Creating a Firearm

How to use a custom mesh and animations for your firearms.

Updating the firearm mesh

Open up the BP_FPS_Firearm blueprint and navigate to the viewport.

The skeletal mesh can simply be replaced with a skeletal mesh of your choice. However, make sure to re-position the Bullet Origin arrow component which is attached to the skeletal mesh. This arrow defines where the fake bullet tracers will spawn.

The Bullet Origin arrow component should be aligned with the muzzle of the weapon.

Updating the firearm animations

Open up the BP_FPS_Firearm blueprint and navigate to the 'Settings -> Animations' variable category. Here you can set all relevant animation montages. Note that these must be compatible with your chosen mesh.

Important Note: Sounds and particle effects are played using animation notifies (e.g., muzzle flash and casing eject vfx, shot sound sfx).

AS_FPS_Rifle_Fire: All sounds and effects are played using animation notifies. Make sure to add these to your own animations as well.

Staged Reloads

If you have staged reloads enabled, you need to add certain montage notifies to your reload animation montage. For more information on staged reloads, refer to the Firearm Settings page.

In the content browser, navigate to your reload animation and create a montage if you haven't already. All following steps will be done inside of this animation montage.

Montage Sections

You need to add 3 montage sections to your reload animation:

1. MagOut: Defines the section where the player removes the magazine of the firearm (presumably at the start of your reload animation).

2. MagIn: Defines the section where the player inserts a new magazine.

3. CycleAction: Defines the section where the player pulls back the slide (cycles the firearm action).

Spelling for these montage sections must be exact. Make sure that the sections also go from MagIn -> MagOut -> CycleAction (in the Montage Sections window).

Montage Notifies

Next, you need to add 3 montage notifies to your reload. These notifies signal that a reload stage has been completed. For example, when the MagOut montage notify is called, the firearm's magazine will be removed (current magazine is set to 0 or 1, depending on if there still was a bullet in the chamber).

To add a montage notify, right click the notify section and select montage notify. Make sure to rename this notify to the correct name.

These 3 montage notifies are called MagIn, MagOut, and CycleAction again (same spelling) and should be put at the end of each corresponding montage section.

Setup Completion

Your animation montage should now look like this:

It is highly recommended to check out the reload animation montages that come with the pack as a reference.

It is also recommended to add specific reload sound notifies to each stage of the reload (as can be seen in the example above).

Tip: The earlier you place the montage notifies, the earlier the reload logic will be triggered. This means that the player can cancel the reload animation slightly before it ends and still have their weapon reload. The sooner you place the montage notify, the sooner the player can cancel the animation and still benefit from the reload.