Real-time simulation of animated characters crowd in unreal engine 4

Abstract

Realistic crowd simulation is still not an easy task in computer animation and computer games domain, especially when it has to be done in real-time and no post-processing correction is possible. The goal of this paper is to analyze and compare the algorithms of crowd behavior and collision avoidance available in Unreal Engine 4, which is one of the most popular game engines. We addressed various methods: natively implemented in the engine, requiring their own implementation and requiring the use of external software. We found one of the natively implemented algorithms, Detour Crowd, as the most useful in terms of quality and flexibility to extend, so as a consequence we use it as a base for our own improvements of engine functionality to achieve more believable movement of actors in crowd simulation. These improvements are also addressed by the paper.