Tic Toxic Studios - AI Controlled NPCs in Unreal Engine 5 - Part 1.

Step by Step guide using behavior trees to create a simple NPCs to walk around in a couple different ways. Learn to set up and use behavior trees, blackboards, and ai controllers.
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00:00 - Intro
00:20 - Like and Subscribe!
00:25 - Project Setup
00:51 - AI Controller
01:51 - Blackboard
02:56 - Behavior Trees
05:01 - Tasks
07:31 - Blackboard Keys
08:39 - Tasks with multiple keys
11:31 - Decorators
12:37 - Wrapping Up

[@rtkartist]

This was so much easier to understand than most other blackboard tutorials.

[@TicToxicStudios]

Thank you for the kind words!

[@Dennis-np2dn]

As opposed to some people in the comment section, I actually liked the sped up blueprinting since you're mostly explaining the design of the feature instead of being very specific about the blueprinting. I have occasionally paused the video to look at your code which worked well for me. Great tutorial! Short, concise but filled with a lot of content. Keep up the great work :)

[@TicToxicStudios]

Thank you for the feedback! I’m glad you found the video helpful. Personally, I appreciate fast and to the point videos also. It’s easy to back up and pause, but it doesn’t hurt to slow down at the important parts as I have started doing in future videos. I have also started displaying completed code longer at the end of each section so pausing and double checking code is easier! If you have any ideas to make my videos better I’d love to hear it!

[@abdoulraoufgambo]

please continue adding contents. your tutorial are so good

[@TicToxicStudios]

Thanks! There will definitely be more to come!

[@grit-mike]

Agree 100 %

[@supjay3945]

Goodluck trying to follow this tutorial

[@TicToxicStudios]

I agree that this video was a bit too fast for what I claimed as a beginner video. I will slow future videos down and try to explain steps better. Thank you for the feedback to make future videos better!

[@supjay3945]

@@TicToxicStudios thankyou. I understand that you may have showed the general workflow. But it would be valuable if theres a tutorial that viewers can follow along. I also find it helpful if the instructors mouse pointer does not move around to express a point but only when needed to reduce confusion. Other than that, your videos very helpful!

[@ryanjdevlin87]

Stop looking for every tutorial to give you a 100% complete solution ... your not gonna learn everything in 1 tutorial. If you want to know more about anything mentioned in a tutorial do the same thing you did to find this video and search for it... smh asking him to change his tutorial style so you dont have to do more searching is selfish and foolish. Good day to you sir.@@supjay3945

[@TicToxicStudios]

I agree, no matter how good a tutorial is, it will never suit everybody’s needs. However, I am striving to make sure viewers understand more than just being shown what to do. And with that in mind, I do agree this tutorial is a little bit fast. Hopefully I am able to find a good balance of not wasting of viewers time, but not going too fast.

[@tim.martin]

Thought you nailed that balance, personally. The part 3:05 "now let's step back and look at how behaviour trees operate", this was pure excellent.

[@arjaywheeler]

Not a fan of the sped up visuals but the content was very useful, had to play at a slower speed and keep pausing. I would be interested in how is best to set multiple points or a set route that AI can choose to take. So like 2-3 paths they can decide to take randomly or in sequence. Also have them perform actions at certain nodes on a path (sit down, idle, trigger animation). I've subscribed, looking forward to future tutorials.

[@tevx9670]

Yes that would be nice

[@TicToxicStudios]

Thanks for the suggestions! I am currently planning part 2 and this will most likely make it in there! I agree that the sped up in this was a little much, sorry about that! I was trying to fit a lot in and not have a super long video. I'll either cut back on the number of topics or just have a longer video. Thank you for the feedback to make future videos better!

[@d_Howard]

What I would like to see is a tutorial on NPCs doing more complex behaviors. There are so many animations available on Mixamo but no explanation about how to implement them for NPCs. Even animals come with lots of animations! I would like to make a deer walk down to a stream, look around, bend over and take a drink, look around again. If a PC gets close enough, the deer runs away.

[@TicToxicStudios]

This is a wonderful idea, I just worry that this would require a much longer video to explain well. Do you think a 30-40 minute tutorial would fly? Or, is that too long to sit through?

[@jkasso7]

@@TicToxicStudios I'd watch it👍

[@d_Howard]

@@TicToxicStudios I don't agree with the idea that Unreal Engine tutorials can be too long, especially if they're well done and helpful. (Yours are!) People can always pause, and come back later if they need a break. Alternatively, you could do a tutorial series consisting of several shorter "chapters" to cover the topic well. Word will get out. They will come.

[@Bakahira]

This helps alot!! Thank you!

[@TicToxicStudios]

Your welcome! Hope future videos help also!

[@Lilium___]

Great tutorial, I hope we'll get to see more in the future

[@TicToxicStudios]

Thank you! Is there anything you want to learn about in a future video?

