QuickStart: Character Controllers

Setting up the Modular Character Series with the Unity Third Person Controller

This tutorial will show you how to easily use Unity’s free Third Person Character Controller with a character prefab from the Modular Character series (or any character, really). It’s available for free on the Unity Asset Store here.

There are some important things to note before you get started. First, the updated Starter Assets packages from Unity are compatible with Unity 2020.3 LTS and 2021.3 LTS. Additionally, these packages require Unity’s new Input System and Cinemachine to work. The installation instructions state that these two packages will install when you import the Third Person Character Controller package, but it’s probably best to install them first.

Now let’s talk about some best practices when adding a character controller to a character.

• Create an Empty Parent to hold Control Logic
  It’s a good idea to create a new empty parent for the character prefab which will hold all of the control components, including colliders. This is particularly useful with the Modular Character series, because height is adjusted dynamically according to shoe type. If the collider lives on a parent object, rather than the character prefab, you don’t need to worry about updating it.

• Spend Some Time on Animations
  Even if you plan to use animation packs as a starting point, rather than your own, spend some time refining them so they look as compatible as possible with your character.

• Decide What Kind of Control You Want
  The Unity package we’re talking about today makes use of the Character Controller component, which does not make use of physics at all. Other controllers (or your own) may use a Rigidbody. They both come with benefits and drawbacks, but you will see different results depending on your needs. This article does a good job of comparing the two.

With all of that in mind, click the button to go to the tutorial!