Creating A Targeted Lightning Particle and Weapon

  The Majority of my assets for this semester's Spinout project revolve around my car, the Tesla Model S.  This includes the particles I will need to use for my explosive barrel, my weapon particle, my boosters, and my Unique Selling Point (USP).  Because of this, I need to come up with a system that will target actors that will work on a weapon and other objects.  For my research into a particle, I'm looking into particle behaviors and controlling them to do so.  I'd like to make them perform a little something like this:

This script changes weapon firemode and targeting.

 In order to achieve what I'm setting out to do, like in the video above, the first thing I need to do is change the default FPS character blueprint.  Instead of a single projectile on a trigger pull, it now loops the firing so you can just hold the trigger to fire.  I also had to begin scripting the targeting systems for the behavior of the particle hitting random sectors, while polling for pawns to lock on to.  When a pawn is found the intended behavior is to stay locked and deal damage while locked.  This mechanic is important for my weapon and USP, as the lightning is to deal damage, and is important to my booster because the lightning needs to lock on to give the speed buff in my level.

This is the script for hit/miss

This script controls the behavior of the particle once hits and misses are registered.  In theory this should control the erratic behavior of the lightning, and the spawn of locked particles when in range. Once I can get the weapon behaving properly, I can begin to look at moving it to the USP and Boosters.

In programming my USP I wanted to have the large Tesla coil activate by a lever on the opposite side of the map.  This would potentially let someone behind or ahead trigger the coil and roast the competition.  In order to do this, I had to create a Boolean for a lever being pulled, but to keep it balanced, I decided to add delays to effectively give the activation a "cooldown." 






Once I got the weapon working in a single player environment I transferred it into the Spinout project and began to set it up to work on my vehicles weapon and USP (unique selling point).  The weapon version was an easy transfer as I just had to create new bones and sphere collisions for my particle to generate from.

The Giant Tesla USP was a bit trickier.  Once I got the lever scripted to activate the coil, the map was almost too dormant.  TO fix this I broke off the erratic behavior of the particle, threw a random delay on it, and set it to activate permanently.  This gives the level a nice ambient random lightning discharge.

Exploding Barrel First Pass

I basically changed up my exploding barrel from what it was (the Tesla Coil) to an Edison light bulb.  I have the scripting down for light hits to make it spark and heavy hits to instantly detonate, but I'm having issues figuring out how to make the glass on the bulb shatter pre explosion.  I also plan to add zapping electricity sounds and particle effects rather than the fiery explosion placeholders that are there now.

For now here is my script:

And a video of it in action

Sophomore Spinout 2017: Low Poly Model 2016 Tesla Model S -premod.

If you haven't been able to tell the big project for us this semester is Sophomore Spinout 2017.  Spinout is a game developed by the whole Sophomore class where we choose a car to model, make a thematic racetrack to race, and an arena to battle our cars.  After choosing out cars we have to envision a modded out version of them that is battle ready.  I chose a 2016 Tesla Model S.



 When I was thinking of cars to do I decided to choose one of the most controversial cars on the drag strip.  The Tesla is known for having pure torque and blazing speeds off the line.  This is what led me to come to the decision that the Tesla would likely be super powerful in a multiplayer battle arena, because, in my opinion, battle is much more fun than just racing.

For the concept of my Tesla, instead of making a Mad Max post apocalyptic bruiser like most of the others, I decided my car would be a sci-fi futuristic tactician.  The Tesla utilizes the massive amount of torque to catch enemies, and sticking with the electric car theme, has a Tesla Coil gun that rises out of the frunk to roast them in an aoe lightning arc fashion.  The car features a wider lower body than the base Model S, and will have emissive inserts that change color when hitting an enemy with the coil weapon.


 The coil weapon will be reminiscent of something like this with protective heat\flash shields.  If you start the above video at about 7 minutes you can see the beam shift color on impact with metal.  Hit registration is something I think will set this weapon apart if I can make it work.  We tested previous years' Spinouts and I could not tell when I was hitting the other players or not.



We had to start off with low poly models of our cars.  Below are a couple screenshots of the progress so far.  I was able to pull these off with about 5k triangles, with optimization to come next.

Front Quarter Panel unmodded Low Poly smoothed

A couple issues our teacher noted were angles on the back bumper and headlights, being a bit too sharp and the rear wheel well being a bit too far back.  I will address these in the modding stage as all of those issues are likely to change drastically with the body kit.

Rear Quarter Panel unmodded Low Poly smoothed

Race Track design Brainstorming

After choosing the 2016 Tesla Model S to model as my car for our racing game, I figured I might as well stick with the Tesla theme.  My level Will take place in a futuristic/tron-ish environment, mixed with the insides of electrical components as well as "sci-fi physics." The overall level design is inspired by the original blueprints of a Nikolai Tesla's "Tesla Coil" and has a couple twists that align with it.

I'd really like to make the map extremely contrasted and make most of the light pure electric to go with the theme.

 

Drawing this map in an isometric format proved to be kind of difficult to wrap my head around because it involves view pane shifts but the track is closed course, and in theory fast paced.  I'd like to make it so skilled players can stay permanently boosted.

The Color scheme I've chosen will be electric blue, it's complement, and lightning yellow and it's complement.
 

 

The hazards I'd like to have the player dodge come in the form of multiple arms and ports that lightning will arc from and Light bulbs that explode in this fashion on impact.

Exploding Barrel PrePro

 

 "Lightning Explosions"

 

For our Sophomore Car Game Project at Ringling I'm planning on sticking to my Tesla Theme for my Tesla Model S.  For the exploding barrel we have to design I am thinking of making Tesla coils that link to people who drive by, increase intensity when they get closer, and detonate within striking distance.  This would give me access to a range of particle effects such as lightning, sparks, and "lightning explosions".

Tesla Components

Electrical Surge

My Materials would be pretty simple to emulate, just basic metals, so it would give me more time to be able to focus on particles and making those great.

A quick sketch