What were going to do here is have a moving point_viewcontrol. Were going to have it track Barney where ever he walks. What this is good for is having a movie like cut scene or making your own in game machinima. This is really eazy so lets get started.

The first thing your going to need is, you guessed it, is something to track. In this case we are going to use Barney. So put in a [e]generic_actor[/e] entity and make it the Barney model and give it the name of barney. Next you going to need your point_viewcontrol entity. So put that in your level (in my example map its right in front of barney). Here is the list of keyvalues to change.

Name: point_viewcontrol
Pitch Yaw Roll: click on the Point At button and point it at barney’s eyes
Entity to Look At: barney
Target Attachment Name: eyes
Path Corner: path_track01

Under the Flags tab check only Freeze Player and Infinite Hold Time.

Now that we have our point_viewcontrol ready we need to get it to move. To do this we need a path_track entity. When you put this in your level it needs to be in the same space that your point_viewcontrol is. This is because when you trigger the point_viewcontrol and want it to start moving your going to have the point_viewcontrol playing catch up to the path_track. Its eazyer to have the path_track and the point_viewcontrol right with each other so you know how its going to move. Here is the list of keyvalues to change.

Name: path_track01
Next Stop Target: path_track02
New Train Speed: This is up to you. Example map is 90

I should point out that you can also use path_corner in place of a path_track or both. The nice thing about using a path_corner is that it has a Wait Here value so you could pause your point_viewcontrol.

And thats about it. In the example map I have it set up to start as soon as you walk into the trigger. Once triggered your view will switch to the point_viewcontrol. It and barney will start moving and the point_viewcontrol will track barney.

As you can see there are endless ways to use this. The one thing that I haven’t got working yet is how to contol the speed that the point_viewcontrol looks at what you have it set to look at. It seems to have just one speed. For example, if you set the point_viewcontrol in one spot and have barney walk right pass it, it will not speed up to keep tracking right on barney’s eyes. It will move at its set speed and sort of play catch up. If anyone knows how to fix it please let me know.

Video: Half-Life 2 Tutorial: Point Viewcontrol

Where going to make an elevator with two props and have it close the door once you press the button inside and go to the next level. Once at the next level the door will open and wait from you press the button again.

First you want make a prop_dynamic with the models/props_lab/freightelevator.mdl. Give it a name of prop_elevator and make the Parent elevator (we will be getting to that in a moment). Now make another prop_dynamic with the model models/props_lab/elevatordoor.mdl. Give it the name prop_door and parent it to elevator. If you look at the front of the elevator model you will see a dark beam on both sides of the door and wouldn’t you know it the elevatordoor.mdl fits right in there.

Now we come to the parent I was talking about. Get the nodraw texture and make a brush the size of your elevator from the top. Here is the important part. Make sure the top of the brush is level with the floor in the elevator. If not, wherever the top of the brush is where the player will walk. So it’s better to have even with the elevator floor.

Now make the brush you just make a func_tracktrain (Ctrl+T) with the name elevator and change the Max Speed to 50 (the default of 100 is a little fast). Also change the Height above track to 0 and for First Stop Target put path_track_01. Go to the flags tab and check only No Pitch and No User Control.

To make it clear what we have done so far is get our elevator and door and tied them to the func_tracktrain. So where ever the func_tracktrain goes so will the elevator and the door. Now we just need to tell it where to go.

To do that you need 2 path_track entities. Name the first one path_track_01 and for the Next Stop Target put path_track_02. Go to the Outputs tab and add these 2 outputs.

My outputs named: OnPass
Target entities named: elevator
Via this input: Stop
With a parameter override of: none

My outputs named: OnPass
Target entities named: prop_door
Via this input: SetAnimation
With a parameter override of: open

Since we changed the Height above track to 0 for our func_tracktrain we can set the floor of the elevator right where we need to. In the x/y (top) view put the X in the middle of the path_track entities right where the X for the func_tracktrain is at. In the y/z (front) or the x/z (side) view put the X for the path_track even with the top of the floor you want it to start on.

Do the same as above for the other path_track but name it path_track_02 and set the Next Stop Target to path_track_01. Of course put this one above or below depending on what way you want it to go.

Now we need to trigger all this. To do that we get our nodraw texture again and make a small brush that covers the button inside the elevator.

Make this brush a func_button (Ctrl+T), give it the name of elevator_button and made the parent elevator. Go to the Flags tab and check only Don’t move and Use Activates. Now go the Outputs tab and add the following two outputs.

My outputs named: OnPressed
Target entities named: prop_door
Via this input: SetAnimation
With a parameter override of: close

My outputs named: OnPressed
Target entities named: elevator
Via this input: StartForward
With a parameter override of: none

Video: Half-Life 2 Tutorial: Freight Elevator

And there you have it. The door will start open, you get inside and press the button, the door will close and the elevator will move. But theres one more thing. If you try it now you can just walk out the sides and back. To stop this get the Player Clip texture and made a brush for the sides and back. Select all of them and make it a func_brush (Ctrl+T). Make the parent elevator and your set.