The logic of the different node types and flow is not really tied to the logic that would be used in a C++ script. Complex code turns into a visual mess (which sadly is also true for the Shader editor), if you are trying to look up information online the documentation is lacking, and worst of all, the name of the nodes shown in the node editor doesn't match the name of the nodes in the selection list. The rest of the blueprint system on the other hand is just a nightmare for me. After some months of experimentation, I feel comfortable creating quite complex shaders, and even at the beginning I learned stuff fast. I found the Node based Shader system of UE4 really easy to get into, and very powerful once you understood all the options. It might no scare away coding newbies with ugly ASCII characters, but its still some kind of "Syntax" you have to learn and understand.įrom my own expierience with Unreal Blueprint system, it is a Syntax that is not necessarily easier to learn. Well, from my own expierience, visual scripting is just "another language to learn". You should use the tool that enhances your productivity at the time. There's a reason we don't have one language to rule them all, and also why many games that I've worked on have used all five of those bullet points together (and nope, it wasn't to allow non-programmers to program - everyone was C++ capable). Visual declarative languages are well suited for configuring event-based systems (which is something that is common in gameplay) or for configuring data-flow systems (which is something that is common in graphics).Functional languages are useful for automatically identifying and exploiting parallelism.Lua is well suited to high-level dynamic rules and duck-typed interactions. C++ is well suited to manual memory manipulation.Asm is well suited to clock cycle scheduling.These visual scripting systems (Blueprint, Kismet, Flow, etc) are used for the same reason that Lua, Python, C# are used instead of C++, and why C++ is used instead of assembly.ĭifferent programming problems are more easily solved in different languages. I hate the term scripting scripting is programming :p It is still coding, it is still programming, and it will not magically make you a coder/programmer, it just makes the activity for non-experienced people a bit easier. still work out of the box.Īll in all visual scripting is actually a pretty old technology, not a new thing at all, and so far it could not break into and take over the mainstream industry, and I guess this is due to having "m uch smoke, little fire". You immediately have and can leverage all the pre-existing tech and infrastructure, no need for a special diff tool only an extra presentation layer for the pre-existing diff tool, no need for a new debugger (you get the point here), no need for a completely new virtual machine, and all the editors, syntax highlighters, json parsers etc. one here) and using an extra presentation layer/tool on top of to make it easier for non-programmers to edit it and check it's workings is a much more logical route. I know blue-prints are really cool looking, and I know it is well engineered, has a fancy merge tool, but using a pre-existing text-based scripting language like javascript (substitute your fav. I may be wrong though, but the point of visual scripting is to present and to allow editing of code in a "always compiles" syntax correct way (much harder to make mistakes) + to show and present useful information about the "flow" (control structures, scopes, mutability etc.) of certain code parts, and in this regard seems to be a much much much better implementation than unreal blue-prints, having all these positives and providing a similar experience to text-based coding. I still believe, that visual presentation and editing of code can and will work, but most of the current implementations in game engines (Unreals kismet and blue-print, Stingray flow etc.) missed the point a little. I think Visual Scripting is a kind of thing which is wonderful on paper, but most of the implementations are not really working, and it is more hyped, than actually helping.
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |
AuthorWrite something about yourself. No need to be fancy, just an overview. ArchivesCategories |