Cant migrate to 5.3

[matrix-gk]

Hi I’m working on a school project and I’m planning to use this plugin, but I can’t open the example project with the branch for 5.3 , the editor just won’t start. It looks like that example only works with 4.27. I also tried following the Wiki to create a weapon from scratch, but the instructions are too superficial and I couldn’t get it working.Could you please update the example project for 5.3? I’d be happy to help I can send few weapons I modeled myself and donate them to the example project with no licensing strings attached, if you want to include them of course.

https://www.mediafire.com/file/i2grq4haj6j2y3y/Weapons_by_Berk.rar/file

[matrix-gk]

Unreal.Engine.5.2025.10.14.-.00.49.35.01.mp4

A quick update. Before migrating the sample project, I installed and activated the TacticalVR 5.3 and VRE 5.3 plugins, as well as the necessary starter content in the editor. Then, I copied the entire TacticalVR folder from the sample project directory into the Content folder of the project I had prepared. The project opened without any issues, and as seen in the video, most of the assets were successfully migrated. Only the main weapon and magazine blueprints appear not to have been loaded I’m currently investigating the reason for this.

[matrix-gk]

Here's the current status,when the TacticalVR plugin from the 5.3 branch is added to a C++ project and built using Visual Studio 2022 17.6.0 (the recommended version for UE 5.3, as other versions cause tons of compile and build errors), I get the errors listed below. I'm not completely sure, but this might be related to the VS version ,however i was able to succesfully build VRE plugin before attempting to build TacticalVR plugin , if you copy the TacticalVR plugin into a 5.3 project that doesn’t have a C++ class or .sln file, Unreal Editor compiles and loads it without any issues (as long as the VRE plugins are active).

Additionally, I tried migrating assets from 4.27 project again . As I mentioned before, everything migrated successfully except for the Base weapon blueprints. I couldn't figure out the cause of the issue, but I suspect there might be some incompatibilities, and those assets might need to be recreated. If the error I mentioned isn't caused by the plugin and the plugin works fine in 5.3, I’m planning to recreate the base weapon blueprints from the 4.27 example template in 5.3.

[Tomura]

Yes it's probably best to recreate the weapon blue prints, though with my migration attempt of the private main project. I didn't have those problems, but I also moved from a newer version of my 4.27 plugin.

Thanks for narrowing it down. I might look at it this sunday, but can't make promises. I'm currently not very interested in game dev and VR, so motivation is a bit low, especially when it comes to dealing with something that previously worked not working.

There are indeed some bigger changes between the version I had for the template and the version for 5.3 because I added some new features. Though I would have expected most problems to come from the magwell component.

In general the template probably needs a lot more changes, e.g. moving away from the legacy input system to the new input system, some physics configurations I did (mainly collision channels) worked with PhysX, but don't work with Chaos etc.

[matrix-gk]

No worries at alI i'm glad if I was able to help even a little. So, just to clarify, you didn’t run into the issues I mentioned when building the plugin with Visual Studio, right? If that’s the case, would you mind sharing which version of VS you used,5.3 is really sensitive about VS? The editor builds fine on my end, so I don’t think the problem is with the plugin itself.

Also, I just realized that the 5.3 branch is quite different from 4.27 after you mentioned it. It makes sense now that some components in the sample project aren’t recognized must be because of the differences in assets. You're probably right about that. At least now the issue is clearer, and there’s no need to spend time debugging blindly.

So it needs a lot more changes ,new input system and some physics settings?. I’ve been trying to replicate the 4.27 project exactly, but now I realize it won’t work the same way anyway.

I really don’t want to trouble you, but if you are able to help, I’d truly appreciate it. I’m free this weekend just finished my exams so if you need someone to help with testing or anything else, I’d be happy to assist.

Feel free to use any of the assets I sent however you like! Some of them might have issues with vertex normal shading, but with normal maps applied, it shouldn’t really be noticeable.I made those back when I was still pretty new to 3d modelling.

[Tomura]

The old input system should still work in UE5.3, so that is generally not a worry if you want a quick migration, but the changes in the input system make sense to me, because it moves the basic input settings from the configs to the editor and has the ability for switching between different bindings based on context in a cleaner way.

Collisions: Chaos seems to not really like when Objects in different Object Channels are welded. So e.g. the hands in 4.27 are in the Pawn Channel, but the weapon is in a Weapon channel. This would work in 4.27, but in UE5 they will not physically attach together (so some things like physics collisions will be broken)

You will have to fix it yourself in case you have your own weapons, but I need to set it right in the plugin and example so that you and others have something to use as a reference. I also developed a nicer version of the magwell component, that has better editor visualizations.

I'll take a look at the weapons.

[matrix-gk]

I understand,thank you ! sounds amazing It would be great to have example project where settings like these are already set up as a reference.Im here if you need assist with testing.

