Rotating the character's torso to aim a weapon

When playing a third-person character, you might want her to aim her weapon at some target that is not directly in front of her, without making her change her direction. In these cases, you will need to apply what is called a procedural animation, which does not rely on premade animation clips, but rather on the processing of other data, such as player input, to animate the character. In this recipe, we will use this technique to rotate the character's spine by moving the mouse, allowing for adjustments in the character's aim. We will also use this opportunity to cast a ray from the character's weapon and display a crosshair over the nearest object on target. Please note that this approach will work with the cameras standing behind the third-person controlled characters.

Getting ready

For this recipe, we have prepared a Unity Package named AimPointer, containing a basic scene that features a character armed with a laser pointer. The package, which...