This tutorial demonstrates how to add a vibration effect to a controller through the Motion plug-in.

Before you begin this tutorial:

• Install the Motion plug-in through the Wwise Launcher.
• Learn about Motion integration. Refer to Integrating Wwise Motion for details.
• To use Motion with DualSense controllers, install the Playstation 5 SDK.

Adding a Motion Bus to the Wwise Project

First, add a new bus to your Wwise project and associate the Motion plug-in with it.

To add a Motion bus:

1. In Wwise Authoring, open the Master Mixer Hierarchy and create a new Audio bus under the Default Work Unit and call it "Motion Bus".
2. Select the new bus and change the Audio Device to a Wwise Motion Audio Device. By default, it is called "Wwise_Motion".
3. In the Actor-Mixer Hierarchy, create a Sound SFX called "MotionSFX" and change its Output Bus to "Motion Bus".
4. Add a Motion Source as its Source.
5. (Optional) Do one or both of the following in the Motion Source Editor:
   • Change the Actuator Configuration of the Motion plug-in to something that matches the targeted controller device.
   • Unlink the Actuator Configuration, depending on the platform. This example targets Windows with a Generic 1-Channel configuration.

6. Play the MotionSFX to verify that the controller vibrates.

   Tip: To preview Motion on a DualSense controller, click Audio > Authoring Audio Preferences and change the Motion Bus Audio Device and Hardware Device to Wwise_Motion - DualSense Controller (User 1) (Haptics). You can now feel the DualSense controller vibrate when you play the MotionSFX in Wwise Authoring.

7. Create a new Event called “Play_Motion” that plays the Sound “MotionSFX”.
8. Generate SoundBanks and save the Wwise project.

Integrating Motion into the Game

To transmit the Motion signal to the gamepad, you need to call AddOutput in Unreal with the corresponding Audio Device. You can do this either with a Blueprint or in C++. You can use various engine events to determine when to call AddOutput:

• Call it on the PlayerController when it is possessed by a pawn (that is, when a real player starts controlling it), but the Gamepad must be connected first.
• React to an event when a gamepad is connected through the OnInputDeviceConnectionChange callback.
• React to platform-specific callbacks when new gamepad controllers are plugged in.

First, however, you must create assets for the Event and the Audio Device.

To create Motion assets in Unreal:

1. Open the Wwise Browser, and click Reconcile.
2. Regenerate your SoundBanks.

Using Blueprints

Before you proceed with this section of the tutorial, ensure that a gamepad is connected. The example also targets an XInput controller type (Xbox controller).

To add vibration through Blueprint:

1. Open your GameMode Blueprint Class, find the Player Controller Class and click + to create a new Blueprint. You can also click on the Toolbar Blueprint button, then in the GameMode click Edit [GameMode] > PlayerController > Create, derive from PlayerController.
2. Open the PlayerController Blueprint and in the Event Graph, right-click to add the OnPossess event. Add the AddOutput function and connect the Exec pin to OnPossess.
3. Drag the “In Settings” pin to create a Make AkOutputSettings node.
4. In the AkOutputSettings box, select “Wwise_Motion” for the Audio Device ShareSet pin. The Id Device pin refers to the DeviceID, which varies by platform. For Windows, it is an index from 0 to 3 in the order of the connection of the gamepad. Set it to 0 to select the first available gamepad connected.
   Unreal cannot retrieve the DeviceID as described in the Game setup table. For other platforms, you must write C++ code to retrieve the proper ID.
   

   Note: To target a DualSense controller and want to use Haptic feedback, you must enable Advanced Vibration. To do so, add the following to [WwiseProject]/Config/[platformName]/[platformName]Engine.ini:

   
   You can now post Play_Motion with a Post Event function to make the gamepad vibrate.

To stop the gamepad from vibrating, you can use the RemoveOutput function using the return value of the AddOutput function as the parameter.

Using C++

You can use C++ to add vibration effects to controllers. C++ is more flexible than Blueprints. In particular, it is easier to select something other than the first controller for the DeviceID.

As in the Blueprint section, this example targets Windows and uses an XInput controller.

To add vibration through C++:

1. In Unreal, click Tools > New C++ Class. The Add C++ Class dialog opens.
2. Select Player Controller as the parent class and click Next.
3. Name the controller and click Create Class. The new class opens in your development environment.
4. In the [UnrealProjectName].Build.cs file, add “WwiseSoundEngine” to the list of PublicDependencyModuleNames. You need this to call Wwise SDK functions.
5. Copy the following code into the [PlayerControllerClassName].h file:

6. Copy the following code into the [PlayerControllerClassName].cpp file:

   As in the Blueprint, this code calls AddOutput when the PlayerController possesses a Pawn. The AddMotionOutput function starts by querying whether the current PlayerController is local. Then, the SoundEngine's API is used to call Wwise functions directly. GetInputIndex returns the Gamepad index as defined by Unreal. For an XInput device on Windows, this corresponds to a range of 0 to 3, so it matches Wwise expectations.

7. Compile and start Unreal Editor. In the Toolbar Blueprint menu, go to GameMode > PlayerController > Select PlayerController Class, and select the new C++ class.
   You can post Play_Motion with a Post Event function to make the gamepad vibrate.

Note: For DualSense on Windows, as stated in the Integrating Wwise Motion documentation, you must link to the static library of libScePad for PC Games. In UE5, DualSense is supported through the use of the WinDualShock plug-in, which links to libScePad, and so you must use the ScePad function from this library. The Wwise Unreal Integration links to Motion Dynamically, so you must use the AKMOTIONSINK_DYNAMIC_LINK_SCEPAD_FUNCTIONS macro in Unreal.

Additional Platform-Specific Information

This section includes extra setup information for different platforms.

On Windows, you can use the following code to differentiate between an XInput controller and DualSense or DualShock: