Invector Combat Melee Template OR Opsive Third Person Controller

kitsune_14

Leaving my last question up, because I still want to know the answer to it, I decided to go with TPC. I just bought because ultimately, my goal is to create 3rd person games in AC. I'm just going to have to learn how to set-it up with AC.

I'll be back later to talk about how it's working with AC!

kitsune_14

@Deckard_89 Can I ask you a question? You said you are using TPC with Adventure Creator and it works fine, using the bridge. Can you describe for me how you set things up, if you don't mind?

I followed the steps on about the Bridge Script just fine. If I were just setting up a scene using only TPC, everything runs fine. I add in AC and put on Player on the Player Character(which adds Paths.) I set the animation engine to custom and motion control to manual. INSTEAD of removing the character from the scene, I leave it in the scene. If I do NOT specify a starting camera, make my Player in the settings manager of AC the prefab of the Player Char in my scene, set movement to control and navigation to unity, I am able to move as if I just had TPC running and get no errors.

This is as far as I've gotten as when I try to run a cutscene on start, the cutscene works fine, but after it ends, I don't get my TPC. I'm basically trying to figure out how to run a cutscene on Start, then after cutscene ends, regain control of TPC. I'm suspecting I have the settings wrong in AC and the settings of my camera wrong for starters.

I think the core of my question is: What do you think is wrong with the set-up/how did you do it? It seems like most people wanting to use AC and TPC together want to have 3rd person control power and then retain cutscene power to AC, yet there is no simple answer to this question. I'm wondering if it's because it requires serious scripting to disable AC unless there is a cutscene, in which case, it becomes active.

Deckard_89

@kitsune_14: What are you actually doing in the cutscene - are you disabling player movement and forgetting to use an action to re-enable it?

You say you "don't get my TPC." Do you mean player movement or camera control?

 For the camera, you should make a new one (besides the main camera) and check what components are on it. I forget which, but with TPC there are things like camera monitor, camera controller etc. Only one is required for the Main Camera I believe (I'm not at my computer to check), so open the integration sample provided by Opsive and copy what they have done there to get set up.

Generally though, I'd set up the project with Adventure Creator first, then build your TPC character. I doubt it matters, but that's what I've done.

Also ensure you've used the setup scene functions of both assets; for AC it's in the game editor I think, whereas TPC is in the drop down menu along with the Character and Item Builders. You should have a "Game" object added in your scene by TPC, it handles decals etc.

This is all from memory though, as I said I'm not currently at my computer.

kitsune_14

@Deckard_89 Thanks for coming back and responding. I saw that you had commented a while ago in the Opsive forum regarding AC+TPC, and it seems like you wanted to do at lease one thing like me: use the save, cutscene, inventory and menu systems of AC while retaining the use of TPC for control and combat.

I'm curious as to any major challenges you while doing this, and how you solved them. I want to keep this thread public so other people who may have the same problems can come here and read this. There is really nothing on this topic other than the Bridge set-up.

So back to the question you asked me: I disable movement in the cutscene, but at the very end, I re-enable again. It doesn't seem to be a movement issue at all. It looks like I'm having camera issues. You described the set-up process to me, and fortunately, I've done all of that as you've said - with the exception of a second camera. I don't really understand how to implement the second camera. Instead of asking the wrong questions, would you tell me how would you solve this specific problem using TPC+AC?

When hitting play, the games starts with an AC cutscene.

1. In the cutscene, there is a fixed camera and some dialog between two players, with the PLAYER CHAR restrained from movement.

2.Then, while still midway through the cutscene, there is a camera switch and more dialog. The PLAYER CHAR remains restrained from movement.

3.The cutscene then ends. The person playing the game now has control over the player, and TPC has taken over with it's camera and system.

4.The person playing the game goes up to an armor rack to pick up a weapon. The armor rack is aa AC hotspot.

5.A sword is added to the inventory.

I am having an issue with all of these steps. If I can make these 5 steps work, I think I'll understand how TPC and AC work together because I believe I'm doing something wrong in the set-up.

One other thing: Using TPC's Item Builder, I tried to add a Bow of the Bow Item Type. The problem was when I tried to remove my character from the scene, as you would with AC. When my character spawns, it does not have it's item loadout. How do you get around that.

Thanks for any help you can give!

Deckard_89

Hmm, for the camera I think I just duplicated the main camera, renamed it Character Camera or something like that, and removed the Main Camera script that Adventure Creator adds. Then add a camera script component (AC). On your Main Camera, remove Camera Handler and Camera Controller, so that only Camera Monitor remains.

When you say there is dialog between two players I assume you mean two characters: the player and an NPC. I do not have conversations going yet, but I definitely have camera switching actions going on when picking up items to add to the inventory. All I did was camera switch to change to a static camera, then return back to my camera before the interaction is over by checking "Return to last gameplay" in the second camera switch action. I also have an Engine wait action for like 0.1 seconds before returning to normal gameplay.

