Unity introduces new 2D tools
Monkey Archive Forums/Digital Discussion/Unity introduces new 2D tools
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| Currently in beta, this first iteration of the 2D tools will be included with the Unity 4.3 update this fall. Some of the improvements include a dedicated scene view that includes specialized 2D scene manipulation tools, Helgason says. "You’ll also be able to switch between 2D and 3D. A lot of the good games in 2D are actually mixing 3D – particle systems, things that are parallaxing. That stuff will be easier to do." Other additions that should make importing and manipulating 2D assets include: - a new sprite texture importer type - automated atlasing - dedicated 2D renderer component - A new “dope sheet” and visual sprite animation editing functionality for complex animations - Box2D physics engine integration - Polygon collider generation from sprite textures Source: http://gamasutra.com/view/news/199109/Unity_introduces_new_2D_tools.php |
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| I swear this is leading to some form of monopolization in the game engine market of the future. |
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| doesn't monkey already have all this? |
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| Basically. What I was saying is that Unity appears to be trying to play to both the 2D and 3D markets now. Which is bad in my opinion because it doesn't give a lot of other tools a good chance at growing. |
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| Yeah I think it's quickly becoming a two horse race between gamemaker and unity it's a shame that monkey is falling behind when for a while it was the best option. I'm not ready to move to unity but that time is fast approaching. Worst of it all is that this is only a result of the unity and gamemaker teams being larger than marks. There is no substitute for quality and skill but the sad truth is that Mark alone simply can't keep up with larger development teams. |
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| Monkey still has some significant advantages: lightweight compared to Unity, more of a 'real programming language', cheap license. |
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| I have looked at Unity a couple of times, but was turned off by the methods needed to do 2D. I would consider looking at it again with true 2D support. I love Monkey though and have invested time/effort/money in with Jungle and Ignition and don't expect that I would switch. |
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| I'm the same feeling like I have invested time effort and money in monkey I am likely to stay here, I also love this community and that for me is very important. But at the same time, the sad thing is that monkey seems to be moving along very slow, when compared to the alternatives, and that's not really an insult or criticism of mark as he does amazing work, its just an observation of the current situation. What we need to do is clone mark 5 or 6 times and have a little mark army working on it. |
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| Even though I am not a programmer per se, I don't feel comfortable with drag and drop tools. They make me feel powerless in some way. I like to understand how things happen. I've tried unity, game maker, construct and even game salad and I've always felt over overwhelmed by all the buttons and windows and ui stuff. I like things simple like monkey offers. For me, simple doesn't mean simple games, means faster understanding of the tool. |
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| Unity is powerful - but expensive... 2D in unity is more like "addon" for 3D |
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| It's not expensive. The basic version (which is quite powerful) is free for all platforms. |
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| The way we go about programming hasn't changed much in the last 50 years. Basically we are still writing code in a textfile FOR the computer and it's somewhat sad. It seems everybody has accepted that this is the only "real" way to do it. Having said that I don't think apps like Unity and GameMaker do a much better job at it. Sure, for certain type of games you are more productive (at least in the beginning) but it's more like that they provide templates which you can tweak, although you are still working in a limited system. What I would like to see is being able to create behaviour in drawing apps like photoshop in a logical and natural way. And i am not talking about flowchart programming. It just bothers me thinking that in a 100 years programmers will look back and see us the same way we see binary programmers today. |
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| I always found this video to explain what I think of programming and where it leads to https://vimeo.com/36579366 basically, it's about the iterative cycle between creating our action, and then seeing/testing the results. Unity allows this in a much faster cycle than Monkey. If Monkey had a live editor, this would accelerate things and put Monkey on par to allow that fast iterative cycle. (side note: this is why i've been looking at a monkey extension for Brackets) My other thought is creating better pipelines for the assets. An example would be that I am working on using Blender as a level editor for miniB3D. so if Monkey can somehow leverage existing software that does the level design and asset creation, then proper importing and exporting allows faster iterations as well. I mean, Unity is basically a level editor, is it not? at some point you need to code the game. It seems this is what Corona is doing next. DAME is a nice example, too. |
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| Shinkiro1: "It just bothers me thinking that in a 100 years programmers will look back and see us the same way we see binary programmers today." When computers get smart enough that you can say 'do what I want', soon there won't be any more programmers. Be careful what you wish for. |
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| Unity has its clear strength when it comes to level design for 3d games. Doing 2d stuff is a pain at the moment and I won't never choose Unity for 2d games and probably never will. It's just overkill for that purpose. |
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| I think the press release mentioned a special cut-down interface for 2d games. That might make it much more suitable for 2d, but I agree it will always be overkill for me. My mac can barely run the damn thing anyway :P |
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| I don't see what "free" (and yes it IS free, of no charge) can be cut down more? ;) Just curious. The pro version has shadows and profilers but nothing which is important for 2d stuff... |
