Hey all, a couple of weeks ago I took a short break from my main project Barstools, Brawls, and Banter to play around with some mobile game ideas. One of them involved a simple road network simulation… one thing led to another and I was soon making a plugin for navigation and creation of the road networks. Is anyone interested in this kind of plugin if I continued development for release on the marketplace?
(Whoops I forgot to demo the intersection tool, right now it’s basically a box select that automatically connects lanes)
I intend to have:
A navigation system that can be used by any agent that wants to navigate the road network (which could also be repurposed for general graph navigation).
An editor mode for visually defining the road network.
Components for procedurally defining a road network.
Basic AI building blocks for dealing with traffic lights and road signs.
OpenDrive support - Anything it can define, I want to be able to define (and import/export)
Right now I have some rough basics in place:
Editor support for basic roads and intersections.
Graph following sphere AI using the custom navigation system
Lane and Intersection components that can be used procedurally
What do I offer that’s different from other similar assets? (Correct me if I’m wrong!)
A crunchy C++ core
Integration with Unreal’s Navigation System
Custom editor mode
Focus on road network for navigation rather than mesh creation
If anyone would like to take this discussion off of the forums (or funding the project/contracting me!), just send an email to [EMAIL=“quasar@partlyatomic.com”]quasar@partlyatomic.com
Being able to use open street map data for real life city roads would be useful. Since you can import open street map data as splines that should be fairly straight forward.
Will there be support for pedestrian road crossings, side walks, etc.?
I was initially basing my data model off of OSM ways until I found OpenDrive, so it’s definitely in the back of my head and should be doable.
Not directly. I do plan on having a robust enough system to easily code up something like… an intersection with lights that also broadcasts the necessary events for pedestrians to be notified that a crosswalk (defined via the normal recast nav mesh) is open
If the price is not too high I would probably buy it. I still have too many things to do to reach an alpha stage for my first game and a good series of algorithms to deal with AI traffic systems will be needed. I will have already too many AI code to deal with that just doesn’t exist ready to buy for what I want to achieve and so if I can save time with a ready to go traffic system that would be a must-buy down the road…
Price is still in flux while I figure out exactly how much work the system is going to be :\ I hope to have at least one entry level plugin at <$50 though. Anything specific you’d be looking for in an AI traffic system btw?
Did this end up progressing any further? This is the only thing stopping me from coming over from Unity for my project. Currently have a solid AI system, traffic merging and traffic light system. And theres nothing even close to that on the Unreal store
Would love to second this. It might be an older thread here but it’s still pretty hardcore to figure out a viable road-tool solution that has the ability to have junctions and in-between options for junctions to make these more curved or tight per corner. My head is spinning and the Houdini Dokai-Tutorials for example are not helpful if people need Houdini to deal with it. There is a City-Builder game out here that has the perfect solution for these things but since its a game, I bet the chances are low to see something inside UE4 soon. The closest that comes to it is Roadrunner from VectorZero and Cities Skylines. I really wonder why this topic is so unpopular.
Sadly I don’t have the programming experience, neither with C++ or Blueprints to create an all-in-one solution.