[@Lilium___]

A follow up to AI would be great. There are many ways to implement AI behavior, but it's hard finding the right way. Taking behavior tree tasks as example, there are some blueprint nodes you cannot use inside a task. This leaves the question, which logic you put into tasks and decorators and which logic into for example the character blueprint. For example, where do you start animations or react to outside events. If you have a patrolling NPC and want it stop patrolling if it got hit by the player, how would you do it? Also debugging behavior trees is a pain, the logic in the character blueprint has a debugger with breakpoints while the behavior tree just shows the current state, is there a good way to debug behavior trees ?

[@TicToxicStudios]

@@Lilium___ Great suggestions! I plan to cover these in part 2! Specifically seeing the player to attack them if they’re an enemy, being hit by a player and running away, and returning to the patrol when the player is out of range. Adding the debugging and testing into this video is a terrific idea.

[@Jesters-Jinx]

Great Tutorial, subbed.

[@TicToxicStudios]

Awesome! Glad it helped!

[@TheAngryRubberDuck]

I really liked this video. I have an understanding of the basics, so this felt like a great way to get information! Make a million more! The explanations through MSPaint were great!

[@TicToxicStudios]

@TheAngryRubberDuck Thank you for the feedback! I'm glad my FANTASITCAL artwork was useful. I didn't want to go TOO much in detail, but still give the basic idea so that viewers would be comfortable playing around on their own and know what is happening. Glad you enjoyed this!

[@abdoulraoufgambo]

waouh !! thank you so much !!

[@yolven2303]

you forgot to swap to the 2nd alt

[@abdoulraoufgambo]

@@yolven2303 🤣🤣

[@grit-mike]

Would love to see a video,or ideas around an architecture, for how to "assign" tasks to your NPC players. For instance, having a couple of commands you can assign to an NPC: "Flank", "Take cover" etc, essentially allowing you to coach your team of combatants. If that makes sense? Essentially like having your playbooks of plays like a coach in football. :)

[@TicToxicStudios]

I like the ideas here. Most of these are heavy in animation to have smooth transitions. I'm not very strong in the animation department, but I am working on it. Once I get better, this will for sure be a video. I'm thinking that I will follow the "soldier" style NPC and have them patrol, search area, attack/shoot, cover, and reload. Flanking would be a group or squad mechanic, which will require more explanation so would probably need its our video. Thanks for the great feedback!

[@dajajax]

Great tutorial! a bit fast to my linking but can modify the video speed on youtube so not really an issue. It really helped me with and unrelated issue I was having. In my case, a spawned actor was not moving towards its target, since it seem that Unreal set its IA to false on spawn by default.

[@TicToxicStudios]

Thank you for the feedback! So glad that this helped you! Isn’t it amazing how something so small as one setting being wrong could be so maddening?

[@dajajax]

@@TicToxicStudios Especially since so many examples tend to drop the character directly on the screen. I'm new to Unreal and was unaware of this setting. Looking forward to Your series.

[@TicToxicStudios]

@dajajax I’ve been debating a video idea, Would a very beginner video series about using Unreal Engine be useful to a beginner like you? Like a “Your first day using UE5” where I go into detail about the settings and properties of different parts?

[@dajajax]

​@@TicToxicStudios In my case, I'm more used to search for videos of mechanics, like this one. What could be a really nice adition, and something not very often seen, is if you could do, after showing a couple a mechanics, a video of how to integrate them in the same proyect. Allow me to divert a bit, lets say for example, you have made a video after this one, of Actors attacking the player after reaching it. That chould totally articulate with this video (and part 2), and for my experience what newcommers are lacking the most, is the understanding of how to implement several blueprints at the same time. I hope my response ends being of use to you.

[@TicToxicStudios]

Excellent feedback! Thank you! You have sparked an idea that I think I can apply to a large group!

[@Saz-Ansari]

the thing is the poeple who want to learn don't mind longer videos so if you slow the video a little the poeple who searched for this thing will watch as every dev know its important to understand evrything so we do not face any gliches or errors while working

[@TicToxicStudios]

Thank you for the feedback! I agree and have slowed down my videos since then. Still trying not to waste time, but giving it the proper time to learn!

[@LucasGAKIRE]

please how to chat with my NPCs with voice recogination as smart AI

[@TicToxicStudios]

This is a complex system that I am still learning myself. There are a few issues with something like this: First, most publishers (Epic and Steam) don't like to list games with AI because the replies can be unpredictable and violate terms of service. Also, unless you want your game to be only playable online, Large Language Models are HUGE when run locally and could push your game size into the terabyte+ sizes. The better route would be "Fake AI" with advanced behavior trees that I hope to work into in future videos! Thank you for the feedback to make future videos better!

[@LucasGAKIRE]

I have some ideas we can make AI chatbot in python then integrate with UE5 to meta human. do you think can work?@@TicToxicStudios

[@TicToxicStudios]

@@LucasGAKIRE As long as it is properly written for use in UE5, it is possible. Using unreal types is very important in this situation. Plus it's experimental. Also, getting unreal to reach out to APIs over the internet tends to be questionable. docs.unrealengine.com/5.0/en-US/scripting-the-unreal-editor-using-python/

[@bluegizmo1983]

Yes, but how do I make behavior trees for real people? 😂

[@TicToxicStudios]

Project settings> unpredictable behavior>dumba** friends >apply behavior tree