How to make enemy turn to face the player while attacking?

Question

I need help making this code work. It is made for the enemy AI to move and patrol, chase the player and attack the player.

The problem is when it starts to attack the player, then the player can move around the enemy and the enemy will not turn to face the player but just keeps attacking in front of him.

using System.Collections;
using System.Collections.Generic;
using UnityEditor.Experimental.GraphView;
using UnityEngine;
using UnityEngine.AI;
using UnityEngine.EventSystems;

public class EnemyAI : MonoBehaviour
{
    public float minRandomDistance = 5.0f;
    public float maxRandomDistance = 10.0f;
    public float patrolSpeed = 2.0f;
    public float chaseSpeed = 5.0f;
    public float chaseRange = 10.0f;
    public float attackRange = 1f;
    public float rotationSpeed = 2f;
    public Transform player;

    private Animator animator;
    private NavMeshAgent navAgent;
    private Vector3 randomDestination;
    private bool isChasing = false;
    private bool isAttacking = false;
    private string[] attackAnimation = { "isAttacking1", "isAttacking2" };

    private void Start()
    {
        navAgent = GetComponent<NavMeshAgent>();
        animator = GetComponent<Animator>();
        SetRandomDestination();
    }

    private void Update()
    {
        if (isChasing)
        {
            ChasePlayer();
        }
        else
        {
            Patrol();
        }
        FaceMovementDirection();
    }

    private void Patrol()
    {
        if (!navAgent.pathPending && navAgent.remainingDistance < 0.5f)
        {
            SetRandomDestination();
        }

        // Check if the player is within chase range
        if (Vector3.Distance(transform.position, player.position) < chaseRange)
        {
            isChasing = true;
            navAgent.speed = chaseSpeed;
            animator.SetBool("isRunning", true);
        }
        else
        {
            isChasing = false;
            navAgent.speed = patrolSpeed;
            animator.SetBool("isRunning", false);
        }

        if (Vector3.Distance(transform.position, player.position) < attackRange)
        {
            isAttacking = true;
            navAgent.isStopped = true;

        }
        else
        {
            isAttacking = false;
            navAgent.isStopped = false;
        }
        foreach (string attackParam in attackAnimation)
        {
            animator.SetBool(attackParam, isAttacking);
        }
    }

    private void ChasePlayer()
    {
        // Move towards the player's position
        navAgent.SetDestination(player.position);

        // Check if the player is out of chase range
        if (Vector3.Distance(transform.position, player.position) > chaseRange)
        {
            isChasing = false;
            navAgent.speed = patrolSpeed;
            animator.SetBool("isRunning", false);
        }
        if (Vector3.Distance(transform.position, player.position) < attackRange)
        {
            isAttacking = true;
            navAgent.isStopped = true;

            // Rotate to face the player's position
            Vector3 directionToPlayer = player.position - transform.position;
            directionToPlayer.y = 0;

            Quaternion targetRotation = Quaternion.LookRotation(directionToPlayer);
            transform.rotation = Quaternion.RotateTowards(transform.rotation, targetRotation, Time.deltaTime * rotationSpeed);


            foreach (string attackParam in attackAnimation)
            {
                animator.SetBool(attackParam, isAttacking);
            }
        }
        else
        {
            isAttacking = false;
            navAgent.isStopped = false;
        }
        foreach (string attackParam in attackAnimation)
        {
            animator.SetBool(attackParam, isAttacking);
        }

    }

    private void SetRandomDestination()
    {
        // Generate a random direction and distance within the specified range
        Vector3 randomDirection = Random.insideUnitSphere;
        randomDirection.y = 0; // Keep the movement on the same plane
        Vector3 targetPosition = transform.position + randomDirection.normalized * Random.Range(minRandomDistance, maxRandomDistance);

        // Set the NavMeshAgent's destination
        navAgent.SetDestination(targetPosition);
    }
    private void FaceMovementDirection()
    {
        Vector3 moveDirection = navAgent.velocity.normalized;

        if (moveDirection.magnitude > 0.1f)
        {
            Quaternion targetRotation = Quaternion.LookRotation(-moveDirection);
            transform.rotation = Quaternion.RotateTowards(transform.rotation, targetRotation, Time.deltaTime * 500.0f);
        }

    }

}

Answer 1

You already have code in the ChasePlayer() function that looks fine:

Quaternion targetRotation = Quaternion.LookRotation(directionToPlayer);
transform.rotation = Quaternion.RotateTowards(transform.rotation, targetRotation, Time.deltaTime * rotationSpeed);

I tested your script in Unity, and it works - it's just very slow. The problem is that you set the default rotationSpeed to 2. That's 2 degrees per second. There are 360 degrees in a circle, so at that speed it would take the enemy 180 seconds (3 full minutes) to turn in a full circle. Try using a much larger rotationSpeed like 90 or 180.

There's another problem too: FaceMovementDirection() makes the enemy look away from the direction it's moving:

 Quaternion targetRotation = Quaternion.LookRotation(-moveDirection);

Notice the negative before moveDirection? If this looks correct in the game, that means your character model is backwards. The code in ChasePlayer() that rotates the enemy to face the player makes the enemy look towards the player instead of away from the player. So currently, your enemies will walk backwards towards the player and then turn around to face the player.