Limiting rotation of an object

Questions & Answers
1

Hi there, i’m doing a “platform/balance/roll-a-ball” game, in wich the ground will be platforms that are tilted via the players input, and the ball moves around based on gravity.

The idea is to rotate the platforms (a Cube or Plane) in the x and z axises, so it should always be looking in the same direction.

My issues are as follow:

1.- As i rotate the platform, on the x and z axis, it starts to slightly rotate on the y axis as well, so the control starts to get more and more complicated.
2.- The platform rotation is limited to ±45° on each axis, and that works fine when i tilt in only 1 axis, when i start doing both, it goes beyond 45° and i get something like 80°.
3.- I created variables to store the rotation created by the script, but when that anomalous rotation happens, the actual X or Z rotation is beyond what the control variable has stored.

public float turnSpeed = 1.5f;      // speed the platform tilts
	private float maxtiltAngle = 45.0f; // max incline angle
	public float vrotationTotal = 0.0f; // total rotation on the X axis
	public float hrotationTotal = 0.0f; // total rotation on the Z axis

	
	void FixedUpdate () 
	{
		float vrotation = turnSpeed*Input.GetAxis("Vertical"); // input vertical, rotates X axis
		float hrotation = turnSpeed*Input.GetAxis("Horizontal"); // input horizontal, rotates Z axis

		if (Input.GetAxis ("Horizontal") > 0.01f)  // if input direction is positive
		{
			if (hrotationTotal <= maxtiltAngle)    // and the current rotation is less than the max, it will apply rotation
			{
				transform.Rotate (0, 0, -hrotation); //hrotation is negative to  make it go in the same direction as the arrow keys
				hrotationTotal += turnSpeed*Input.GetAxis("Horizontal"); // modify the rotationTotal variable to keep updated
			}
		}
		if (Input.GetAxis ("Horizontal") < 0.01f) // if input negative
		{
			if ( hrotationTotal >= -maxtiltAngle)  // and the current rotation is less than the max (on the other direction), it will apply rotation
			{
				transform.Rotate (0, 0, -hrotation); 
				hrotationTotal += turnSpeed*Input.GetAxis("Horizontal");
			}
		}

		if (Input.GetAxis ("Vertical") > 0.01f) // if input direction is positive
		{
			if (vrotationTotal <= maxtiltAngle) // and the current rotation is less than the max, it will apply rotation
			{
				transform.Rotate (vrotation, 0, 0);
				vrotationTotal += turnSpeed*Input.GetAxis("Vertical");
			}
		}
		if (Input.GetAxis ("Vertical") < 0.01f)  // if input negative
		{
			if ( vrotationTotal >= -maxtiltAngle)  // and the current rotation is less than the max (on the other direction), it will apply rotation
			{
				transform.Rotate (vrotation, 0, 0); 
				vrotationTotal += turnSpeed*Input.GetAxis("Vertical");
			}
		}

So basically, what i need is:

a) Is there a way to limit rotation on a specific axis so it does not happen? tried applying a rigidbody with constraints but didn’t work.
b) what would be a better way to limit the rotation angle? how can i get the actual rotation from the object so it does not exceed the limit i want to place?

Thanks in advance!!

PS: yeah, i’m reaaaally a coding noob, sorry if this is a silly question…

2

Well Instead of using Rotate I might manipulate the transform.euler as it would be more direct but that is just preference.

The reason you are going past your rotation limit is b/c your vrotation total is by the input axis at every frame. So you are telling it every frame, rotate this object on x asis by one more than it currently is.

You are not limiting the rotation itself you are just limiting how much can be added to the rotation before the variable changes.

You want something like

void FixedUpdate(){
// all your code is here
float currentX = platform.transform.euler.x;
if(currentX > 100 )
  currentX = 100;

// repeate for y and z and negative numbers
// or you could also just use MathF.Clap

// then apply the limitation
Vector3 newEuler = new Vector3 (currentX,currentY,currentZ);
platform.transform.euler = newEuler;

}

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