Im actually trying to make a small sci-fi-themed drone shooting game. I won’t be adding modern weapons right now I’m modeling a sci-fi-style pistol and rifle. I found some concept designs that I really liked https://www.artstation.com/artwork/ZaD0W1

I was wondering why there were two different Mag components in the list, besides the new Magwell component,are there any other features you've added for the UE5 version?
For example, for this AUG type of weapons is the charging handle component has flags to lock the bolt mechanism back and be released either with physical interaction or an input action ? Basically, like the HK slap.

[Tomura]

Little status update. I am at the point where the project compiled and an editor opened properly. It seems like there were some includes missing in some files (so classes were undefined for those cpp files at compile time), for some reason in my other project the plugin didn't care, but I should add these code fixes to the plugin repo as well.

I will run some tests tomorrow to see what needs to be done for the migration to be complete.

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As for locking the bolt back: There is the possibility to either enable a automatic bolt hold open, or you need to program a manual bolt hold open via blueprint. Similarly you could override some functions blueprint to create a HK slap.
Below is a example for what I did for the MP5. It's a bit messy.

https://blueprintue.com/blueprint/c-mmu0-8/

Right now it is mainly cosmetic without any enforcement to actually reload that way. If that sort of reload cycle should be enforced e.g. by making it impossible to insert a magazine while the bolt is closed, it would need a little bit of C++ programming to have a flag that controls whether the magwell can accept a new magazine.

[matrix-gk]

Thanks for the status update ,i guess there are always unexpected things that can come up, I hope this situation hasn't been too frustrating for you. Strangely,as i mentioned I was able to build the plugin using the editor, but I had issues when building with Visual Studio,now this made me think it might be also related due to those missing parts in the code.

and thanks a lot for the blueprint, I’ve reviewed it and it’ll definitely help. The goal is to add some variety to the interaction with the weapon. The HK slap is a nice detail for this kind of weapon. Forcing a reload after the bolt locks back could have made things a lot more complex and realistic both in terms of coding and gameplay. So having a hybrid reload system where it can be reloaded both ways looks much better.

[matrix-gk]

Hi Tomura, I hope everything’s going well and that no extra issues have come up.
Could you please explaine how to add secondary hand grabbing animation for attachments?
For example, the slide component of a pistol, the charging handle component of the ar rifle, or maybe a vertical grip attachment.

after checking the example glock pistol you made ,If I understood correctly, for the main weapon it’s enough to add a “SecondaryHandSocket” component to the main weapon blueprint and link it with the animation.
But what about parts like the slide or the charging handle? should i add the “SecondaryHandSocket” component as a child of those components?

Also, regarding this fixed grabbing animations if I add a “SecondaryGripSpline” component, does that allow me to grip the weapon from different positions along the spline with fixed grab anims, or is it limited to a single fixed point? thanks.

[Tomura]

experimental/UE5.3

I could confirm that the UE5.3 version is working now.
Chaos uses different units for physics, so values for constraints and recoil all need to be updated to something more suitable (if you test it you will see that the arms cannot follow the movement speed or that the gun flies away when shooting it with one arm, because the recoil force is too strong)

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As for the other questions:

1) Grip Spline

Grip Spline is indeed made so that you can grap any position along that spline, but I think right now it only uses the dynamic finger curls from VRE. I was debating whether this feature is still relevant or not, but I do somewhat like it. Currently it has no way of adding an animation to it, VRE has implemented an example grasping hand which moves the bones (and some collision components with it) to curl the fingers until the collide with something, resulting in the animation.

2) Secondary Hand Socket

For a Secondary Hand Socket:
Regardless of what you use, in order to "Register" a secondary hand socket, you need to override the function "GetSecondaryHandSocket". At the moment it is not automatic, because a gun could have two hand sockets, and I do not like searching for components by name or tag.
There is also the function "GetSecondarySlotComponent". By default it will simply return the SecondaryHandSocket component by calling GetSecondaryHandSocket, so for a Pistol you can ignore it.

I don't think it works, but the intention is a bit of a hack so that the secondary slot provides the location of the hand attachment and the hand socket provides the animation. But I have not implemented it yet. So right now you only have the option:

• Spline with dynamic finger curls
• Hand Socket with fixed location, and animation

3) Slide Hand Socket

As for animations for gripping the slide.
This could be somewhat possible, though I have not tested if it works bug free:
If you look at the code for TVRGrasping hand in RetrievePoses() (around line 950) you can see that I implemented the function so that it first checks whether the interface "TVRHandSocketInterface" is implemented. If that is the case it will retrieve the Hand Socket Component by calling the function "GetHandSocket".

This means that you could create a child blueprint of the "PistolSlideComponent". In that blueprint's class settings you let it inherit the "TVRHandSocketInterface". Now you need to add an implementation of the Interface. For this you can find under "Interfaces" on the left side, a new group "Hand Socket". There you see the function "GetHandSocket". You need to implement it so that it returns the hand socket. How you find that hand socket is up to you. Probably best to just look at the children components of your slide component and select the first hand socket.

