Can you make bones dangle?

[Jakuryusei]

Get your mind out of the gutter!

 

I just want my character to have a tail, and I'm not quite sure if I want to animate it specifically or not. Ideally, I think I'd make the first bone in the tail idly flick back and forth every so often, while the rest wring automatically beneath it, but I don't know if that's really possible... or how to go about it.

 

Here's some art of the species, to give you an idea what I have in mind. It's a bit dated now, but it's not too irksome aside from the male's double length thunderthighs.

[nate066]

I think it would be better to animate it if its apart of a character. You can use multiple methods including physics(in the animation software) or a curve/ik deform.

[YouGroove]

Physics in LE3 are super limited. You'll have to animate yourself things like tails, hair, capes or such things.

[Jakuryusei]

Fair enough! On ears, can you make two animations run at the same time? It'd be neat if the twitches were seemingly random to the player.

 

I'd run a test but... I'm still trying to figure out how to model some bits of it. I'm pretty good with blender and sculptris artistically, I'm just still planning how I'm going to set up stuff. Lots a' stuff. Too many things! I figure it's better to stay in planning mode until I'm %100 certain where I'm going with this.

 

I might as well pick the brains of more experienced people, I would think!

[YouGroove]

I'm pretty good with blender and sculptris artistically, I'm just still planning how I'm going to set up stuff. Lots a' stuff. Too many things! I figure it's better to stay in planning mode until I'm %100 certain where I'm going with this.

I would recommend you to go little step by little.

Here is what i do mainly in a project game :

- Make and test custom specific features you need in the engine first , like your animation specific needs, specific customization ( no need to go further if you can't have your specific stuff)

- Code player control and gameplay first with simple level prototype (cubes or BSP are good for that like placeholder characters) , than code AI and interactive stuff

-Make a basic menu to manage new game/quit

- Iterative level design : replace texture and models, bring effects , make bigger levels.

 

I would the first step to be effective is to draw sketches a lot before making the game , like levels disposition, town, HUD screen , characters details and colors etc ... sketches or write keywords for the game system like exploring, icons, combat , point & click etc ... The more you are precise in what to do , faster you will create textures, level, characters.

 

 

Fair enough! On ears, can you make two animations run at the same time? It'd be neat if the twitches were seemingly random to the player.

Yes, you can combine animations, like mixing individual ears or tail animations with any other animation like walk,idle, run ,combat.

You can looks at this game that Rick made :

http://www.leadwerks.com/werkspace/files/file/492-bombkiller/

Look at the animations of the player and how they are combined in in the code ( "3dperson.lua" script )

 

Good luck.

[Jakuryusei]

Ohh, oh! Thanks, I needed that link I think!

 

Personally, for notes I usually use google docs and draw.oi. Branching dialogue is heeella easy when you're working with flowcharts like that, and you can even include character portraits if you import images into the flowchart. It makes things beautifully simple and steamlined, much faster than sketching on paper.