The Arcade Space Shooter Template is a feature-complete game template made in 100% Blueprints that allows you to create a 3D space shooter, similar to games like Starfox.
The template includes the following:
Gameplay Modes:
Track Mode - Player follows a spline-based track through the level. Can customize Player forward speed, as well as offsets in the Y and Z directions. Ability to have multiple paths unlocked based on triggers overlapped or enemies killed.
All-Range Mode - Player can fly anywhere in the map.
Choose your Perspective:
Includes a third-person camera, first-person camera, and a backwards-looking camera.
The third-person camera has a Fixed Mode (follows the Ship but does not inherit rotations), and Static Mode (follows the Player’s rotations and movement)
Abilities:
Roll - Roll to 90 degrees to either side and keep the rotation as long as you hold the button
Barrel Roll - double-tap the roll button to barrel roll to either side
Boost - Short burst forward. Speed increase and time of increase can be customized
Brake - Slows down for a short period of time. Time of decrease and final speed can be customized
Somersault - Speed and trajectory can be customized with a Timeline curve
UTurn - Speed and trajectory can be customized with a Timeline curve
Weapons
Weapons included - Laser, Homing Charge Shot, Fireball, Bomb
Includes a simple weapon switching system that allows you to cycle through weapons. Can easily add new weapon types
The damage per weapon is easily customizable
Pickups
Pickups parent class comes with a variety of settings, such as whether you want the pickup to stick to the Player, or rotate around the Player, and for how long
Pickups included - Health, Shield, Points, Points Cache, Laser Upgrade (double laser), and Bombs!
Actor Components
Template comes with 10 actor components to quickly add functionality to any actor in your scene!
Functionality includes simulate physics on hit, add actor to radar system, convert HISM actor into a fully destructible actor (destruction per instance), and more!
Obstacles
Template comes with several blueprints that help you create obstacles in your level
Take any mesh and make it move or rotate in specific patterns, or add moving debris to your level
Two door blueprints that open on proximity or when hit by the Player
HUD System
Complete HUD system includes Player’s Health, Shield, Weapon equipped, ability timer, and bombs available.
HUD can display alert messages and it notifies Player when a checkpoint is saved
Menu System
Complete menu system with a Main Menu and Pause Menu
Pause Menu comes with options to resume to the game, restart the level, save the game, access options, go to the main menu, and quit the game
Options include - Gameplay Options (such as adjusting difficulty) and Graphics Quality Settings
Save and Load functionality included for 3 save slots!
Enemy AI
Comprehensive enemy AI is included - AI moves in 6DOF and has obstacle avoidance
Comes with 3 Idle Behaviors and 6 Combat Behaviors.
Each instance of the AI gets a variety of parameters from its pawn allowing you to customize the AI behavior on individual enemies!
Comes with 2 sample bosses - one in All-Range Mode and one in Track Mode
Level-Building Tools
**Procedural Debris **- creates a destructible asteroid field using ISM. You can specify the instance’s health and its behavior once destroyed. Can use a culling volume to create a path for the Player through the asteroid field
**Road Builder **- Simple tool used to create spline-based roads. Easily change the mesh and materials to suit your needs. Automatically create bridge sections - the supports adjust to the terrain in realtime
**Corridor Builder **- create your indoor scenes in minutes with this blueprint. Comes with 4 connector types and the ability to chain several blueprints together to create indoor sections.
Other
Bonus Modes: Survival Mode and Time Attack Mode
Level-linking system allows you to create your level sequence in minutes. You can also specify the level music and other parameters
Checkpoint system
Difficulty Manager - change the game’s difficulty at runtime - it changes each enemy’s stats based on difficulty. Easily extendible to your other systems!
