Hi everyone,
We’re in production on a game that features two playable characters. The game can be played in local co-op mode (each player controls one character), or in single-player mode, where the player can switch between characters at any time.
We already implemented a split-screen system for co-op. However, in single-player mode, we’ve encountered a new need: for a specific puzzle, we want to show a split-screen view even though there’s only one player, to display both characters simultaneously.
We’ve come up with two possible approaches:
1. Spawn a second player controller (with input disabled)
This leverages our existing co-op split-screen system, meaning minimal performance overhead and no need to recreate anything. However, we’re concerned about edge cases or bugs this might introduce, especially considering that our game is targeting PC, Switch, Xbox, and PlayStation.
2. Use a SceneCapture2D with a RenderTarget
This would be more isolated and potentially safer from a system perspective, but in our tests, even with optimization, it has noticeably higher performance cost. It also means building a second split-screen system just for this use case.
Our main questions:
- Which option would you recommend for this situation?
- What issues might arise from using a second player controller for a single player?
- Are there any platform-specific concerns (especially for consoles) we should be aware of with either approach?
We’re using Unreal Engine 5.4.
Thanks in advance!