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I will never use this Flash thing for 3D games

Discussion in 'Developer Preview Archive' started by mlyons, Jan 8, 2012.

  1. mlyons

    mlyons

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    The Unity Flash (and I believe Flash itself not because of the Unity team or the fact that it's a beta) isn't in the same league as the Unity Web Player - it's slow at least 2-3 times slower with complex graphics if they play at all without the dreaded Error null, it's buggy very buggy crash, crash, crash with any complex 3d graphics and textures and it doesn't support even the .NET to .NET 2.0 level of compliance no string.Contains is a good example of very poor support, no support for WWW so you need to implement networking in Flash. Personally, I really don't like or ever want to learn to use AS and this complex integration is even more bug prone, but if you were going down this road that's what you would probably what you'd need to do - not for me. As for paying money (people are saying $400 to publish) for going backwards and having to have a lot of pain to do it - you would have to be kidding right?

    Please Unity I much prefer your player and Flash aren't going to have any support for mobile - please get out of bed with these guys and concentrate on continuing your brilliant work. A new GUI would be a much better spend of your time.

    What's next integration with Silverlight?

    ps another little trivial annoyance I just realized - the Flash player doesn't auto focus on start up so you have to put a button on the control under all browsers except IE (which you have to write special focus script for) to focus the control. It's certainly not a default thing - this is a trivial issue but for a user their first experience of a game means a lot. Anyway never going to use this and recommending to my workplace as the lead Unity Developer to never use it either.
     
    Last edited: Jan 8, 2012
  2. Noisecrime

    Noisecrime

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    Just because you wont ever use it does not mean that others wont either, so i'm sure they don't see it as wasting time by Unity.

    The performance issue is always going to be there since as I understand it Unity are having to effectively write their engine in AS. However i've yet to see it run particularly slow, unless you've got errors in your game.

    As to the other issues, its a beta, what did you expect? Sure its very frustrating that parts of .net/c# aren't working yet, but they will get round to it and just like anything else you can work around most of the problems.

    So it might cost $400, clearly you aren't interested but plenty of others will be. Now when a client comes to me and says can we implement this concept in 3D in a web browser and I say 'sure, we'll use Unity' and they turn around and ask 'what's that' I can just say, 'never mind, it will play in Flash', another client won over.
     
  3. mlyons

    mlyons

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    @Noisecrime - maybe for 2D games but not 3D ones - it's too much effort - the biggest problem is Unity dropping support for their own player if it happens. In practice what will happen is that your client will expect you to work around all the problems and you'll probably end up having to be a Flash developer for a worse result. That's what I know will happen at my work place after many years of bad experiences on these types of things where the vendor just says they have done something that they haven't and kick the can to the poor developers using the product to clean up the mess. IMHO this is just a Unity publicity stunt to get more users and all power to them but it may back fire badly if all businesses just ask us to do everything in Flash from scratch.
     
    Last edited: Jan 8, 2012
  4. mlyons

    mlyons

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    ps if anyone is interested Vertex Lit is not supported under the Flash Player only Specular and Diffuse
     
  5. cannon

    cannon

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    Unity is unlikely to ever drop their own web player; they like everything running the same way on everything, and they're not going to leave the fate of the web player in the hands of a third party.

    Unity publishing to Flash is driven by two things, one is client demand, the other is just that it's a really cool tech project.

    They're not "in bed" with Adobe for this; remember that you just created a SWF without using any of Adobe's commercial offerings, and Adobe is itself trying to figure out how get money from everyone rushing to compile their engines to Flash.

    Another misconception is that Adobe is Flash dropping support for mobile, which is quite incorrect, but that affects very little here until they finish their Stage3D port to mobile.
     
  6. BrUnO-XaVIeR

    BrUnO-XaVIeR

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    It is very buggy, yes, but still all games I tried ran flowlessly in all my machines.
    I'd see the null error once and nothing else, but I had reports of very bad performance on friends' pc, and such reports are enough for me to wonder about getting this flash license or not.
    However it may be very important for showcases and demo versions of games for other platforms.
     
