifies track to add a new custom notify.

Normal maps

Can be created in Photoshop (3D) and Blender.

BSL equivalents

print

Level Blueprint, right-click to search for "Keyboard Event V", add that node, drag the "Pressed" slot to the backgound to create another node: "Print String". Compile. Close.

Play Level, hit "V". "Hello" appears on the screen.

Use you imagination: This could be used to toggle visibility of developer stuff. In connection with a HUD you could create the equivalent of "chr_debug_characters = 1"

Cooking the game

On Windows, run the game editor with administration rights.

Then go: File > Package Project > Windows > Windows (64-bit).

Choose an output folder.

You can now play the game.

https://answers.unrealengine.com/questions/37357/how-do-i-create-a-exe-of-my-game.html

Exit the game

Create two nodes in level blueprints: "input keyboard escape" and "quit game". Connect the execution slots.

Videos

Those videos are merely video proofs that a certain feature can be made by us with this engine. Not more, not less.

Oni UE4 experiment 1 - Main Menu, HUD, Fall damage

Oni UE4 experiment 2 - picking up hyposprays and using them

Oni UE4 experiment 3 - optional glowtex, animation binding, character sockets

Comment

Glowtex can be disabled if we need to. Though I think the majority of the modders wants a non-visible "hammerspace" inventroy.

The pickup animation from "Character Interaction" is too slow for Oni's fast pace. Also the animation needs tweaking so that it better interpolates to the idle anim.

Restless Souls/Wishlist

Oni 2 game

Engine

Features

Primary Daodan traits

Secondary Daodan traits

Improved movement set and h2h

Miscellaneous

Oni 2 game tech demo with Unreal Engine 4

Goal

Stuff that is probably coverd by the tech demo

Practice notes

Tutorial summary: 3rd Person Game

Selected knowledge

Code management

Videos

Icon and Splash Screen

Game instance

Main func

Blueprints

Cameras

Third Person View

Music

Meshes

Custom collision boxes

Reimports

Sockets

Powerups

Glowtex functionality

Swappable Glowtex

Hyposprays

HUD

Mouse cursor

Health bar

Texture

Material

Widget

Widgets

Button and section images

Text pages

Bulk import

Pause menu

Objective pages

Item pages

Weapon pages

Diary page

Help page

Animations

Key binding

Interaction

Normal maps

BSL equivalents

print

Cooking the game

Exit the game

Videos

Navigation menu

Search