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| I'm sure that Unity having proper 2D functionality will prove to be a significant boost to their already fruitful endeavor. I still ain't installing a smegging "plugin" just to run the things in my browser though. What is this 1998!?! |
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 Click to enlarge Box2D physics engine integration Exactly what I was waiting for ! I was used to 2D Toolkit and NGUI so all the tools for 2D was already available except maybe an adequate 2D physic engine. Farseer wasn't working optimally and every Box2D "indie" assets was bad until now. I didn't try the new Chipmunk2D for Unity but now, who cares :D I guess existing assets like 2D Toolkit will work even better with dedicated 2D Tools. I never really understand comments on how bad 2D development was on Unity3D... Maybe these additions will end that presumption ? Seriously, if you desire you could code everything in an old fashion way without using 2D Interface at all ! Now if they could add something like "Coherent UI" by default we would be able to develop real cross-platform applications. NGui is great for games but not an apps solution. About the cost, I got 2D Toolkit & Ngui in Madness sales for half the price of Monkey+Jungle IDE. About Unity3D itself, deployment is now totally free on many platforms. You can even found dedicated assets for missing pro features at small price (Like shadow system, AI, etc. which proves you can absolutely develop them like you would in Monkey). Most missing features are barely useful for 2D anyway... You should really try before arguing. To me it's like saying Windows 8 is shit because of the Metro interface (the thing I only use to quickly find the desired configuration panels or apps by typing it and nothing more). |
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| You are right, the free version has improved a lot. You are still stuck with the Unity splash screen, but in some ways that becomes harmless or an asset if people are used to seeing it. That said, how *big* in terms of MB is a 2D game made using Unity Free? |
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| That said, how *big* in terms of MB is a 2D game made using Unity Free? I looked at every prototypes I got and I saw html5/mobile games as small as 3Mo and Desktop one as big as 40Mo. Some 3D/2D full games I worked on at work was around ~400Mo, really depend on your materials Images/Sounds. Like the Unity Splash screen, I don't bother much about it. I know you can go way higher but also way smaller like 1Mo. |
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| They end up deploying apps on the App Store or Google Play that weigh in at 18mb by using the free version. The Unity player runtime for iOS is about 13mb without the pro stripping capability. I think the Unity splash could become an asset, however, if it only appears on bloated slow to download and slow to start up apps it could come back to bite. In other words, seeing the Unity splash screen could be a red flag saying, "warning, incoming bloated software delete immediately :)". Consumers are quick to figure these things out, for example AIR apps for iOS and Google tend to get negative reviews if they are determined to be AIR apps, I would think the same thing would happen with Unity games deployed with the free version. Also, for 3G iOS downloads I think there is a cap at 20mb, otherwise the app has to be downloaded via wifi. At the end of the day, Unity needs to make money so there shouldn't be a problem paying the license fees for the pro version. The problem is during development, it would be nice to have access to develop with all the pro features and only be restricted for deployment. I guess (according to Armitage1982) you can fill the gaps with 3rdParty addons. |
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| Well I see a file size of 6MB minimum here with the free version... |
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| Hmmm... is that compressed, it is possible. If it is compressed then it gets uncompressed by Apple once they put it in the store. If it is 6mb uncompressed that is better than what I get. |
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| @Gerry Quinn: ...more of a 'real programming language', Define "real programming language". Unity games generally contain plenty of code. Just because it doesn't have a Main() method and you don't fill your game with "DrawImage" doesn't make it any less of a programming language. It's not GameMaker. |
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| I think Unity is more or less an evolved game development studio... a one-stop-shop, if you will, for making great games. I think that it depends on each game developer's needs and likes as to what suits them best. I enjoy using Monkey to develop with, as I do C#, Java, etc. I'm sure if I took the time to learn Unity, I'd enjoy it as well. Samah is right about it being a real programming language. You aren't drawing everything because at some point you need to enter some glue code to get it doing what you need done. Even in Visual Studio .NET, I can make an entire application without really needing to write a single line of code, yet C# is a "real programming language". It has a very handy IDE with a robust framework coupled with a Form Desiger filled with ready to use objects. How is that any different than Unity? |
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| In all honesty and I say it all the time when people ask WTF is monkey, its nothing more than a tool, it's NOT what a game is made with that matters, its the end result. And Unity clearly produces good results, so does GameMaker, if it didnt people would not be using it. |
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| it's what a game is made with that matters I think you forgot the word 'not', as it doesn't matter what a game is made with as long as it plays well (which is what I think you were trying to say?) :) |
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| I did indeed. thanks for pointing that out to me. |
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| To build on that point, I know a few people, fellow developers that can be very snobby , and if they are not working in some form of C they think their dirty or something. "Oh this isnt some form of C Its not a real language" .. makes me wana slap them. |
