Hi everyone, I just released a new product on the Unreal Engine Marketplace. Grid Creation Systems is a collection of blueprints that allow you to quickly set up grid systems for your games.
You can choose from a varied list of grid configurations including the basic cuboid and circular grids, the more advanced longitude-latitude based spherical grids, or even offbeat patterns like the hollow square and flying wedge. Simply drag & drop the grid configuration of your choice into the level & start customizing right away!
Right now it supports the creation of following grid configurations:
And I plan to add a few more configurations over the coming weeks. Will post videos of them soon. You can get all the latest updates either through this forum thread or the Grid Creation System youtube playlist: https://www.youtube.com/playlist?lis…sU9X3z9QnZq3wK
Also here are some screenshots of the various grid types:
Can be used to create both rectangular/square as well as cuboid grids.
Grid Count X/Y/Z - Number of Grid Points along local X/Y/Z axis [Z=1 gives a planar grid on local XY plane]
Grid Size X/Y/Z - Dimensions of an individual Grid Cell along local X/Y/Z axis [Does not scale visualization meshes; Check common parameters section for scale control]
Can be used to create Grid Points in a Hollow Square formation.
Outer Square Grid Count - Number of Grid Points on each side of the Outer Square
Rank Count - Number of Square Patterns starting from the Outermost Square
Grid Size - Dimensions of the side of an individual (square-shaped) Grid Cell [Does not scale visualization meshes; Check common parameters section for scale control]
Can be used to create Grid Points in a Flying Wedge formation.
Number of Rows - Number of rows of grids from Apex to Base of the Triangle
Grid Count Increments - Additional Grid Points per row from Apex to Base of the Triangle
Grid Size X/Y - Dimensions of an individual Grid Cell along local X/Y axis [Does not scale visualization meshes; Check common parameters section for scale control]
I have a few suggestions - add the ability to create individual instances so they can be replaced with other things - have you thought about adding animation to the systems like mograph in cinema4d ? can someone please do that - there are so many tools like this on the marketplace and they only go to level 1 and they all seem to be missing needed components - mograph is like level 3 - and theres the new field system in Unreal so you could potentially have the same kind of volume selections in a visual gadget ?? - also what about generating polygons and lines between the objects like plexus - and being able to add noises to the total shape of the system - again if you could animate the noise thru it that would open immense capabilities for motion design usage . esp if you could control all the parameters in Sequencer for how its arrayed --I’m an artist so doing it myself is not really possible - I’d have to pay someone else as I am sure many others would too but I would pay $30+ for that tech easy - there is no procedural animation tech on the marketplace that lets you pump a modulation into a parameter to animate - big missing piece of digital production tech that is everywhere in DLC packages but for some reason missing from game creation software (ref signal from greyscale gorilla) - and obviously people make their own but if you are an artist just learning or doing digital film stuff it’s not gonna happen unless you pay someone and that creates a huge roadblock for incoming users
Hi @Arcane, thanks for the suggestions. I’m not familiar with animation systems since my work experience is mostly focused around blueprints and programming. So we’re kind of on the same boat there.
But regarding the ability to create individual instances, consider that done. Both static mesh & skeletal mesh visualization options will be added in the first update along with a new grid configuration.
The v1.1 update has been submitted to the Marketplace.
ChangeLog:
Added a new Grid Configuration: Square Pyramids
Added support for spawning actors at grid points instead of using the default instances static meshes. To enable this feature, simply call the new **SpawnActorsAtGridPoints **function at Event Begin Play of the grid creator blueprint.
The actor class can be specified through the **SpawnActorClass **variable in the grid creator blueprints.
The v1.1 update has gone live on the Marketplace. Grid Creation Systems is now compatible with v4.23 as well.
@Arcane You can now populate the grid points with individual instances of actors including skeletal mesh actors & characters. Here’s an example of it being used with the character class from Top Down Template:
Hi, I’ve started work on the v1.2 update for Grid Creation Systems. The initial plan was to add a new Grid Configuration, but I received some feature requests that could add a lot of utility to all existing configurations. The most interesting one of the lot was to have helper functions that return grid cells that satisfy certain specific conditions.
For example, a function that returns all grid cells in a particular row of a Rectangular configuration, or perhaps one that returns all grid points along a longitudinal plane on a Spherical configuration.
So I decided to focus this update on adding helper functions for all existing grid configurations, and then proceed to go ahead with the original plan of adding new configurations in subsequent updates. Starting with the Rectangle configuration, it’ll be receiving three new helper functions as part of the update:
GetAllGridCellsAt(X)
GetAllGridCellsAt(Y)
GetGridCellAt(X&Y)
Also included in the update will be new In-Editor Visualization options for these functions as shown in the preview below:
I’ll share the progress after completing work on the other configurations. Meanwhile, I’m always looking for new ways to improve Grid Creation Systems. So feel free to share your feedback & suggestions.
Finally on to the last WIP update for the v1.2 edition of GCS. Added a new helper function to retrieve grid points by rank in the Hollow Square Config:
GCS will be receiving a price increment (to $9.99) to reflect the additional value offered by the new features. So if you have not purchased it yet, you can still get it for $5.99 until the v1.2 release.
The v1.2 update has been submitted to the Marketplace. As mentioned in the previous posts, all grid configurations will be receiving additional helper functions to retrieve specific grid cell patterns. I will post the v1.2 trailer and changelog once the update goes live on the Marketplace.
The v1.2 update has gone live on the Marketplace. I’ve uploaded a video to briefly showcase all the new features, most of which are geared towards enabling you to retrieve & highlight specific grid cell patterns within each type of grid configuration.
v1.2 Features Showcase:
ChangeLog:
New helper functions to retrieve grid cell patterns:
New functions for highlighting grid cell patterns, exposed for the editor for easy customization & testing.
Revamped the Hollow Square grid creation workflow to minimize the number of calculations required to retrieve grid cells within each rank of the formation.
Bug Fixes:
Fixed a bug that caused duplicate grid cells to be generated at the poles for Sphere configuration.
Additional Notes:
Search for Version1_2 in the blueprint editor to identify all the major changes in this update.
Hi, the v1.4 update has been submitted to the Marketplace. I’ve added a new example scenario demonstrating the Rectangular Grid Configuration being used for basic player interaction. Thanks to those of you who requested the feature, I’ve now learnt to draw Pac-man using grids.
Since this is an example scenario built on top of the core grid generation framework, I’ve added the new files to a new “Extras” folder under Blueprints. You can load up the new level from the Maps folder and try it out for yourself.
Hello, Rohit, long time no “see”! I would like to ask (before dig thru all the threads etc) - if i place actors in grid, can those be “bunch of actors”, and by choice also randomized? Think city squares of buildings, as example.
Hi Juris, yea it’s been quite a while. But given the situation, I haven’t seen much of anyone at all these past few months. I’m assuming that you’re referring to the standard square grids. And by bunch of actors, is something like this (it’s handcrafted, not generated through code) where you’d have a bunch of buildings randomly placed around certain grid cells, what you had in mind:
I would like to ask (before dig thru all the threads etc) - if i place actors in grid, can those be “bunch of actors”, and by choice also randomized? Think city squares of buildings, as example.
I’m assuming that you’re referring to the standard square grids. And by bunch of actors, is something like this (it’s handcrafted, not generated through code) where you’d have a bunch of buildings randomly placed around certain grid cells, what you had in mind: