Multiplayer options / multiplayer split-screen (chosen idea) Multiplayer meshes

When we first loaded up Unreal Engine 4, after deciding we were going to make the multiplayer dodgeball game. I was in charge of creating the multiplayer feature.

The is obviously one of the biggest feature of the game.

5v5

As I did briefly explain in one of my other blog posts ' beginning of the project' we didn't know what style of multiplayer we wanted to go for. We thought about making the game an online multiplayer opening up the opportunities to make this the 5v5 we originally planned.

when we did originally plan the game to be 5v5, there were more ways we could've expanded the gameplay, such as mini-game. These mini-games would be for those players that have been hit and are now out.

I'm not sure how the play time would've been, as there are more players it could take longer to element all the opponents, however with a timer this could've made it fast-paced as you will be cheering on your team to get all the hits they can.

however when it comes to playtesting we could have the problem of having to find 10 new players each time, and as we were running the playtest local within the college, this could cause some inconvenience. We would want new players to test the game for at least the first 2 or 3 playtests, then after we would bring those players who have played before, to test to see what feedback they gave us and how effective it is.

After some more planning and coming up with ideas, the realisation of having to be able to get an online server to be stable and function with only a few months to give us plenty of time to plan the game more, have play tests, we thought it was best as based on an assessment of the skills and experience of the team, it was selected to make the game local, as opposed to introducing an online element that would have presented a significant risk factor to the project. The team decided to accentuate elements of the game that would improve the user experience, rather than expose the project to unnecessary risk.

1v1

after going through with the idea of making this game 1v1, the next decision was choosing how we wanted it to work we would make it split-screen as that would only be a way local multiplayer would work for us, as we decided not to go online.

we thought horizontal would be the best layout for us, as the players can sit on their side so it wouldn't get confusing in a high-intensity match.

To create this multiplayer feature, the code is simple, it's essentially 2 nodes.

This will then create the number of players that you need.

some of the challenges when it comes to split-screen, as we are adding more perspectives into the world means more objects require rendering, and less time for culling. This also means that more things are in use and loading constantly, this will cause great strain on the engine.

With multiplayer, the characters share the same blueprints so when you want to alter a specific character you will have to identify the player ID.

As shown above I was working on getting the characters to have different meshes.

Another way that I could've done this is using an instance static mesh component, this is a component to which a mesh can be allocated to things and be duplicated with no extra rendering cost, you can also have as many instance meshes as needed.

The way that deiced to allocate different skins is through getting the player IDs then setting a skeletal mesh and then getting the player index. By getting the skeletal mesh, it was then a simple drop-down bar and then I will select the character from the unreal content folder, which another member of my team has created and uploaded.

For the weapon, all I needed to do was to add on a set static mesh and set the target to the bazooka placeholder, it then gives me the drop-down to which I again select the weapon from the content.