[RELEASED] Emerald AI 3.2 (New Sound Detection) - The Ultimate Universal AAA Quality AI Solution

But the events are NOT missing?

 

The Dev is back to work or on vacation?

 

You might have better luck on discord with that question. Dev has a history of disappearing when focusing on one of his assets.

 

Yeah. What I think he is doing now

 

Hi there!

*** I just solved it: it was the Stopping Distance in the AI Settings/Movement.

**** That being said, has anyone been able to create a more precise setDestination (i.e., have the EmeraldAI walk directly to the target location)?

When using setDestination, both in visual scripting and c# script, my EmeraldAI simply stay in its place. Dynamic wandering type works well, so it's not an issue with the movement itself. When set to Dynamic wandering, using setDestination stops the EmeraldAI for a while, then the wandering resumes.

I've consulted the API at https://github.com/Black-Horizon-Studios/Emerald-AI/wiki/Emerald-AI-API#SetDestination

Does the EmeraldAI require anything else to begin moving towards a target destination?

Test code excerpt:
if ((activateDestination == true) && (initiatedDestination == false)) {
initiatedDestination = true;
EventsManager.SetDestination(targetDestination); }

Thanks!
Pascal

 

Besides AI sound detection it would be awesome to have a dismemberment system when fighting monsters or any other AI character.

 

Why is AI trying to link off the NavMesh?

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1M4ZBm3YJz2fx1-VtGB0bnJyXxWJparLE/view?usp=sharing

 

Greetings, I tried the discord and no luck thought I would try here. (fingers crossed) I have an AI companion and I seem to have two problems with it. 1. when the companion AI is set to "companion" the idle sounds do not work, so my companion does not "speak" at all, but if I change it to aggressive the ai walks around using the idle sounds and speaks and attacks everything lol. any know how to get a companion to actually use the idle sounds?

2. When an enemy AI attacks me first the damage is taken into the player (my VR character from VRIF) but if the enemy switches over to the companion character and attacks, the VR player character still takes takes the damage and dies even if I am a mile away!. if the enemy fights the ai companion first then all goes well and smooth. does anyone know how I can fix this?

thank you for your time and attention.

 

Hi, I have the same issue with set destination not working. I tried clearing target, changing movement type abd my AI will no move. I even tried bypassing the ai and telling the navagent to move and that didn't work either. Seems like something is forcing the ai to remain still.

 

@BHS Hasn't been around in a while. Not sure whats going on?

 

Would using as many as 15 - 20 factions effect frame rate?

 

Not being able to play the hit animation while AI is moving or in combat causes a lot of issues. Feels very unrealistic that the zombie/enemy still keeps walking towards the player even if the player is attacking the enemy.

Is there an easy way to do this ? @BHS

The emotes also work only for non combat situations.

 

Hi there!

I have an animator issue occurring from time to time, which state: 'Attack Cancelled' does not exist. I have looked at EmeraldAI settings, but can't find an "Attack Cancelled" in the animation or the AI settings.

Where should I look for this Attack Cancelled animation option?

Thanks!

 

Hi! I'm having problems with Support Abilities. I have followed the tutorial to make an energy shield as a support ability but doesn't appear in my ai enemy. However, the Offensive Abilities work fine. I have configured the animation event like a "EmeraldAttackEvent". Is it right? Can anybody help me?

 

I'm currently working on swapping the navmesh system integration to AStarPathfinding and already have it kind of working. If anybody is interested when I'm done, i'll setup a github repo with patch instructions.

 

I'm interested, but can I use this tool to create an AI for a 2D game, or only 3D?

 

Hi Setzor!

Indeed, if you manage to get it working with AStarPathfinding (paid or free version), it would be greatly appreciated if you could setup a github repo with integration instructions.

Thanks!
Pascal

 

You get that working, a lot of people will be thanking you.

 

I'm literally just replacing the navmeshagent integration with astarpathfinding. whatever the system currently supports should still work. In my case I'm testing in 3D.

 

Hello
Is it possible to integrate somehow Emerald ai with fmod?

 

Hello @BHS !

