Rotation in 8 way direction

Question

Hello there, and first of all i know that there are ALOT of questions about rotation already answered, but i think that none of them seems to answer my problem ( i tried alot of things that came out of those ).

The thing is quite simple, using the arrows or WASD keys i want an object to rotate in the Y axis towards the same direction while having a static camera ( so i dont need a rotation based on the camera ). this is in a 3D way like the old games , for example : i press "up" and the object looks at 0º, i press "right" and the object looks at 90º, i press "up" and "right" and the object looks at 45º ( here is my problem ).

So far i have this code working but it seems pretty poor because it only works when i press "up " and "right" at the EXACT SAME time, otherwise if i press "up" and THEN press "right", it will still be looking at 0º.

 if (Input.GetButtonDown("Up"))
         {
      transform.rotation=Quaternion.Euler(0,0,0);
     }
 if (Input.GetButtonDown("Right"))
     {
      transform.rotation=Quaternion.Euler(0,90,0);
     }
 
 // and here is what i can't figure out how to do it correctly
 // tho i know that all this could be made in a different way
 
 if (Input.GetButtonDown("Up") && Input.GetButtonDown("Right))
         {
         transform.rotation=Quaternion.Euler(0,45,0);
         }

Thanks for any kind answer and sorry if someone asked something similar ( thought i looked around 20 other questions before doing this one to make sure no one asked this already)

PS: as you can see, i just want the object to change abrutly its rotation as the old good games, so there is no need to "smooth" the thingy. And i have already configured the input keys.

Answer 1

Best Answer

Answer by save · Dec 28, 2012 at 10:28 PM

You could assign a new forward direction based on the horizontal and vertical axes.

 function Update () {
     if (Input.GetButton("Horizontal")||Input.GetButton("Vertical")) {
         var newForward : Vector3 = Vector3(Input.GetAxis("Horizontal"), 0, Input.GetAxis("Vertical")).normalized;
         if (newForward!=Vector3.zero) transform.forward = newForward;
         transform.Translate(Vector3.forward*Time.deltaTime);
     }
 }

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geroppo · Dec 28, 2012 at 10:39 PM 0

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wow it worked pretty good thanks! i didn't thought about using forward direction

geroppo · Dec 28, 2012 at 10:41 PM 0

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sorry to ask one more thing, i noticed that when you go into the opposite direction, the console says "Look rotation viewing vector is zero", its not a problem but i wonder why

save · Dec 28, 2012 at 10:46 PM 0

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Ah yes sorry, that happens when trying to set the forward direction to zero. Use the updated code sample to fix that issue.

geroppo · Dec 28, 2012 at 10:51 PM 0

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thank you very much! works like a charm

Answer 2

Answer by Golan2781 · Dec 28, 2012 at 10:53 PM

What you want to do could be easier done using Input axes. Go to Edit -> Project Settings -> Input and define two axes here, one for left/right and one for up/down. Once you got that, the two axes can be seen as a direction vector. The construct

 Vector2((Input.GetAxis ("Horizontal"),(Input.GetAxis ("Vertical"))

would for example point up with you'd press up or point to the lower right if you'd press down and right.

Seeing how you're only interested in the angle of the direction, you can calculate that directly using trigonometric functions. Arctan is the correct one in your situation; unity calculates the arctan in radians, so you also need to convert it to degrees.

 Mathf.Atan((Input.GetAxis ("Horizontal")/Input.GetAxis ("Vertical"))*Mathf.Rad2Deg

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geroppo · Dec 28, 2012 at 11:09 PM 0

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thank you for your explanation, i did have those inputs but i was very confused about how to use them , so i divided them in 4 :P

Rotation in 8 way direction

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