  7. Oliver-Eberlei

    Oliver-Eberlei

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    Why the hate? Sure it does not have the functionality of the webplayer (most of it is still in the works. remeber its just a beta) but the install base of the flash plugin is far greater than that of the webplayer. For some applications that does make a difference.

    As Noisecrime said, for client work, you don't always have control over the tech they want you to use. But now, if they request a flash app, you can at least still work in our beloved Unity IDE.

    There are usecases where the web player will be better (maybe most of them) but there will also be usecases where the flash player will be far superior.
     
  8. Arowx

    Arowx

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  9. Noisecrime

    Noisecrime

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    I'd disagree with that completely as long as you design any new projects with the Flash exporter in mind, just in the same way you would if you were going to also support iOS/Andriod. Granted being a beta its currently a bit of a PITA for converting long established projects, but that situation is only going to improve over time.

    I'd agree with that, but I don't see it happening, Flash is simply another export platform, not a replacement for the webplayer.

    Again no different I would imagine for including iOS/Android support of a webplayer or standalone, you just have to understand the restrictions/performance issues of exporting to Flash and design accordingly.

    Although I personally feel Flash is over the hill now, that Adobe has dropped the ball with it, like so many of their other products its not going to disappear over night. Its still going to be the dominant plug-in for the next decade, especially for games or interactive 3D. I had high hopes for webGL but that doesn't seem to be getting any traction and i'm doubtful html5 is really going to be that appealing for 2D game developers for a long time.
     
  10. Cameron_SM

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    With Unreal Engine (and others) now also supporting Flash output I'd say Adobe saved Flash for desktops with Stage 3D.

    Mobile platforms and Flash is a bit of an oddity still. You're not going to play any flash games on a mobile even if you could, they's just no sensible way to design richly interactive experience's (save really simple stuff) that works for both point and touch devices without going to crap-tone of effort (never say never). However, at that point you'd save a heap of time and money releasing to multiple platforms rather than building some colossal hybrid-flash beast.

    Web GL would be nice. It's remaining saving grace is Mobile platforms IMO. If Apple embed support for WebGL in Mobile Safari on iOS (as opposed to limiting it to iAds like they currently do) then we may see a lot of engines target it as well - perhaps Unity too.
     
  11. Aiursrage2k

    Aiursrage2k

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    This is only the beta build. Imagine being an early adopter to hit up the flash portals (never know what hit em -- because they are so used to mostly 2d flash games).
     
  12. khanstruct

    khanstruct

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    First, no one is forcing you to buy the Flash exporter. Unity has said from the beginning that this is not a replacement for their web player. If you prefer that option, more power to you.

    Second, saying "it's too much effort" falls entirely on you. Sure, there were some issues in building to Flash (as a result of it being a beta release), but we built a 3d game from scratch in 1 week that successfully built to Flash and runs great (and we're not the only ones).

    The plain and simple fact is, Flash has a HUGE portion of the browser gaming market. Having a Unity Flash build makes perfect sense, and yes, people will pay for it. Maybe you won't, but you're clearly the minority here. If you prefer the web player, use that instead.
     
  13. mlyons

    mlyons

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    Simple Question for everyone to ponder: Why not target native browser standard WEBGL/(DirectX for IE) and HTML5 like Adobe are now doing instead of going after another plugin and support web standards instead of fighting them? Flash might seem like a large user base and community but compared to the HTML5 / Browser based development community they are insignificant and becoming obscure and they know it - Google, Apple, Mozilla Foundation and even Microsoft and Adobe themselves are far bigger than Adobe by themselves - Adobe know this. I'd just ask the Unity team to stop and think about this plugin vs native browser support. WEBGL doesn't have any great front end tool yet if Unity take it they will be ahead of the game not following the coat tails of a Flash plugin. The browser isn't going away and if the browser is important enough to support not just one but two plugins then just get to the point and support it's standards directly, Flash is just a browser plugin after all.
     
    Last edited: Jan 8, 2012
  14. hippocoder

    hippocoder

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    mlyons,

    Your opinion isn't important.

