Im about to do character animation for my game, I remember before Ue5 the correct and common way to do this was state machines and anim bps, but now there’s all this why around motion matching.
After taking a look at motion matching it looks EXTREAMLY complicated for my scope and workload. the fact that it is only possible with root motion means it’s a no for me. (im hand making my animations).
However something I do like about these new systems is Choosers, haven’t done too much research into them yet, but them seem like a more streamlined way of animating.
Anyway, my question is What has become the common practice for animating a character? is it still the old way, or has motion matching just become what the engine pushes you to use? If it’s still appropriate to use state machines and such can i still use some of the new tools like choosers?
There seems to be an over abundance on how “cool” motion matching is but very little explanation of when it should be used.
Yep, it’s still mostly done with state machines. I mean I didn’t interview a couple hundred devs but it would be speculative to think otherwise.
I think some of the plugins required for motion matching are still experimental thus Epic in fact discourages their use for projects that are meant for release, as it says so on the warning message when we try to enable them. Note that this doesn’t mean you shouldn’t be using experimental plugins, it was just to point out that I don’t see Epic pushing anyone to use motion matching. It’s cool, I like it, but I feel more control over my state machines.
Why wouldn’t it be appropriate? They’re not deprecated or anything. I see a lot of people using the latest version of everything in general and whatever’s the newest toy out there, but that’s not the way to go. It’d be the opposite in general, well established stuff are more reliable and have more documentation! These things make them more preferable. Though don’t hold yourself back from trying out new features as well!
You can absolutely still use state machines for animation! Whatever you’re comfortable with. I would suggest some tutorials to understand HOW and WHY to use the choosers, and then determine if it’s better for your use case.
As far as motion matching- it’s for more realistic movements in the environment and making the IK and turn animations work together. If you’re handmaking your animations alone it would be a huge addition to scope so keep that in mind.
