This is a shorter project I worked on which is a Helldivers-inspired drop pod sequence for our game Neon Revolt. I spent about two weeks part-time on it. The idea came from a gameplay perspective, where more advanced police units don’t show up in the usual way, but instead get dropped in via pods from satellites, carrying robot officers.
It ended up being a nice mix of modeling, rigging, and VFX, which made the whole process really fun and well-rounded.
For the game, I had already made human officers, so I had a general idea of what the robot officers should look like. I wanted them to have heavy-duty legs paired with a sleeker upper body to give the impression that they’re firmly planted. These guys don’t go down easily.
I also created an emission map to give the robots flickering red and blue lights in Unreal, really pushing that law-and-order aspect.
NGP Droid Rig
Animated
The drop pod is split into multiple parts: the main pod, the landed version, and the side panels. The pod itself stays the same throughout the entire drop phase, and only spawns the landed mesh upon impact.
The panels are handled in a Niagara emitter when the pod hits the ground, it spawns four panels that fly off in their respective directions, adding to the impact and overall feel of the drop.
Drop pod meshes
The effects in this project are pretty simple, but they come together nicely to sell the whole piece. The aerodynamic heating at the front of the capsule is made up of two meshes with panning noise textures, giving that classic heat-distortion look.
The thrusters are actually pointed downward, even though the shuttle is also moving down. That’s because if they were pointing up, the effect would look choppy. The shuttle moves faster than the fire’s spawn rate, so by aiming the emitter down, it keeps things looking smooth.
For the impact, I added smoke, dust, and some camera shake to really sell the feeling that the pod just slammed into the Earth hard.
Aerodynamic heating
Thruster
Landing Explosion
The drop pod blueprint sends a line trace toward the ground every tick to check if it's within range to trigger certain events. At 4000 units from the surface, it spawns a cloud ring to show the pod just broke through the atmosphere. At 1000 units, it plays the impact sound, and at 100 units, it spawns the landed shuttle mesh.
The sound plays slightly before the actual impact so it has time to build up and sync better with the moment the pod hits the ground.
Timing logic in blueprints