    Millions of flash developer opinions are important.

    Html5/WebGL not market stable.

    Flash market stable.

    Why not tell Epic they shouldn't publish to flash. Epic are doing it too.

    Bye.
     
  15. hippocoder

    hippocoder

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    Kiss goodbye to what little chance you have making money when they do.
     
  16. mlyons

    mlyons

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    @hippocoder

    Adobe just officially announced that it's killing Flash Player for Android and the BlackBerry Playbook, following a ZDNet report of the decision late last night. The company will still develop and support Flash for the PC, but says that HTML5 is the "best solution for creating and deploying content in the browser across mobile platforms."

    http://www.theverge.com/2011/11/9/2...lash-player-for-mobile-says-html5-is-the-best

    Bye
     
  17. hippocoder

    hippocoder

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    Yes for mobile where it a) never did work properly b) can't work properly long term.

    Hope you can learn something about reading :)

    Bye.
     
  18. Lucas Meijer_old

    Lucas Meijer_old

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    Just for the record, as people have been mentioning a specific pricepoint in this thread, no pricing information has been announced at this point. additionally, our webplayer isn't going anywhere. we prefer our webplayer too. but this flash thing happens to be installed on an amazing amount of computers, and that happens to be something that a lot of our users (and their clients) care about.

    pick which one makes most sense for your project.
     
  19. Cameron_SM

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    What the?

    The underlying technology used should never really matter, it's the creativity of the content producers that counts. Perhaps you make money via some bizarre technical hi-jinks, but I can't see why that would have anything to do with how I work. Native Apps, Flash or WebGL - none of it matters as long as you can produce content people want.
     
  20. hippocoder

    hippocoder

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    Really? so hows web sales going for you right now then?

    Desktop is almost dead for gaming compared to console statistics. People just use it for trashy thrills now, with the majority of the big money coming from consoles.

    Facebook, etc, free web based stuff... or niche one in 10,000 apps like minecraft. Do that to iOS and most people will forget about paying for anything really.
     
    Last edited: Jan 8, 2012
  21. rcrowe

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    Thanks Lucas. For me it's all about reach. For what we do we simply can't ask users to install a browser plugin, and 99% of them will have Flash. It's a pain on the coding side, but it's required.
     
  22. tra2002

    tra2002

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    I am sorry but this is only genre based. You have your big sellers on all platforms. Some good some bad, but for the Desktop if the desktop was almost dead why is it EVGA and other similar companies having no problem staying in business? Also last time I looked World of Warcraft was not selling very well on ps3 or xbox?

    Different people like different types of games and devices. Only reason looks like desktop is dying is that the publishers do not want to push to the desktop because of piracy.

    If you have a good game and people just have to play it they will get that device and play it. Comes down to what you create and if people will actually love it.
     
  23. angrypenguin

    angrypenguin

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    I grabbed a year-and-a-half old existing project originally from the days of Unity 2.6 and it took me less than a day's worth of effort to get it "ported" fpr Flash exporter compatibility. Admittedly there are still bugs, and admittedly there were some things (all minor) which I just dropped because there was no (simple) workaround, but this is a beta so that's to be expected.

    In terms of actual code modification, I had to change only three things to get AS3 compilation working, and all because of .NET functions which weren't ported to C# yet. All were relatively easy to work around, taking less than 10 minutes each, including re-compiling to Flash to see that they actually were fixed.

    I got the "dreaded" "Fatal error: null" in a total of three places. In each case, using a debug Flash viewer helped me solve the problem. But in each case they were no brainers anyway, because they were null pointers that threw exceptions in the Unity editor which I'd simply been too lazy to fix earlier (they were all cases of a reference being used in the start frame before they were set, so setting them in Awake rather than Start, like I should have been doing in the first place, was a simple 10 second fix each time.)

    The game doesn't perform as well as it does in the web player or a standalone build, but who really cares? It still runs perfectly acceptably. If you want to make a twitch shooter a-la Quake Zero then Flash probably isn't a viable target (for many reasons, not just framerate), but the vast majority of Unity apps don't need that kind of performance.