Debug tools allows you to skip to any part of the level while on track mode, as well as debug point and radial damage
Comes with sample meshes (ship, enemies, building) and particle systems (explosions, smoke)
The template has been submitted to Epic. While its pending approval, I will start working on more detailed documentation and video tutorials founds on my Youtube Channel
***Art assets are meant for demonstration purposes and are not optimized for production
*Template does not come with the music or sound effects seen on the videos
I’ve been working on the flying enemy AI for the past few days and this is what I have so far:
Idle Behavior Preview:
Idle Behavior:
-Stay In Place - Hover in place until Player is in range
-Pick random location within a bounding box
-Follow a route - the route is a spline and it can be closed loop or open
Combat Behavior Preview:
Combat Behavior (so far):
-Ignore Player
-Chase Player
-Chase and Shoot
-Go Past Player - come from behind the screen and get infront of the player for a set amount of time. After the timer expires, it picks a random direction and leaves the screen
-Stay Infront of Player - Similar to the above, but this has the AI face the player and shoot
-Come Towards Player - Goes past the player while shooting
Quick update on what I’ve been working on in the past few weeks.
Since last time I’ve added:
New meshes:
-Meshes for buildings and doors
-A player ship model
-Enemy models - turret, tank and a few flying enemies
-Pick Ups - Points, Shield, Health, Laser, Bomb
New PickUps - Double Laser and Bombs! The Laser gives you a double laser and the bomb does high radial damage to multiple enemies.
CheckPoint and Death - Now when you die you are respawned at the last checkpoint. It also resets all enemies in the level and resets the player stats. If you run out of lives it branches to a Game Over screen.
A new type of projectile - “Never Miss” - This projectile is an MMO-style projectile that cannot miss. Your only option is to outlive it or barrel roll to deflect
Item spawn system - now enemies can spawn pickups - You can specify a spawn rate and whether it spawns a specific pick up, a random pick up or a “smart pickup” based on the Player’s needs
Procedural Road - Quickly lay down roads for your level. Spline-based with the option of adding supports that scale towards the floor.
Procedural Debris - Using ISMs you randomly generate meshes within the volume. You can configure the range for the random scale and rotation. You can also use a “Cull Volume” to create a path for the Player through the asteroid field. You also have the option of adding rotation to the meshes during runtime.
I’ve also been working on my own version of Corneria as my PoC level to test all the features. Its very early still, but my goal is to have a similar level with 2 different paths leading to 2 different bosses.
-Improved the procedural debris tool - Now it replaces each individual ISM instance with a destructible mesh when it receives damage. It also uses a variable map to keep track of each ISM instance’s health! Now you can have a procedural asteroid field with destructible meshes!
-First boss added - Added my first boss to the game. The boss has a Core, Head, and two Cannons. Each part has its own health and behavior. The boss has its own behavior tree and has options for damage type, projectile type, speed and acceleration, and other optional behaviors.
-Spawn any enemy type with specific damage, weapon, and projectile type.
-Specify the Idle and Engage AI behavior and customize the behavior stats
-Allows you to randomize most parameters to give your level variety everytime you play
-Allows you to spawn multiple enemies from the same spawn on a specific frequency
-Can be 1 of many spawners used by the Spawn Manager to create waves of enemies
Pause Menu - Pause game at any time with option to change the difficulty at runtime!
**Main Menu **- New Main Menu level with ability to load saved game!
Save and Load Game - Save level, lives, and bombs to disk
**
New UI Elements** - Bombs get a UI overhaul and now you get a cooldown for Boost and Break
**
Proximity Mines** - Added proximity mines to the game. They do radial damage on proximity (fully customizable)
-Inspired by the secret boss in Corneria
-A random cannon opens on the attack cycle and exposes a vulnerable spot
-Boss picks between 3 behaviors randomly - Attack, Get close and Attack, Run Away
-Basic behaviors done, just need some more polish
Thanks Galeon! I actually have a basic minimap on the lower right corner but I agree its hard to see the enemies. I have “adding enemy icons to the minimap” on my to do list but havent had time to figure it out yet
For the radar I would suggest look at Elite: Dangerous for the radar bit that @Galeon Suggested.
Why I suggest it is simple - You can see all enemies regardless of their height difference from you.
This video should explain things in more detail on how the radar in Elite works.
Not sure how feasible it would be from your end. But It might help