Hey everybody, I just released my first asset on the asset store! Living Birds is a set of bird models, animations, sounds, and behaviors designed to let you add realistic behaving birds to your game in just a few minutes.
The system consists of a bird controller and bird targets. The controller can be set up within the inspector in under a minute. You can choose from 6 different species of bird and the amount of birds. Targets are then place in your scene for birds to land on (prefab targets and controller are included.) And thatâs it! Your game will now have realistic songbirds flying, singing, eating, and doing generally birdy things.
The system dynamically loads targets based on the proximity to the camera. Birds automatically spawn and unspawn when they are off camera. The birds are AI driven on their own but a full list of function calls is included so that you can control birds through scripting by sending message to the controller. Please let me know if there is anything that you would like added to Living Birds. I am actively working on this project and would like it to grow to include features that people are looking for.
Right now the controller is not set up to use other prefabs but I love the idea of adding this feature. Obviously if outside models are used they will have to have certain animations to allow them to work properly but It shouldnât be hard to implement. I will also look into adding species specific targets.
Mobile âshouldâ work fine but I am not set up to test on it. The birds are under 730 triangles so depending on how many are active it should work. I will look into it further and try to get more solid data on mobile. Thanks for the feedback!
For mobile, Iâm more concerned about the AI script and physics CPU usage than the onscreen polys (those I know how to account for), so any insight you have on that would be helpful.
I am working on an update now that will include alpha textures that create âflight feathersâ on the wings of the birds. This will result in a more detailed and realistic look to the wings. I had originally left them off because I assumed that people would be more interested in the increased efficiency of not using alpha based textures. The new update will include this as an option so you can choose to use it it or go with the faster texture âsolidâ wings. If I have time I will also put in some more bird types.
I am working out a way to get the package fast enough for mobile as well. This probably wonât be in the next update but I am working on it.
Thanks for the feedback, it is greatly appreciated!
I do have a question. Can any items be set up to use as a target? Could I have birds landing on trees, on a cobblestone street, etc.? How difficult would it be to set up other prefabs as targets?
The birds can land on anything you would like them to. The way that this is achieved is by placing targets on the object that you want them to land on. There are 2 types of targets currently, perch targets and ground targets. There are prefabs of the targets that you can drag into your scene, or you can set them up yourself.
Perch targets can be any transform with the tag âlb_perchTargetâ. Use this for tree branches or wires, just place the target point where you want the birdâs feet to be.
Ground targets are any transform with a box collider set to trigger that has the tag âlb_groundTargetâ. Use these for your cobblestone street. Just place the collider so that the top of the box is exposed and the collider overlaps the street. The surface that the birds land on needs a collider of some sort as well. Multiple birds can land within the same ground target. Birds will seek a random point within the ground target and then raycast down to ensure that they are actually landing on the ground.
If you use prefabs in your scenery you can include the targets in the individual prefabs. For example include a few perch targets on a tree prefab. This way the birds will automatically land in the tree where it is used.
Hope this helps, if you have any more questions please let me know. There will be an update coming this week with new higher quality textures.
I just submitted Living Birds version 1.1 for approval! Here are the new features:
-High Quality option which includes alpha enabled shaders for all the birds allowing for detailed wing and tail feathers
-Animations have been tweaked to resolve any of the issues with the birdsâ wings
-Birds can now be killed with one function call and there is a feather particle emitter.
-Crows have been added to the bird pack bringing the total number of birds to 7
-Crows scare away other birds that get too close for added realism
Here are some pictures of the new birds. The webplayer demo has also been update and can be seen here: WEBPLAYER DEMO ASSET STORE PAGE
As always I would love to hear your feedback. Living Birds is something I am continually developing and would love to hear any of your suggestions. On the roadmap is increased mobile efficiency, species specific targets, and more bird types.
Hi
Iâm quite new to unity, I just saw -Living-Birds-Automated-Realistic-3D-Birds assets and I think itâs pretty cool. I have been looking for a bird assets for my Ancient Greece project. Is it possible to view from one of the bird perspective, I want a bird flying over my city and looking Down. At the start of the scene we see the bird then switch the camer to the bird perspective.
It would be really helpful if your assets is able to do that, or anyone else has idea or solution to my problem. I would really Appreciate it
You could always attach a camera to the bird transform but I donât think that would give the results that you are looking for. If you think about it a bird flying normally would not result in a good camera view because the bird is worried about flying around not properly looking down on the landscape below in cinematic terms.
It would be better for you to add an animation component to your camera and animate the âbirdâs eyeâ view that you want to show with the camera alone. If the first camera shows the bird and then you switch active cameras to one flying through the air the playerâs will know that they are looking through the perspective of the âbirdâ but the camera will still do exactly what you want it to. You donât really need to have a bird flying around when the camera is seeing through its eyes.
Yeah now that I have heard another person thought I realise it would be better if the camera was attach to the bird as it travels around the city, so it will be following the bird. As suppose to looking through the bird perspective, that way we can see the beautiful bird model move around
Ps: is there a demo of this, I just want to test before buying because I have brought assets in the past that I thought were useful but later found out it wasnât
The birds in Living Birds fly based on their own AI and are designed to do their own thing within a certain range of the active camera. Based on your needs, I think you would probably be better off purchasing one of the other animated bird models on the asset store so that you could animate the bird flying over your city exactly as you want it to. There is a web demo of Living Birds here
I am interested in this asset but I read the reviews and am concerned about birds flying through buildings. Anyone find a fix for this? I notice there have not been updates in a while. Of course, the bird sounds are worth the price at the moment.