    While the Unity plugin gives superior performance, its install base is negligible compared to Flash. It was quoted at GCAP 2010 that you lose 9 out of 10 users when you ask them to install a plugin to see your content. In a competitive market like Flash games on the Internet, you can't afford to lose 90% of potential players. If your game doesn't have their attention immediately they'll just click the next link to another game. It doesn't even matter how good your game is because those people will never see it. With that in mind, consider that over well over 90% of all "multimedia PCs" have some form of Flash player installed, compared to Unity's comparatively small install base given only as estimates in the tens of millions.

    Something worth keeping in mind is that Unity is a cross-platform dev environment, so a lot of stuff that people make will be designed to scale from mobiles up to PCs. In those cases, the Flash export is a massive bonus. The game is already designed to run on low-performance hardware, so the fact that it has to run in a slower language when exported to Flash is offset by the fact that you now have so much more CPU power to throw at it. Add to that the increased penetration you get by using Flash. Add to that the fact that there's nothing to stop you exporting to both, using JS to check what the user has, and load whatever is best for their system.
     
  24. Eric5h5

    Eric5h5

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    That's really not true. Look at things like Steam, and the markets where console ownership is almost non-existant and computer gaming is pretty much all there is. Blizzard makes stupid amounts of money without touching consoles. Also note how consoles are becoming increasingly computer-ified, and desktops are becoming increasingly console-ified (see the popularity of all-in-ones)...at some point I expect they will merge, and consoles won't really exist as a distinct category anymore, but will probably become just a brand. Especially since they are currently stuck with physical media (for the "real" games anyway), which is fast becoming archaic. If you have a console that downloads games like a computer, and browses the web like a computer, and has add-ons like keyboards...guess what, you have a desktop computer, and the distinction between "desktop" and "console" has become moot.

    --Eric
     
  25. Trackpants

    Trackpants

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    @ Erich5h5 Sorry for going off topic, but I can see how you'd think that console's and computers will merge. But you have to look at it from a technical view. All Xbox 360's have the same hardware as each other, the same goes for PS3's or Wii's or PSP's. So it is a lot easier to develop something for them, because you know how much each console can handle, you won't have to sit there wondering if people with 1gb of ram and a 256mb video card will be able to run your game. You've got a benchmark at which to develop to.

    So while consoles and PC's are getting increasingly similar (exluding Nintendo, who seem to be the only company actually innovating with gameplay/tech) they are still quite different in other ways. Most console gamers would rather go to a store and buy a game then to download it. Where as the majority of PC gamers have steam and would much rather just download it due to ease. I personally sit somewhere in the middle.
     
  26. mlyons

    mlyons

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    Some fair comments, my thoughts:

    What we're really talking about here is developing for the browser as a platform. To summarise if there was a Web GL / DirectX / HTML5 target as well as the Flash one released now at the same time I wouldn't be posting as I would just use the native platform one i.e. the Web GL/DirectX/HTML5 one with no need for any plugin.

    On targeting the operating system platforms directly as better than the browser - well that really is the point - Flash is not a native platform and is mainly just a browser plugin - no browser usage no need to use Flash.

    On whether the Unity guys have considered this - well what I and I'm not alone think is they are considering things in the wrong way regarding their priorities.


    On targeting native / standards browser - I don't think anyone is saying that DirectX and HTML 5 and Javascript are not stable? The W3C and Microsoft might argue with that? As for WEBGL it's on it's way and this is a big opportunity for the Unity Team to become the premium provider of WEBGL for not just games but for everything.


    If developing for the browser at all, the real problem here is there is just one platform here that all these different ways are addressing i.e. the browser - so having a Unity Plugin, Flash, Silverlight?, HTML / web standards as 3 and maybe 4 different ways to do one target platform is overkill - a Unity high performance plugin and a web standards / native browser platform approach would have been enough and perhaps eventually could have been merged to be one in the same which will never happen with this separated Flash approach.

    ps I don't really think that the Unity guys will be silly enough to target Silverlight surely that's dead.
     
