Hello all, I have been following along through Kaans tutorials and have been learning a great deal. As others have noted when you’re following through the Alien Attack series you’ll come to the particle effect video which has since been dated thanks to an update on the GoDot engine.
I was hoping I could clear up some of these confusions that others have had because I was having some myself, so I began taking a bit of notes from the documentation that address these issues.
Firstly, when adjusting gravity it cannot be searched for, but it is there - just not in the same place as in Kaans video. That is because now gravity is found under Accelerations now, which is itself only found under the ‘hidden menu’ by clicking on the newly created Process Material.
***Quick edit to note I say ‘hidden’ because you can’t use the search bar in the inspector to find the value for whatever reason. I assume because it is a menu nested inside of a menu? But maybe this is just a current bug in GoDot.
This will bring up a list of 9 values that each have specific values they adjust. Here is a screenshot of the menu and where gravity is located:
I highlighted the portions to click on to find the gravity setting.
I also personally ran into the issue that once getting rid of gravity the ball wouldn’t move again because I couldn’t find 'Initial Velocity that he adjusts anywhere.
Note that in the screenshot there is an option for ‘Animated Velocity’
If you open this there are several types of velocity that can be adjusted. Angular, Directional, Orbit, Radial, and Velocity Limit.
Each of these effect different properties but here is what they do in a nutshell
TAngular velocity makes the particle have a sort of spinning effect.
Whether you want it to spin left or right is adjusted with the min/max, or set with a curve.
Directional velocity is explicitly a curve, and I’m not fully sure what this one does. I have tried setting the curves for X and Y values and have noticed nothing changing. I’m sure I’m missing what this does.
Orbit Velocity is how much the object curves. Think of picking up items in many roguelite games and how the items will often curve around you - like with a gravitational pull. This can also be set with a curve or a min/max value.
Radial velocity is almost like an explosion type effect. They seem more random and like they would be good for creating a smoke effect, or water splashing. Something with a burst kind of motion.
This cannot be effected by damping. It is also set with a Min/Max value or applying a curve.
Velocity Limit is applied exclusively with a curve.
After going through each velocity and acceleration types I haven’t been able to get the effect of my particles appearing behind my character without adjusting gravity.x to be negative. This is most likely me overlooking a better or simpler way to do it.
I was hoping that providing this list of velocities, and what they do would help someone else who knows more, but is lost in the spaghetti menu that is the particle node inspector.
If anyone knows a better way to fix my particles appearing behind my character than adjusting the x value it would be greatly appreciated.
I do have a rather extensive OneNote document on all of this if anyone wants to see more I can post more about this, but don’t know that I’m the most equipped to explain each one in depth.