I don't even know where to stark when making my game multiplayer. Since it's just a co-op with 2 players it's not so heavy.
What need to be synced and how to sync it? I'm ment to use photon pun 2.
Do I make a separate script or is it in emeralds code I add pun 2 sync codes ... Could someone spread some light on this. Thanks

 

in my case i just have the AI code run on the server side. obviously transforms and animations and what not need to be synced. i've been working on a simple multiplayer twinstick shooter game and what i thought would be simple has proven to be quite a challenge when dealing with real time bullet physics working with npc enemies running around.

 

Hey everyone,

My apologies for the lack of communication regarding the Sound Detection update.

While the sound detection feature is not quite ready to be showcased (but will be soon), I'm eager to showcase another major improvement I've been working on.

This is a complex AI Duplicator, which is capable of duplicating every component of one AI including, weapons, animations, Emerald AI settings, ragdoll components (both Character Joints and Configurable Joints as well as their colliders), and more and copying them to other AI. This even works with blank animated models that haven't been setup with Emerald AI yet.

Some features do require identical rig naming (as shown in the picture below), but as long as the naming is the same (like how Synty Studios name their characters) this will work, even if the characters are from different packs.

Overall, this make setting up AI a lot easier and quicker, even if you just want duplicated settings and animations. I'd love some feedback on this and if there's anything that's missing or can be improved. If anyone is interested in testing, please email me with your Emerald AI invoice number.

The AI Duplicator Manager


There's no limitations to the amount of AI that can be duplicated at a time. The AI Duplicator has been stressed tested this with over 200 objects at once.


A completely blank model (on the right) that has not been setup with Emerald AI or had ragdoll components applied to it. It's also a part of a different character pack:


The same model run through the AI Duplicator. All needed Emerald AI components, settings, animations, weapons and weapon placement, ragdoll components, colliders, and LBD component have all been applied:

 

I try to test Emerald AI 3.0, but I'm not able to upgrade materials:

Emerald AI UI material was not upgraded. There's no upgrader to convert UI/Default+1 shader to selected pipeline

Anyone can help?

 

I added a trigger to make my NPC jump when I push a button (it's in VR, and I added a button to the left hand, and when pushed, the NPC jumps forward). The problem is, that the NPC immediately returns to the x/z coordinates at the beginning of the jump. Not sure how to correct this.

 

I think I figured it out. I had to eliminate the last frame of the jump animation, since it was the same as the first. I then had to set the AI's movement to root motion, instead of NavMesh. Not ideal though, I really feel like the AI's movement is better with NavMesh.

 

I dont know what it means by having the AI code run on the server side... Also all that syncing, where do I sync that?

 

My AI character is not doing turning correctly. It is glitching.

I have a few guesses on what might be causing it.
1)The Zombie anim asset I purchased doesn't have walk right & left animations, so I didn't set them. Are these compulsary? If so, can someone recommend me a good Zombie anim asset that's compatible with Emrald AI?

2) Another thing is I set the turn animations to 45degree turn animations since that is the smallest degree of turn I have in the anim pack. I'm not sure if it's not supposed to be like this.

Solved Edit: I fixed the turn thing by changing the turn animation from Root motion to In place even though I'm using RootMotion movement. I guess even in Rootmotion movement the turn is supposed to to be In place. Correct me if I am wrong.

Now that's settled are walk right & left animations compulsary? Will not having them cause problems?

 

That shader is just the Default UI shader with an increased Render Queue to render in front of everything. You can try assigning the default UI shader and increasing the Render Queue manually to see if that works. I will work on upgrading it to be compatible with other render pipelines though.

 

Yes, even Root Motion turn animations are supposed to be stationary. Movement turn animations are for Walk Left, Walk Right, Run Left, and Run Right.

You do not have to have walk left and walk right animations. You can use walk straight animations, but the AI just won't turn as sharply. I'm working on making a custom option for turning instead of relying on the NavMesh turn as it isn't always quick enough.

 

Is it possible to dynamically change the Nav Mesh offset in runtime? I tried adjusting it by hand and there was no change to the agent.

 

Yes, but you would need to adjust it directly with:

Code (CSharp):

1. YourEmeraldComponent.m_NavMeshAgent.baseOffset

 

Thank you! Worked out great

 

Hey everyone,

Here's another brief update on some of the improvements coming with version 3.2. This improvement is important with the next update having the addition of sound detection.

Currently, targets with changing collider sizes for functionality like crouching and crawling could have issues being detected by Emerald AI agents. This can easily allow for exploits where players can be undetected by both line of sight and an AI's aim. With this example, and the development of this next update, the Invector character controller is being used.


