Hello everyone! I’d like to share something that I’ve been working on for a while.
Advanced Optics
You can follow development progress and check out the Advanced Optic roadmap here: Trello
Advanced Optic is expected to release in September/October and will initially be listed for $45USD. The asset price will eventually increase to $200USD as more features are added, so become an early adopter! It will support UE 4.25 and above.
This asset provides weapon sights and other kinds of optics for your game.
- Optics and their attachments are drop-in to any existing weapon system with minimal effort
- It works extremely well with the Advanced Locomotion System v4 (not included, but go buy it because it’s great.)
- Nested assemblies of optics and attachments can be configured in the editor or at runtime
- Preset optic and attachment assemblies can be created
- An inventory system sample is included that allows for runtime creation of nested assemblies
- Thermal and NV are based on real-life reference videos from high end scopes. Reference videos are included with the asset to help you get your materials looking exactly right.
An example I often share is a scope, mounted on a ring mount, with a canted riser attached to a position on the ring mount, and a reflex optic on the canted riser, like so:
https://i.imgur.com/OfkLx2G.jpeg
https://i.imgur.com/fR4MfU8.jpg
https://i.imgur.com/AB1thux.jpeg
https://i.imgur.com/7udQWWb.jpg
Each item is a separate entity:
- Ring mount
- Scope
- Canted riser
- Reflex sight
Each item is configured using a preset and quickly assembled in the default configuration. It can then be attached to a weapon whose rail is simply defined as two sockets, one at the start and one at the end. You can place any number of assemblies along a weapon rail, in any position.
Further sockets can be added to define individual attachment points and camera positions. Camera distance can be configured per-preset.
From there you can configure an input binding to enter Aiming-Down-Sights mode and configure inputs to control sight mode toggle (switching between scope and sight) and features such as zoom level, reticle shape, brightness and colour, and breathing control/weapon steadying. All of this is either available out of the box, or an example configuration in ALSv4 will be provided. Camera switching during ADS is automatic.
Advanced Optics has the most realistic and performant implementation of glass, night-vision and thermal optics available. Glass optics feature parallax, occlusion, first or second focal plain, depth of field and automatically handle render texture resolution switching and frame update rates.
The asset also includes a number of detailed assets ranging from sci-fi to realistic, and a number of hand-painted skins for each model. The tutorial will also show you how to configure your own optic and attachment models to work with Advanced Optic.
The ALSv4 demo project will include examples of how to set up weapon-canting and all input graphs. You must however own a copy of ALSv4 and be able to create an ASLv4 project in order for the demo project files to run. Nonetheless, if you’re not using ALSv4 then configuring Advanced Optic from scratch is easy.
The included models are detailed and feature common elements from scopes, sights and attachments. All materials are PBR and all texture maps are 4k.
Advanced Optic is a one-stop-shop solution for must-have weapon attachment functionality in your game.
Here are a handful of videos taken during development:
Canting Preview
IR Emissive Test
Tutorial (work-in-progress)
(Other content pictured but not included with this asset: ALSv4, Stylised Desert Environment)
More images
https://i.imgur.com/DfdXNC0.png
https://i.imgur.com/2fjvSCY.png
https://i.imgur.com/hLKsytz.png
https://i.imgur.com/W8P0CjP.png
https://i.imgur.com/LinnzsW.png
https://i.imgur.com/U10pHZ1.png
https://i.imgur.com/7hmUfGS.png
https://i.imgur.com/4nDOmGf.png
https://i.imgur.com/NlSTYIK.png