So once that all works, Instead of the C++ SlideComponent, you can use your customized SideComponent Child Blueprint instead. It is a child of the original, so it inherits all other behavior.

Same could in theory be done with any component.

The plugin does not come with a fixed structure for weapons, because it is intended to be customizable by creating child blueprints, by adding components that add additional functionality. So if a weapon has an ejection port, you add a ejection port component. A lot of functions are Blueprint overridable, so behavior can often be replaced or enhanced.

[matrix-gk]

Hello, sorry for the delay, but I finally found the time to test it. First of all, thank you very much for making this happen.Also I was able to get answers to almost all of my questions from your responses.

The Grip Spline and grasping hand system are actually really nice ,i also like them since they allow creating animations from different positions and angles, which reminded me of the grip system used in Metro Awakening. However, they used a fixed animation system that triggers based on the hand’s position and rotation. For the Slide, I’ll try to apply the trick you mentioned using the Hand Socket and animation. I really like how you designed the plugin to be flexible and modifiable in different ways, and that it doesn’t force any component to be used as-is.

Also, I have a couple of final questions
Did you modify the source code of the VRE Plugin to make it compatible with your system? In other words, is the VRE Plugin in the TacticalVRCore Example project different from the original one? I’m asking because I’ve made some changes to the VR hand system in the VRE example template and added IK arms. I plan to use these new arms, so I’m wondering if there would be any compatibility issues if I just added the TacticalVR plugin to my project.

And for adjustable gun stocks for the forward/backward sliding, rotation, and folding features are you using components that come with the VRE Plugin, or did you create a custom Blueprint solutions for them?

Aside from that, I tested the 5.3 example project to provide feedback. The project rebuilt and opened without any issues. Then I cooked the assets to check for possible errors aside from some yellow warnings, there were no errors.
I packaged the project and tried to run it, but before the game could start, it crashed with a fatal error. I found the crash log folder and opened the UEMinidump.dmp and TacticalVRTemplate-Win64-Shipping.pdb files in Visual Studio to debug. The result is as you can see below.

Unreal.Engine.5.2025.10.28.-.17.40.32.02.mp4

UEMinidump.dmp

If you were able to build and run it without issues, then the problem is probably on my end. However, just in case there’s an issue in the Experimental branch, I wanted to report it here.

[Tomura]

I have not modified VRE (the plugin), but I made my own C++ implementation of many of the blueprints from the example, to make them specialized to my use-case. Usually my C++ classes serve as base classes for final Blueprint Implementations, Anything that needs rapid prototyping is then usually solved in blueprint first, until I think it needs a generalized C++ implementation.

So likely you need to look into how to extend my stuff (a lot is overridable) or you need to create some work-around.

There are sadly some limits in how much I can decouple dependencies (and keep complexity reasonable). So some things assume that something is a child of a certain class, etc. But that also means that usually if you can solve it through polymorphism you should be able to solve it.

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I have not tested a shipping build yet.
Some of the warnings can probably be gotten rid of, by fixing some of the blueprints from the VR example (e.g. there is a spectator pawn by Epic I think, that still references input actions that do not exist), some input actions in the config point to HP reverb input actions.
The other ones I do not get.

As for the crash dump. Truth to be told I don't fully understand why it crashes here. OnColorVariantChanged is a even that is BlueprintImplementable. As far as I understand the crash happens in [External Code]. So my gut feeling is that something is preventing the Blueprints from being cooked properly.So I feel like it's a UE4 -> UE5 conversion issue.
Maybe try re-saving all assets, in hopes there is some conversion process?

Otherwise I don't really know. But I am interested if you find out a solution.

[matrix-gk]

Hello, I apologize for the late message. I’ve been feeling quite unwell and only just started recovering. I’ve been troubleshooting some issues over the past few days, and while packaging the project, I encountered the warning: "Static Mesh Actor has NULL StaticMesh property." As you already guessed, this was due to the assets not being properly cooked. After performing the following steps, the issue was resolved: "Right-click the Content folder in the Content Browser and select Resave All." This action really saved me from a lot of headaches since resaving assets one by one is time consuming!

In the end, the build ran smoothly without any crashes, and with your advice, I was able to overcome this problem.
I wanted to share the following feedback after testing:

Chaos feels a bit heavier than Physx,,somehow feels good if it's not too strong.

Recoil definitely needs an update as you said. It feels more like firing a .50 caliber rifle rather than a handgun. 😄

The character's hands don’t seem to keep up with the speed, and this issue seems to occur even when I'm not holding a weapon. This might be related to something other than just the recoil.

The rifle magazine doesn’t drop properly. It gets stuck just before falling. I suspect this is due to inconsistent settings in Object Channels or physics collisions.

Performance is really good, almost no different from 4.27. Don’t mind the video recording; I was getting well over 72 fps, and I believe it could have been even higher without the FPS cap of steamvr.

Since this is the first test build for UE5, some issues are to be expected. If you make any updates or changes to the project files or plugins, I’d be happy to test them with you.

video_2025-11-23_02-37-52.mp4