    Last edited: Jan 9, 2012
  27. angrypenguin

    angrypenguin

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    How can you question their priorities? They're trying to help us get our products to the maximum number of people possible. End of story.

    Are there known numbers in regards to WebGL and equivalent uptake? I expect that Flash installs would eclipse up-to-date 3D-capable browser installs quite significantly.

    Also, any links for IE9's DirectX providing WebGL-equivalent 3D functionality? IE9 does use DirectX, but as far as I can tell that's for generic hardware acceleration, not to provide a canvas for 3D scenes. So unless there's something that I failed to find, IE9 needs a plugin to access WebGL content, which puts us right back where we started anyway.
     
  28. andorov

    andorov

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    I probably hate Flash more than the OP, but this is one of those things in which complaining isn't really going to accomplish anything.

    The issue is that people say the idealistic things.. no DRM, support web standards, etc. Then they go vote with their wallets. Tons of developers continue to target Flash; tons of users continue to download Flash. Till the love for Flash dries up, follow your own advice and "don't fight against web standards" and embrace Flash, because unfortunately, at install numbers it currently touts, its more of a web standard than HTML5/WebGL.
     
  29. mlyons

    mlyons

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    @angry - you know that they need to update to Flash Player 11 right to use this? What gamer wouldn't update their browser if it meant a better game but would update their Flash Player? Need to think through those kind of statements IMHO.

    IE9 and IE10 soon (I'm already using IE10) and DirectX are integrated no one is talking about DirectX and WebGL talking to each other.

    So where we are is just back to not needing Flash as even flash themselves admit for mobile devices.

    http://www.theverge.com/2011/11/9/2...lash-player-for-mobile-says-html5-is-the-best

    This is the quote from the company themselves...

    "The company will still develop and support Flash for the PC, but says that HTML5 is the "best solution for creating and deploying content in the browser across mobile platforms."

    @andorov how can you say that HTML5 is not an adopted web standard? Even Adobe disagree and think that their own product is not as good a way to go as HTML5.

    Come on guys Flash is going to die within 5-10 years there will be no Flash Plugin at all and maybe no Unity one either.
     
    Last edited: Jan 9, 2012
  30. Dreamora

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    HTML5 is a supported webstandard but html5 has no platform to offer for 3D games so its of no importance (WebGL is NOT html5 and not even finished so far) for any unity developer as unity has no 2d only platform that could be neutred enough to run on javascript with more than 1 frame per second if at all
     
  31. angrypenguin

    angrypenguin

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    I did think about my statement. You need to think about who your target audience is or, perhaps, who other peoples' targets might be. When the Flash player update comes along most people click yes. Going out of their way to install a whole other plugin, even with Unity making it as easy as they have, still kills off 90% of potential users at that point (a statistic from a presentation about Flash, so perhaps biased, but it's still an argument of degree, not occurrence).

    Also, you're right that (self-professed) gamers probably have up to date browsers, but (self-professed) gamers aren't the point, because they're a minority. The majority of people playing Flash/browser games aren't "gamers" in the same sense as, say, people who buy $50+ console games or get stuck into Steam at sale time.

    If you're making assumptions like "people will have up-to-date browsers" (or Flash plugins, for that matter - but that one's at least significantly more common) then you're cutting your audience without even realising it, unless you happen to know that your target audience is a niche where that happens to be true.

    I'm not talking about integration, either, I'm talking about equivalence. In an admittedly quick search, I can't find any reference to IE providing 3D capability the way that WebGL/Unity/Stage3D does. It uses DirectX for hardware acceleration, it does new 3D stuff for CSS3, but that's the only reference to "3D" I could find on the wiki page. Furthermore, as dreamora says, WebGL is not the same thing as HTML5, and is not finished. You say we should use that because it's "on the way", but the fact is that Flash3D is already here.

    Mobile devices are a completely different matter. Flash aren't abandoning mobile, like you quoted they're abandoning mobile browsers. Flash can still export "native" apps to mobiles, can't it? It's just a different approach and, to be honest, one which better suits the platform (for design and bandwidth reasons before performance even gets a look in).

