Free-orbit third-person camera

The mouse now orbits the camera around the player a full 360 in yaw
(unclamped) with a wide pitch range -- swing it around to look at the
avatar's face. The body no longer snaps to the camera yaw; instead it
turns smoothly to face its movement direction (lerp_angle at
BODY_TURN_SPEED), so controls feel the same: W is still "away from
camera", A/D still strafe relative to view.

Implementation: CameraPivot is set top_level so it doesn't inherit the
body's rotation; _update_camera() places it at the head each frame and
points it by _camera_yaw / _camera_pitch. Movement direction is built
from a yaw-only camera basis. net_input.look_yaw is now the body's
movement facing, so remote players render facing the way they walk.

Verified: headless boot clean, 2p multiplayer still connects/moves,
avatar smoke 14/14 (source + exported pack), fresh-clone PASS, and
eyeballed the orbit in rendered screenshots (behind -> side -> face).

Co-Authored-By: Claude Sonnet 5 <noreply@anthropic.com>
Claude-Session: https://claude.ai/code/session_015jtxAiu5dAW4WxCNdGkrkJ

scripts/player.gd

@@ -3,9 +3,12 @@ extends CharacterBody3D
 ## The player character controller.
 ##
 ## A CharacterBody3D with WASD/arrow locomotion, gravity, jump, and a
-## third-person camera (SpringArm3D behind the player) with mouse-look --
-## yaw turns the body, pitch orbits the camera. Reads the spawn point from
-## the current scene's `PlayerSpawn` Marker3D.
+## free-orbit third-person camera. The mouse orbits the camera around the
+## player a full 360 (yaw) plus a wide pitch range -- swing it around to see
+## the avatar's face if you want. Movement is camera-relative (W = away from
+## camera) and the body turns to face the direction it's moving, independent
+## of where the camera is pointed. Reads the spawn point from the current
+## scene's `PlayerSpawn` Marker3D.
 
 
 # ---------------------------------------------------------------------------
@@ -25,6 +28,7 @@ const MOUSE_SENSITIVITY: float = 0.003
 # ---------------------------------------------------------------------------
 
 var _input_direction := Vector2.ZERO
+var _camera_yaw: float = 0.0        # free orbit, unclamped (wraps 360)
 var _camera_pitch: float = -0.12
 var _spawn_position: Vector3 = Vector3(0, 1.5, 0)
 
@@ -32,10 +36,15 @@ var _spawn_position: Vector3 = Vector3(0, 1.5, 0)
 ## line up with the bottom of the player's collision capsule.
 const AVATAR_FEET_OFFSET: float = -0.8
 
-## Third-person pitch limits (radians): a bit up, a lot down (looking over
-## the avatar's shoulder toward the ground).
-const PITCH_MIN: float = -1.1
-const PITCH_MAX: float = 0.45
+## Camera pitch limits (radians): from nearly top-down to looking up at the
+## avatar from below. Yaw is deliberately unclamped -- full 360 orbit.
+const PITCH_MIN: float = -1.35
+const PITCH_MAX: float = 1.2
+
+## Where the camera pivot sits relative to the player origin, and how quickly
+## the body swings to face its movement direction.
+const CAMERA_PIVOT_OFFSET: Vector3 = Vector3(0.0, 1.2, 0.0)
+const BODY_TURN_SPEED: float = 12.0
 
 @onready var _camera: Camera3D = $CameraPivot/SpringArm3D/Camera3D
 @onready var _camera_pivot: Node3D = $CameraPivot
@@ -79,8 +88,12 @@ func _ready() -> void:
 	var arm := $CameraPivot/SpringArm3D as SpringArm3D
 	arm.add_excluded_object(self)
 
-	# Start the camera arm tilted down a little so the avatar is framed.
-	_camera_pivot.rotation.x = _camera_pitch
+	# The camera pivot orbits the player freely, so it can't be a child that
+	# inherits the body's yaw -- detach it and drive its world transform
+	# ourselves each frame.
+	_camera_pivot.top_level = true
+	_camera_yaw = rotation.y
+	_update_camera()
 
 	# Capture the mouse for look. Headless/test runs have no real window to
 	# capture input for, so guard against that rather than error.
@@ -159,12 +172,21 @@ func _clear_input_direction(key: InputEventKey) -> void:
 
 
 func _handle_mouse_look(event: InputEventMouseMotion) -> void:
-	# Yaw rotates the whole body (so movement direction turns with the
-	# look direction); pitch orbits the camera arm around the player, so the
-	# capsule itself never tips over.
-	rotation.y -= event.relative.x * MOUSE_SENSITIVITY
+	# Mouse orbits the camera only -- the body is left alone (it turns to face
+	# movement in _physics_process). Yaw wraps freely; pitch is clamped.
+	_camera_yaw = wrapf(_camera_yaw - event.relative.x * MOUSE_SENSITIVITY, -PI, PI)
 	_camera_pitch = clampf(_camera_pitch - event.relative.y * MOUSE_SENSITIVITY, PITCH_MIN, PITCH_MAX)
-	_camera_pivot.rotation.x = _camera_pitch
+	_update_camera()
+
+
+## Place the free-orbit camera pivot at the player's head and point it per the
+## current yaw/pitch. Called from _ready, on mouse-look, and every frame (the
+## player moves under it).
+func _update_camera() -> void:
+	if not is_instance_valid(_camera_pivot):
+		return
+	_camera_pivot.global_position = global_position + CAMERA_PIVOT_OFFSET
+	_camera_pivot.global_rotation = Vector3(_camera_pitch, _camera_yaw, 0.0)
 
 
 # ---------------------------------------------------------------------------
@@ -189,17 +211,24 @@ func _physics_process(delta: float) -> void:
 		velocity.y = JUMP_VELOCITY
 		jumped = true
 
-	# Build movement direction from input. Godot's local "forward" is -Z, not
-	# +Z, so W (input.y = +1) must use -basis.z -- using +basis.z here would
-	# move the player backward when pressing forward (confirmed by reading
-	# Camera3D/Node3D's own convention: a node looks down its local -Z).
-	var direction := (_input_direction.x * transform.basis.x -
-		_input_direction.y * transform.basis.z).normalized()
+	# Movement is camera-relative: W (input.y = +1) heads away from the camera,
+	# A/D strafe. A node looks down its local -Z, so forward = -cam_basis.z.
+	var cam_basis := Basis.from_euler(Vector3(0.0, _camera_yaw, 0.0))
+	var direction := (_input_direction.x * cam_basis.x -
+		_input_direction.y * cam_basis.z).normalized()
 	velocity.x = direction.x * WALK_SPEED
 	velocity.z = direction.z * WALK_SPEED
 
+	# Turn the body to face where it's moving (independent of the camera).
+	if direction.length_squared() > 0.01:
+		var target_yaw := atan2(-direction.x, -direction.z)
+		rotation.y = lerp_angle(rotation.y, target_yaw, clampf(BODY_TURN_SPEED * delta, 0.0, 1.0))
+
 	move_and_slide()
 
+	# Keep the orbit camera on the player as it moves.
+	_update_camera()
+
 	if _limb_anim != null:
 		_limb_anim.set("speed", Vector2(velocity.x, velocity.z).length())