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[Azel]

I was comparing the games Syberia and The Art of Murder. I noticed something strange about the movement of characters in each game.

I was playing Syberia and the main character Kate can be smoothly moved in small increments to face in any direction. But, the main character in The Art of Murder (an WME game) seems to jump into one of eight pre-rendered positions instead of a smooth turning motion.

Can someone explain why this is so?
Is it just how WME game engine works?
Is there a fix for make full smooth character moves?

Thanks
Azel

[nigec]

In Syberia, more noticeable in the first one  I think there was quite a lot of dedicated animation, probably more noticeable when she tackles stairs, she'll halt, turn, stand, climb, its never a fluid motion.. Lara Croft in Tomb raider des a similar thing
If you just had the character climb it would be more float unless it was walking up geometry, but my attempt at that didn't work to well

[Azel]

Yes, I see what you mean. I had always wondered how Kate walked so well up stairs. Dedicated animation explains it.

But what about just during normal stop and turn direction movements of the character? Why does WME seem to skip frames causing a jerky turning look, as opposed to a smooth turning of the character? Is there something that can be done in WME to fix this jerky character turning movement?

Thanks
Azel 

[fireside]

I have no turn animation right now, and the turn is perfectly smooth.  Trouble is, it's like a top turning without an animation.  Perhaps your angular velocity speed is too fast or slow.  It's in the actor3d file.  It may also be animation blending if you have a turn animation that perhaps makes it look choppy.  I notice the 8 directions, but not the choppiness.  Are you getting 60 fps?  Perhaps it's your computer also.  My walk animation looks a little jerky, I think I need to add more key frames or something.

[Azel]

I am looking at the character movements in the game The Art of Murder (made with WME) to make my observations. I am comparing them with Syberia which was made with the game engine Virtools, which is now discontinued I think.

I noticed how a player of Syberia can nudge the character in any direction with just a little keyboard movement. There is no snapping into the 8 positions like in WME.  This looks more natural in the game. I was wondering if WME could be made to do this.

It’s a small thing, but if you play Syberia you will see what I am talking about. I am not complaining about the WME engine. I was just wondering if WME could make it’s character move like those in the Virtools engine, and why the two engines move their characters differently.

On a separate note. I downloaded Unity and played with it a few months, but it never had the feel of a classic point and click game like Syberia or The Longest Journey. So, I then started looking back at 2 ½ 2D game engines. I read that Double Fine Productions almost used WME for their new game Broken Age so I felt WME must be the best game engine for 2D if they had considered using it. That is why I was testing WME.

Thanks
Azel

[nigec]

From what I've done with WM I thought the movement wasn't to bad compared to 2D characters, maybe it depends on the amount of way points a scene has and a confined space could get abit choppy, its been years since I played Syberia but from memory she did a lot of long works and large areas
Also if you use 2D waypoints/floor it could change how the character reacts

Above all its down to how much effort the developer put into the character animation, its the hardest thing to get right, I haven't played The Art of Murder, but I'll take a look