The Panel

Playground & scene editor

Where you talk to the character before anyone else does — and arrange the scene it stands in.

Every character editor has a Test in Playground button in its header. It opens a full conversation with the character exactly as configured — same model, same voice, same documents, same rules — plus a 3D viewport you can arrange.

The playground showing the 3D character in the viewport, scene hierarchy on the left and the chat sidebar on the right
The playground. Scene tree on the left, character in the middle, conversation on the right.

Talking to it

The right-hand panel is a normal conversation. Type into the box, or press the microphone and speak. The character answers in its own voice, and its mouth moves as it does.

ControlWhat it does
Chat tabThe conversation. Enter sends a message.
MicrophoneHold a conversation out loud. It becomes available once the header shows Connected.
Emotion meterAppears bottom-left once the character has feelings to show — a live readout of the eight emotional axes.
Connected badgeThe live connection. If it stays on Connecting…, reload the page.
Do all your persona tuning here. Change a line in the character's Background, press Save, come back to this tab and reload — the very next answer reflects it. That loop takes about ten seconds and is far faster than testing through Unreal.

Building the scene

The centre viewport is a real 3D scene, not a preview image. Drag with the mouse to orbit, scroll to zoom, and use the tree on the left to select things.

Scene itemWhat you can do
EnvironmentThe backdrop behind the character.
GroundThe surface it stands on.
CameraFrame the shot. Whatever you leave the camera looking at is what visitors see.
CharacterPosition and rotate the character itself.
Ambient / Key / Fill / Rim lightsThe four-light setup. Key is the main light, Fill softens the shadow it casts, Rim separates the character from the background.
Add prop (GLB)Drop a 3D object into the scene — a desk, a plant, a product you want it standing next to.
  1. Frame the camera first. Orbit until the character is composed the way you want it seen — usually head and shoulders for a website widget, full body for a kiosk.
  2. Fix the lighting. A character that looks flat is nearly always under-lit on the rim; lift that light until the silhouette separates from the background.
  3. Add props if the setting matters. A receptionist behind a desk reads differently from one floating in a void.
  4. Press Save scene. This stores the camera and everything in the tree, and the same arrangement is replayed for visitors in the embed.
The scene you save here is what your website visitors get. It is worth spending ten minutes on — good framing and lighting do more for how "real" a character feels than any model upgrade.

Getting the embed code

The Embed code button in the header gives you a ready iframe for the character with the scene you just built. It is the same snippet as the one on the character's Publish tab.

What the playground does not show

The playground always draws the browser-based 3D avatar. If your character is set to render as a LiveFace photo or a cloud MetaHuman, you will still see the 3D model here — use the preview buttons on those tabs instead.

Close the playground tab before running a live stream. An open playground counts as a connected renderer for that character, so it can pick up and answer viewer comments that were meant for your broadcast. This is the most common cause of "the character answered but nothing came out on stream".

Where to go next

Tune what it says

Identity & voice →

Put it on your site

Publishing →