I've rewritten some of the detection code to use the collider's center bound position as with line of sight, no target info is received until the target is seen. Previously, just the transform position was used which resulted in the above issue. Using the collider's bounds allows unseen targets to have properly adjusted heights, even if the target's collider size changes.




The Target Position Modifier has also been modified to work with colliders that can change size. A collider source is automatically grabbed so you can see the changes right within the editor and adjust the height offset as needed.

 

@BHS tried to use mixamo archer as npc for archer, you should do a video on it

 

Having issues with what seems to be an AI's turning radius.

• If I just run around in circles, the AI follows, and I can evade it forever.
• If I stand still after this, the AI will continue to run around in a circle around the player, never able to just stop, turn to him, and fight.

 

This tutorial should guide you through setting up a ranged AI. This one covers AI with guns, but the process is the same: https://github.com/Black-Horizon-Studios/Emerald-AI/wiki/Creating-a-Shooter-AI#creating-a-shooter-ai

 

This usually happens when the AI's attack radius is too small. This makes AI unable to reach it resulting in this issue. You can try increasing the attack radius to see if it helps. I also have plans to improve turning speeds while moving with the next update which should minimize this from happening.

 

Where is the Attack Radius setting please? Is it the same as Max Damage Angle (Melee Settings)?

 

Here's the Attack Distance:

 

This does seem to help a bit so far, yeah. Thank you

 

I'm getting null reference exceptions in EmeraldAIDetection at line 409. This occurs because an AI was searching for a player, but that player has died and been removed. The AI retains a reference to it in LineOfSightTargets.

A quick, but hacky, fix is to add `if (T == null) continue;` before line 409.

 

If your player dies, you need to use SetIgnoredTarget right when the player dies so it isn't retargeted. This can be found here: https://github.com/Black-Horizon-Studios/Emerald-AI/wiki/Emerald-AI-API#setignoredtarget

When your player has been respawned, you can then clear the ignored targets with this: https://github.com/Black-Horizon-Studios/Emerald-AI/wiki/Emerald-AI-API#clearallignoredtargets

 

Thanks! BHS can add it to his list @BHS Can't wait for your sound detection! Huge thing that will help your AI system for me and I think everyone!

 

That doesn't seem very practical, in fact it feels far more hacky than my "ignore nulls" (though I worry about the buildup of nulls in that list of objects being tracked - not sure when they are culled, if ever).

Your suggestion, if I understand it correctly, means I have to iterate over all the AI that may have seen the player and call two methods, one on death and one on respawn. Wouldn't it make more sense for the AI to say "oh, they're dead, forget them now". They are, after all, already detecting when the target is dead.

It would seem to me that there may be many situations in which a target dies and this approach would work for every possible scenario in which a target leaves the game.

 

All AI share the same static IgnoredTargetsList variable. Only the AI who is currently interacting with the player will be checking if the target is within the IgnoredTargetsList.

Alternatively, you can just use the ClearTarget function when the AI dies right before it's destroyed: https://github.com/Black-Horizon-Studios/Emerald-AI/wiki/Emerald-AI-API#cleartarget

 

@BHS tried emerald a bit & it's good for prototyping but i missed a few features, AI hit animation handling should be improved there should be a way ai play a specific hit animation for a specific attack. If it is not too much work would be a great feature to add. If thats too much at least add directional hit detection an optional feature if someone have model that have hitt animation of different direction emerald ai should be able to handle it.

 

@BHS I would like the NPC to play an animation when it first detects the Player. I tried doing that in Events and placing the animation in emotes. And trying to play then animation with on detect target event with EmeraldAIEventManager.PLayEmoteAnimation but it doesn't work.

How can I accomplish this?

 

On one of my NPC's, I suddenly can't get to the Animations or AI's settings tabs. I click on them and nothing happens. All the other tabs (Temperament, UI Settings, etc.), work just fine. It happened after I changed the combat idle animation.

 

If it's an enemy you could just set the AI to Cautious then use the Warning animations.
The way you described should work too if set up properly, however combat overrides emote animations by default. I had the same issue and BHS helped by showing me a setting in the Animator that forces the emote animations to finish first. See attached pic. Click on the line indicated in blue then enable Exit Time for each emote.