Characters

This article is about the engine feature. For a list of characters in the Overgrowth universe, see Characters (lore).

Overview

Characters are a game entities that are directly controllable by a player or by the AI.

Characters have Rigged Objects attached, which support skeletal animation, rag doll animation, blends of those two, and character physics.

TODO: More in depth description, akin to that in Hotspots and LevelScripts

Documentation

Callable functions and data available inside character scripts

A list of functions, data, etc, is created automatically whenever you run the game, in a file on your hard drive. This lists what external code you get "for free" and can call from inside a character script.

• Windows: My Documents\Wolfire\Overgrowth\aschar_docs.h
• Mac: ~/Library/Application Support/Overgrowth/aschar_docs.h
• Linux: ~/.local/share/Overgrowth/aschar_docs.h

This documentation will change with each version of the game, so keep checking back on this aschar_docs.h file to see the most up to date information.

There are also wiki pages which have more detailed documentation many of these functions. These pages have a danger of going out of date, but give more detailed documentation on some of the code:

• These functions are unique to character scripts
• These functions are shared with other script types

Character instances in other scripts

Characters are exposed to other scripts as instances of the MovementObject class.

MovementObject instances are like other objects in the game. They support everything that is supported by Object, and also have their own special set of functions, properties, etc.

If you have a handle to a MovementObject@ object in angelscript, you can convert it to an Object@ by calling ReadObjectFromID(movement_object.GetID());.

Working with Characters in editor

TODO: How to set a character as playable in the editor.

TODO: List of supported character parameters and how to use them. Some of these things verge more into "game" territory and not "engine" territory, so should at the very least mention that it's fully changeable in script...

TODO: List of species specific traits? Some of these things verge more into "game" territory and not "engine" territory, so should at the very least mention that it's fully changeable in script...

How to create a character

Character XML files

TODO: Description of XML format

File path conventions

TODO: Description of where to add files in mods so they don't conflict. Ala Hotspots#File_path_conventions

Modeling

TODO: Links to or docs on modeling, graphics features like fur fins, various texture channels and what their components (alpha etc) mean, UVs, object space normals, etc. Also, any export info that would be necessary.

Rigging

TODO: Links to or docs on rigging and rig export

Animations

TODO: Links to or docs on animations and export, tagging, etc

Attacks

TODO: Links to or docs on attacks system and export, tagging, etc - related partly to animations.

TODO: Possibly also scripting attacks and animations, and character-bound input, etc - though maybe that should be in a different section?

How to add a character to the spawner menu

Short version:

• You must add it in a mod.
• You can add as many characters to the spawner menu as you want in a single mod, you just need to follow the below instructions for each, and add multiple <Item> tags to your mod.xml file.

In your mod.xml file, add this xml tag:

<Item category="My Custom Mod Characters"
      title="Some Character To Spawn"
      path="Data/Objects/example_item_pack/mod_item_example.xml"
      thumbnail="Data/UI/example_item_pack/thumbs/mod_item_example.png" />

• category is the top level category where the character will show up, in the Load menu.
• title is the name of the character, as it will show up in the spawner menu.
• path is the path to the character XML that will get spawned. See the How to create a character section for which XML file to target (either the character XML itself, or a version you saved off that has modified default parameters). TODO: Be careful to advise which character XML to add to the spawner - there are multiple character XML files!
• thumbnail is the image that will be used for a tooltip when you hover over your character in the spawner menu.

See GameInstallDir/Data/ExampleMods/mod_xml_specification.txt for full information.