Hazrat:
The next hurdle was to create a dynamic camera that could interact with certain scenes for a more cinematic feel to the game. Juxtaposed to the last blueprint, this was rather difficult to set-up correctly as I had to set-up my own trace channel which I wanted to originally use for character mechanics only.
This was an issue due to the fact that UE4 only allows us to use a maximum of 18 additional trace channels. Oh! And trace channels allow the player to constantly trace for a certain object on command whatever distance in relative position to it… a powerful function to have!
Nonetheless I pursued forward with this blueprint. One of the first issues to arise was the camera itself. At first I wanted to allow the player to have his camera boom rotate around him when in contact with certain areas of the map, this proved rather difficult as setting up a second camera inside a character blueprint was something I had not done. However I was willing to learn.
After a week of failed attempts I soon realised that the camera boom was to be deleted and replaced with another boom that allowed the follow camera to be referenced correctly. This then allowed me to reference and update the camera on command, allowing us to pan, tilt and zoom.
This too was set-up with a trace channel and later a timeline function to make the transition smoother.
Nevertheless, this then messed up the character control as it was now moving in an odd way. Something I’m still working on to fix.
The secondary camera was set up to help create a cinematic angle of the room, this was done in the level blueprint however I did run into a lot issues with this. The main issue was the character movement playing up due to the mouse being able to move the position of the player.
Unfortunately I had to cut this blueprint out due to the fact that it made the game unbearably annoying to play…. And it angered me!
James:
At this stage we realized we needed some blueprinting work to be done for the girl character, Olive. She needed to be able to move around and guide the way while you play through the puzzles, with some more interaction possible later in the level. This seemed more suited to the level blueprint as her movement is very area specific. I managed to get her to move as an AI to certain spots when I enter a trigger volume, simple but effective, as this can be used to call other actions the girl can do in the levels like activate a door or hide in a certain spot.
One goal for a certain puzzle was to have the girl climb partially down a ladder with the player moving an object underneath her so she can jump down, unfortunately I couldn’t figure out how to do this but we knew if not the girl had to be able to jump of her own accord as an AI NPC. This I almost managed to do using the navmesh in UE4 and something called Link Proxies which can link two separate areas of the navmesh together, allowing an AI to find it’s way across a gap, but the jumping didn’t work properly… As Olive kept jumping to her death. I had to change the speed of Olive’s movement for now to compensate but this will require a proper solution later on.
I started work on some other simple mechanics which we had on our list, the first one was a simple blueprint for a lantern which lights up when the fire character approaches it. I also created a very rudimentary UI including a start menu and pause menu that Haz could decorate later on.
