@Eric Truman: I considered a different approach and did a bit of RnD in order to check which was the best solution, and in the end I did the switch to Unreal...
Character customization WIP <https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3CLuZJFCC7Q> This is a tool I'm currently working on...it took me 2 days in total ( consider 2-3 hours per day ) to figure out the logic behind the blend shape blending, visual update, lipsync retargeting and so on, which is something that in Unity I have to code, there is no script which currently do that, and of course I have to hire someone for this... I already asked, more or less a year ago, about some custom scripts for an interactive architectural project I was working on, to be able to see in into the browser and be, well, interactive...only for the scripts ( 6 in total ) the average price I was asked was 800$, plus some plugins ( including Playmaker for simple node based logic stuff ), so in the end the loss on the project was way too much. Luckily I waited and UE4 came out, and the time and effort to develp the project was well spent, not too complicated to setup and to test some of the stuff I requested a quotation in Unity most of the stuff was already there, and the node based editor was a life saver. I perfectly know that with programming knowledge all those problems in Unity could be easily solved, but I still find the workflow very tedious in Unity...and I got easily bored with programming stuff, so in part its my fault, in part the ICE-like setup of blueprints made things easier for me. Currently in UE4 there are still some dumb things which they're still broken/bugged, but at least I'm able to start and end a project without too many issues or desperately ask for help ;) 2015-01-20 4:29 GMT+01:00 Siew Yi Liang <soni...@gmail.com>: > Hi Angus: > > Just came off a Unity project for my last job (http://neveralonegame.com/). > My advice is exactly the opposite; if you value your time as an artist, > don't even bother with Unity. It's nowhere near the level it needs to be to > even think about competing with UE4/CE3, let alone other game engines. > > I normally don't like to write negative things, but because I feel so > strongly against how Unity is designed (and how they responded to our > support requests for stuff that was clearly broken), here's my breakdown of > why I disliked working with it. > > *Shaders*: Even U5's new PBR shaders are a nightmare to work with. No > node-based shader editor (other than Shaderforge, thank god for that) makes > it very difficult for non-technically inclined artists to work up cool > shaders. And I was working with U4, which was terrible in itself in terms > of OOTB offerings for lighting. And as for the "one-click multi-platform > deployment" stuff, yea...the last 3 months of Never Alone were our main > engineer and a few of us frantically trying to figure out why our shaders > were all compiling pink on PS4/fine on PC/geometry not rendering on > XB1/other mad bugs, and Unity pretty much refusing to help fix their own > bugs. At least with UE4 we'd have been able to fix the problems, whether > ours or the engine's. > > *Mechanim*: The entire animation system is a nightmare to me. The > retargeting system really pissed me off as an animator, and as a rigger, I > wouldn't ever want to work with it again. Essentially whatever rig you > provide Unity will always be re-targeted to a internal rig that is > pre-defined and unchangeable...and it provides 2 spine bones for > deformation, along with also requiring you to setup RoMs for every single > joint...for every single character that you make. The only benefit to this? > Animation re-targeting. Which no other sensible re-targeting system (afaik) > does in this manner. The alternative? None, other than using the legacy > animation system which is unsupported and does not have IK solvers. I > should also point out that it was in response to Unity's nonsense with > Mechanim that I ended up writing a custom viewer for Maya just so our > animators (and I) could look at our own animations and critique them > objectively without worrying about if Unity was actually doing some weird > stuff with the Avatar system that was causing them to look different > in-engine. > > *Shuriken *(particle system): Let me put it this way, having worked with > UE4 and Unity (and a few other particle systems besides), there's no > contest. Shuriken is in serious need of an overhaul; it's way too basic and > buggy (esp. with animated textures and mesh particles), and 99% of the time > effects I want I end up using a combination of scripting/shaderforge to get > what I want, rather than struggling with the limitations of Shuriken. > > *Pipeline*: Unity's YML files (way it stores metadata) is an absolute > nightmare. Apart from the annoying way it generates metadata files (and > regenerates GUIDs for every asset comes in) the way it works (by randomly > writing metadata everywhere within the same YML file) pretty much ensures > that if you have more than 2 people working on the same level at the same > time, you're going to end up with merge conflicts all the time unless you > have very, VERY well-trained artists/designers in terms of SVN > lock/whatever VCS you choose to work with. We ended up with a gDoc that had > people manually update what section of which level they were working on > based on nothing more than an honour system, because people didn't know how > to use SVN lock, and you can imagine how that went :) > > As for animators, because blend state trees also use the same YML file > storage format (and the same dumb ways of using GUID/UUIDs to refer to > animation clips instead of filenames) also ensures that only ONE person can > work on ONE file at a time, and must ensure that their file is checked in > along with the metadata file that accompanies it, or Unity will start > regenerating it on everyone's machines automatically, and then when they > check those files in, enjoy resolving the resulting mess of conflicts! > > I'm not here to plug UE4 really (I personally am a huge fan of CE3 cause > I'm a graphics whore :P), but I will say that if you think it's easier to > 'learn' Unity compared to UE4...perhaps the UI? But I would suggest that > running into technical roadblocks that actively inhibit producing quality > content is far more damaging than getting over a higher learning curve. > > Hope that helps, (and it doesn't sound like I'm bashing Unity too much)! > :P > > Yours sincerely, > Siew Yi Liang > > On 1/19/2015 7:58 PM, Eric Turman wrote: > > @Nicolas Esposito > "....In the end you could end up spending A LOT of money just to have some > basica stuff which you could code ( if you have the knowledge... ) > For me Unity is a good engine for a team project, not for a personal one." > > I think that you might benefit from considering thinking from a > different point of view: > Purchasing the right asset from the asset store can save a lot more money > in the long run when you stop to consider how much time it would take you > to create that from scratch (even if you are a competent coder.) When > Considering assets from the asset store, the real questions are: > * Could I script/learn-to-script this in less time than I would have to > pay myself at $n/hour > * Does the asset give enough capability and flexibility out of the box, > and, if possible, what could it take to extend its capabilities > * Is this something that I would rather invest in my time to become > proficient at > > Unity allows an individual or very small team to accomplish a wide > variety of projects on a wide variety of platforms that could otherwise be > out of their reach. > > There are even node based setups in the asset store for programming. > > As for examples in Unity, there are many as well. > > Cheers, > -=Eric > > -- > > > > > -=T=- > > >