As for TPC items and inventory - I haven't got that far yet, this is where it gets tricky because, in my case at least, I want to have the TPC weapons displayed in my Adventure Creator Inventory. So to do this, you have to add an item to your AC inventory (easy enough) but also add the item to your TPC inventory to actually be able to use it. So, you have your TPC inventory that is sort of "hidden behind the scenes" and your AC inventory which the player will actually use to equip weapons etc. This is why I'm investigating Dialogue System, I was looking through the documentation and there are Lua functions to add items to the inventory, heal your character etc. Very useful, but I can't comment on how easy it will be yet.

I think you'll sort out the initial problem with the cutscene eventually, after that you're pretty much the same as me. I don't have much time lately though due to pretty much being worked to death, but I work on my game when I can. Maybe you'll get the weapons and stuff up and running before me, and if so, I'm all ears.

>-

kitsune_14

Hmm. So, for every game camera that you make, you duplicate the main camera - the one TPC makes? Then with the duplicates, you untag them as main cam, add an Ac camera script, and remove everything relating to TPC except for the camera monitor? Those are the ones you're using as static cams to do camera switches? ~OR~ do you mean you just did the previous steps for your ONE main camera? The one tagged main camera? And you just have basic static cameras the way they are by default in AC, and those are the ones you're using for scenes and then switching back to former, that main camera? I'm trying to determine if I am suppose to do the former or the latter.

I'll get back to the topic on inventory with you once I try it again, later today. I am trying to handle the camera for starters.

Deckard_89

@kitsune_14: The latter. I only duplicated the main camera once, to create the character camera (the same as the sample provided by Opsive, I suggest you take a look at it if you're still having trouble). My static cams are just AC created through the game editor, like you would with hotspots, player markers etc. I used "simple camera" for example for the static camera I switched to during the interaction.

kitsune_14

I give up. TPC is script-heavy if you want to integrate it with AC. It isn't really compatible. It doesn't crash when you try to run the two together, but unless you know AC's scripting API really well, you can't really do what you need to do.If you're using them separately, they are just fine, but together, there is no documentation and it's too hard to do anything beyond just getting your character to walk around and play animations.

Someone please prove me wrong. I'm thankful for the bridge, but because of the inventory system and the camera situation, it's unclear what I'm supposed to do in the settings too.

kitsune_14

Ignore the last post. I didn't give up all the way yet...

What I said is true...it's very hard to get this to work together. Howwever, I found that I could create two main cameras. One is the ADV creator main and the other one, TPC main. ADV main is a prefab of the adventure creator camera. It is nothing but that prefab. The other camera is that prefab, with all my image effects added, plus the default setup given by TPC 'Game' option in the Start toolbar.

To that, I added an ADV creator First Person Camera (script). Why did I do that? Because all Adventure creator cameras must have an adventure creator camera component, it seems. However, there are only two to chose from and the other one, _camera, froze my character transforms. Not sure why that is, but anyway, that is my workaround thus far.

Now I'm going to try adding multiple cameras and seeing how I can manage those with both AC and TPC running.

Alverik

Ummm, the problem is, this goes beyond just the character control, which the integration is intended to cover. Linking the inventories will probably need some custom actions, and it will probably require a way to handle both inventories at the same time (Inventory pro has also been mostly left out from AC for the same predicament). There's still no easy way to connect AC's inventory to other inventory systems.

This is one of those cases were you would probably be better off getting some advice from the devs. You could ask Opsive, or someone in their forums, to give you some code example of how another system could control their inventory under the hood (or get in sync with it), then you could come back to the AC forums to see what we can do with the example. I can't really give you any more ideas right now, because I don't know anything about TCP's API...

kitsune_14

Yes, I have been running into some very serious problems indeed. I requested help over in the TPC forum, and I noticed that developer is really quick to respond to questions that same day, within the hour even.

@Alverik Those are good suggestions about asking for coding examples. I'm a little stuck right now to be frank, so I haven't got much to say other than I have no idea how I am ever going to get the systems working together, inventory and character control, to do what I want within the game. At this point, I would be happy with improvising so that I can set up my own health, own enemies, all independent of TPC, and just stick a trigger on the end of a sword to decrement health, along with my own script for doing so. If I can just use TPC inventory to ONLY keep track of my weapons, and isolate  those weapons from the AC ionventory, I think everything could work. Those are my thoughts but I don't have the greatest confidence that it's the best option.

EDIT: The reason why I want to use TPC to keep track of weapons is that it has the built-in system to do so, and it would make sense to not think of them as 'inventory' per say, but almost as something collected once and retained permanently. Think of, for example, in a JRPG, when you unlock a clothing or BGM. The inventory system in TPC feels more like an 'unlock when collected' to me, and I'm not even sure if you can drop the items once you obtain them.