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A complete guide to the gengine Command Center — all five tabs, what each shows, and how to use them effectively.

Command Center

The Command Center is gengine's main interface inside the Unreal Editor. It provides five tabs that cover chat, tool browsing, task monitoring, activity logging, and diagnostics — everything you need to work effectively with AI-driven editor operations.

Opening the Command Center

Open the Command Center from the Unreal Editor menu bar:

Window > gengine > Command Center

The panel behaves like any Unreal editor panel — you can dock it, float it, tab it with other panels, or pin it. Its size and position are saved between editor sessions.

Keyboard shortcut

Assign a shortcut via Edit > Editor Preferences > Keyboard Shortcuts, search for "gengine", and bind Toggle Command Center to your preferred key combination. Ctrl+Shift+G is a popular choice on Windows.

Standalone browser

While the editor is running, you can also access the Command Center's Chat tab in any browser at http://localhost:3000. The Tools, Tasks, Activity, and Diagnostics tabs are available at http://localhost:3000/tools, /tasks, /activity, and /diagnostics respectively.

Tip: The standalone browser version is especially useful on multi-monitor setups. Keep the editor on one screen and the Command Center on another for a seamless workflow.

Chat tab

The Chat tab is the primary interface for interacting with your configured AI model. It embeds the full Web Chat Panel with all its features:

  • Topic tabs for organized conversation threads
  • Persistent memory per topic (via the brain icon or /remember command)
  • @ asset mentions with real-time autocomplete from your Content Browser
  • Image paste with Ctrl+V for visual context
  • Markdown rendering with syntax-highlighted code blocks
  • Streaming responses that appear word-by-word as the AI generates them

The gear icon in the Chat tab opens Provider Settings where you select your AI model. The brain icon opens the memory manager for the current topic.

See the Web Chat Panel documentation for a detailed guide to all Chat tab features.

Tools tab

The Tools tab is a searchable reference for all 97 MCP operations that gengine exposes. It is the fastest way to discover what gengine can do without asking the AI or reading source code.

Browsing operations

Operations are organized by domain tool. Click any domain to expand its operations list. Each entry shows:

  • Operation name (e.g., spawn_actor)
  • One-line description of what it does
  • Parameter table with name, type, required/optional, and description
  • An example call in JSON format that you can copy

Search

Type in the search box at the top to filter operations across all domains. Search matches operation names and descriptions. For example, searching "rename" shows both unreal_assets / rename and any operation whose description mentions renaming.

Copy example

Each operation's example call has a Copy button. Paste copied examples into the chat to ask the AI to run that exact operation — useful for precise control when natural language is ambiguous.

Operation:    capture_viewport
Domain:       unreal_world
Description:  Capture a screenshot of the active editor viewport.

Parameters:
  resolution   string   optional   Output resolution, e.g. "1920x1080". Default: current viewport size.
  filename     string   optional   Output filename (no extension). Default: auto-generated timestamp.

Example call:
{
  "operation": "capture_viewport",
  "params": {
    "resolution": "1920x1080",
    "filename": "lighting_test_01"
  }
}

Tasks tab

The Tasks tab shows the async task queue — multi-step operations that run in the background while you continue working in the editor.

Task lifecycle

Each task card shows its current state:

  • Queued — waiting for the previous task to complete
  • Running — actively executing; shows a live progress indicator
  • Completed — finished successfully; shows a summary of what was done
  • Failed — encountered an error; shows the error message and the step that failed

Task details

Click any task card to expand it. The detail view shows every tool call the task made in sequence, with the parameters and result of each step. This is useful for understanding exactly what a complex multi-step operation did.

Cancelling tasks

Running tasks can be cancelled with the X button on the task card. Cancellation is best-effort — if a tool call is mid-execution, it will complete before the task stops. Completed steps are not rolled back automatically.

Note: The task queue is a Pro tier feature. On the Free tier, operations requested in chat run synchronously and block the chat until they complete. The Tasks tab is still visible on Free but always shows at most one active task.

Activity tab

The Activity tab is a real-time feed of every MCP tool call that flows through gengine — from any source, including direct API calls, task queue operations, and chat messages.

What each entry shows

  • Timestamp (relative: "2s ago", or absolute on hover)
  • Tool name and operation (e.g., unreal_assets / search)
  • Key parameters (shown as a compact summary, expandable for full detail)
  • Execution time in milliseconds
  • Result status: green checkmark for success, red X for error
  • Result summary (e.g., "3 actors spawned" or "Asset not found")

Filtering the feed

Use the filter bar to show only specific domains or statuses. For example, filter by "unreal_blueprints" to see only Blueprint operations, or filter by "Failed" to investigate errors.

Debugging with Activity

When something does not behave as expected, the Activity tab is your first stop. It shows exactly what parameters were passed to each tool call. Common issues visible in Activity:

  • Wrong asset path (the AI guessed and got it slightly wrong)
  • Parameter type mismatch (string where a number was expected)
  • Missing required parameter (AI omitted something it should have asked for)
  • Validation rejection (a parameter was blocked by gengine's safety layer)
[14:32:07]  unreal_assets / search                    12ms  ✓
  Query:   "Rock"
  Type:    StaticMesh
  Path:    /Game/Environment/
  Limit:   20
  Result:  2 assets found
           → /Game/Environment/Rocks/SM_Rock_Large
           → /Game/Environment/Rocks/SM_Rock_Small

Diagnostics tab

The Diagnostics tab gives you a complete health check of the gengine system. It is the first place to look when something is not working.

Status indicators

Each component has a color-coded status badge:

  • Plugin — gengine C++ modules loaded correctly in the editor
  • REST API — HTTP server listening on port 8080 and accepting connections
  • MCP Bridge — Node.js bridge process running and connected to the REST API
  • AI Provider — configured provider is reachable and authenticated
  • Tool Registry — all 97 operations registered and validated

Error details

When a component shows red, clicking its card expands an error detail view with:

  • The specific error message from the component
  • The most likely cause based on the error type
  • A numbered fix suggestion list
  • A "Retry" button to re-check the component after applying a fix

Dependency checks

The lower section of the Diagnostics tab lists dependency versions:

Unreal Engine    5.7.2    ✓  (required: 5.7+)
Node.js          20.11.0  ✓  (required: 18+)
gengine plugin   2.1.0    ✓
MCP bridge       2.1.0    ✓  (must match plugin)
claude-panel     2.1.0    ✓  (must match plugin)
npm packages     current  ✓

Warning: The plugin, MCP bridge, and claude-panel versions must match. A version mismatch after a partial update is a common source of mysterious failures. The Diagnostics tab will flag this explicitly with a "Version mismatch" error.

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