December 2024

Situation System Dependances Refactoring

In November's development diary I explained how and why I had to refactor my situation system.
The situation system is used a lot in the game, so I had to update a lot of dependencies.

Firstly, the data structure used to configure the nodes in the editor was changed.
Several parameters in the different nodes in the different situations were lost, so I had to reset the parameters and test all the configurations.

Then a lot of scripts, particularly in the case of artificial intelligence, had to be updated to use and be compatible with the API and the new way in which situations work.

Grab System

I've started work on the new Vore animations and I've had to update my grab system.
As a reminder, I created this grab system following a major refactoring. I talk about it in the March and April development diaries.

For the grab animation I had created a selector that automatically selected the animation to be used.
The module selects a pose to override on the basic animation and the body part to modify depending on the type of character, the object being grabbed and the context, such as whether the character is crouching, standing etc.

The problem was that it didn't leave enough control for specific uses.
For example, it wasn't possible to hold the same type of object in 2 different ways.

Cobble is ‘Grabbed’ by Talas when it is in his beak, via the Grab system.
And that's precisely the problem with Vore because I could only use one pose at a time.
When Cobble is trapped in Talas's beak, an animation selected by the Grab system ensures that Cobble is positioned in his beak and not in his neck.
Cobble's body is pointing towards the exit and in the next update it will be possible for Cobble to be turned towards Talas's throat.

So I had to redo the animation management part.
Now, instead of applying a simple pose, the Grab system applies a whole animation script depending on the object.

(If you're a developer, I use Anim Layers).

Then the animation script itself manages the pose and the part of the body to be modified.
This way I can manage poses and modifications directly in the dedicated animation script without any constraints.

New Vore Animations

Now that the dedicated tools have been updated, I've had more time to concentrate on the animations during this month.

I've made a new animation that allows Talas to catch Cobble directly with his beak on the ground.

As this animation is not procedural at the moment, it will be easy to dodge Talas.

I've added some more advanced animations that allow Talas to turn Cobble over in his beak.

In game with Lumen render:

For the moment I've worked on these animations to get a good result in FPV and TPV views. I'll have to do some more tests for VR.

I've also started up some new teasing animations, allowing Talas to lick Cobble, for example.

Many animations are still in the blocking stage.
Blocking in an animation consists of the basic steps required to visualise the animation with simple poses.

Situation Configs

With the new animations I've revised some of the situation configurations for the Game Master.
I've also added the crouching situation. At the moment Talas can't do anything when he's crouching.