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| All good points Taiphoz, and they all say what I'm saying :) It matters not what you make your apps with, but what the apps do and how good they are. It drives me CRAZY when I hear my coworkers speak of the C derivatives as if those are the ONLY languages that are viable. PFFT! I've proven time and time again that the "sub-ordinate" VB.NET can produce the same level app as a C based one can. I'm not a VB fan either, but each language has its perks and shortcomings. Realistically, its the DEVELOPER that generally stands in the way for any given language and app made. No one will know what language was used, but how well it performs. Honestly, I can't tell the Monkey made games from the Unity made games to the C++ made games. I can play them all, and I choose which ones I will continue to play :) Thats how all users will be. |
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| I watched the keynote and it looks pretty impressive. I am going to give it a look when it is available. |
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| I am already working at a simple 3D game on Unity. That framework it's awesome. |
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| I must give it a try. It's not that I'm snobby about languages - far from it - but as a personal preference I am a bit old school, and Monkey hits that button for me. |
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| 4.3 with the 2D toolkit was released while I slept. I'm downloading it now. I still find Unity's black box nature to be worrying/off-putting as a dev but can't ignore its success as a platform. Edit: I see that the only "Pro" feature for 2D is the atlas stuff. As writing an atlas loader is usually fairly simple I'm interested to see if it's more problematic to roll your own in the Unity workflow. |
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| I would be interested in your feedback. Maybe one of your awesome blog posts :) I am going to take a gander when I get some time. I didn't like having to use a bunch of 3rd party hacks for 2D when I looked at it before, but I am interested after watching the stream they did. |
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| I'm not that impressed. I still think using Unity for 2d only games is simply overkill (beside the huge package sizes you get). For 2d stuff within 3d games it is indeed a step forward even though I still prefer the usage of toolkit 2d which works nice together with Unity 4.3. |
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| It's a nice step, but still feels... cumbersome for me. |
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| actually Unity it's the 'next gen' game framework for indies and also big studios (at least for Namco) I waited for their 2D support to start making my next HOPA game. PRO: (from my POV) - gorgeous particle engine - BFG portal and others offers support for micro-transactions (which is the future) - i am familiarized with c# (or at least i was 2 years ago when I discovered BlitzMax) |
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| how big is a hello world example in mb? if only installation is so big - so it is ok |
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| I may blog about it (just to force myself to write a blog post or two more than anything) but it's always going to mostly boil down to subjective opinion/needs. Everything about Unity can be spun as a pro or a con. * Feature-rich - Overly complicated/bloated * Consistent framework - Constricted development * Unity Player improves cross-platform standardisation - People don't like plugins / increased download size. On the same theme a big draw for me is that C#/JS and Unity itself are recognised and saleable skills. If programming is your career then it's hard to ignore the fact that Monkey/Haxe/Lua based cross-platform engine experience isn't going to shine as much on a CV or present the same level of contract opportunities. On the other hand if you're not a coder (or, I guess if you are but happy just doing games as a hobby) then that's irrelevant or a negative if you don't like C#/JS. What I would argue is that people shouldn't just ignore the likes of Unity out of Monkey loyalty or because it's editor-centric rather than code-centric. There are some great ideas at the language, framework and editor levels that could be brought over. |
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| @dragon: Just created an empty project with 4.3. It results in a size of 8MB for an Android apk. @muddy: True. I love C# by myself but the current Mono version is pretty old, especially the GC has improved in the latest Mono builds but Unity still use the old one because they just would have to buy it. The Particle System is pretty good, one thing which really bothers me there is that you simply can't scale a complete emitter. How odd is that? Beside that it's pretty good to work with, it's very fast only the apk size could be lower. |
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| 8 mb is ok. i shold test it. |
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| I have loaded it up and gotten the sample 2D project imported but I have no idea where to get started. It is pretty intimidating. The 28 minute video that they have is a high level fly through and if you have never used Unity it is pretty much useless. Until a decent 2D tutorial comes out I definitely won't be using it, which is a shame because I really want to give it a fair shot. |
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| I know that feeling. Coming from a non editor background with just programming and doing LoadImage/DrawImage stuff it was a rough start for me as well. But now I really like it! Still using Monkey for 2d stuff though. Maybe I just make a tutorial for programmers as I know the start difficulties.. ;) |
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| That would be great. I have been coding since the C64 days but I have never used anything editor based. It is definitely overwhelming. I have some books on using it for 3D, but I really have no interest so I would prefer to learn the 2D pipeline. I have been wanting to improve my C# skills too, so I can achieve 2 goals. |
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| Well, so we went the same path! I started with a C64 by myself (doing 6502 assembler was fun!), later Amiga, then PC... I'll see what I can do. I know the pitfalls, especially when it comes to the editor. I have to admit I've still not tried that 4.3 Unity stuff as I still use 2d toolkit. Actually I still think toolkit 2d is worth it, especially at the current sale off: https://www.assetstore.unity3d.com/#/content/908 This ends in a day or two, don't know exactly. Toolkit2d still has some stuff, Unity 4.3 does NOT have: http://2dtoolkit.com/forum/index.php/topic,3081.msg15127.html Cheers! |
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| I looked at 2D toolkit before briefly, it looks pretty nice. Probably some good tutorials out there for it. |
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