Pitch rotation problem with FindLookAtRotation function

[Benderonny]

Hello everyone! Can you please help me with this?

I’m trying to create a 2D platformer where player can shoot at any angle (not just 8 direction like in a classic games). My decision was to separate the player character sprite to two - lower body and upper body. The upper body sprite should follow the mouse in 360 degree range.

To calculate the rotation angle of the upper body sprite I use GetHitResultUnderCursorByChannel and trace my mouse to the plane just behind the character (the result is represented as red debug sphere on video)

Then I use FindLookAtRotation with ActorLocation as a starting point (green debug sphere on video) and my mouse hit result location as target point. Then I use Y(pitch) value from the result to set my upper body sprite Y angle.

With all that I get very strange angle values (see the video, angle is printed). This same logic works well with rotating on Z axis so I admit the gimbal lock problem here. I saw this topic

How can I avoid Gimbal Lock with Rotations?

but I’m not sure how to apply that solution to my problem and if it’s the case at all.

So the questions are:

1. How can I solve this problem and get normal angle values from 0 to 360 or something?
2. Is this even a good logic for such a gameplay mechanic?

Thanks

Video - record_2025-04-13_00-07-15.mp4 - Google Drive

Angle calculation function

[Benderonny]

Somehow I managed to get the right 0 to 360 angle values. Problem was in how FindLookAtRotation result behaves.

This is the working function for calculating the angle. Maybe it will help someone.