    Ahh, so even you say it's got 5 to 10 years left. :p Even if you're right, imagine how many people could be playing Flash-deployed versions of my games in those years? Plenty more than if I didn't take advantage of the capability, that's for sure. ;-)
     
    Last edited: Jan 9, 2012
  32. mgear

    mgear

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    Right now the flash player would be good choise for us,
    atleast if you want your webplayer to work within big corporation pc's.
    (usually they dont have admin rights to install any software, not even extra webplayers for browsers,
    but everyone has flash usually)
     
  33. Dreamora

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    If they have no rights to install then they can't install Flash 11.1 either to run stage 3d. If they can install Flash then the Unity Webplayer is installable too as it does not require admin rights either as per Unity 2.6 upward
     
  34. Trackpants

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    When is anyone's computer ever not up to date with flash? Doesn't it have an annoying auto-update feature?
     
  35. fanjules

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    All this anti-flash hate, my goodness.

    I am hugely impressed by Unity work with Flash. To go from nothing to what we have today is excellent work. However, there is still a long way to go. That's why it's BETA. The performance was always going to be worse than Web Player, where you've got Unity's workings optimised perfectly in C++. We knew this months ago. This is not a big surprise. But if you can optimise for an old iPod touch you can sure as hell optimise for Flash.

    The amount of tweaking and adjustments needed to export to Flash is still far more than I would like, but Unity are getting there (come on let's have C# rectangular arrays!). :)

    Lot's of people have been saying how Flash won't be around in a few years time, but they're so far ahead of themselves. When HTML5 and Steve Jobs first started kicking off people were saying Flash would be gone in a year, lol. Meanwhile you have games like Cityville with 103m players. Let's say Flash shrinks 90% in the next half decade (a long time in this business) then that's still a game which would have 10.3m million players today. Which is a lot.

    @trackpants: if you have Chrome installed Flash is always up to date. :)
     
  36. fanjules

    fanjules

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    In a few years time, browser games will still be going strong, and more and more of them will be 3d. And a lot of them will be Unity based. And you know what? I think Unity Web Player use is set to rise dramatically - publishing dual Flash and UWP versions, hook a gamer into the Flash version and they'll soon be install UWP to play the game in it's finest rendition. :) :) :)
     
  37. runonthespot

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    Regarding corporations, having previously worked for a large one, I can confirm that largely they have flash installed (and kept up to date in a controlled manner via a central desk), usually as all HR stuff is flash presentations as are a number of news feed websites (less these days, but still).

    For those literally millions of PCs, Flash is the only option. No flash, no play. This means that Unity is completely confined to games on people's home machines (+other platforms). No body could consider using Unity for anything remotely business oriented.

    By "trojan horsing" in flash (if you'll excuse the term!) Unity have massively expanded their own use-case options. Want to put together some whizzy 3d visualization of corporate data- now you can. For a lot of companies, the cost of dealing with virus/malware etc makes anything beside very very large and well known and broadly adopted technologies like Flash, too risky to consider.

    Sure the performance suffers and you have the tedium of debugging on yet another platform, but ultimately it's a ticket to a massively bigger audience.

    Best of all, you now have a decent platform for Facebook games, where 100% graphical fidelity is less important than simply being there, and unlike poor flash developers, you have a mostly fully functional 3d development environment and highly efficient pipeline.

    No, I don't work for Unity ;)
     
  38. fanjules

    fanjules

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    I appeared to have missed this first time round:

    You really need to get out there and experience or try and work with the technologies you talk about, rather than what you've read on the Internet.

    Flash will still be around and relevant in 5 years time. I would be very surprised if WebGL has dragged itself up to any level of decent performance by then. If anything I read less and less about WebGL nowadays and it appears to have became the preserve of the demo scene. Hopefully some more advances in Javascript performance will come along to rejuvinate it.

    Meanwhile Flash's Stage3d is here and working prime time, right now.
     
  39. cannon

    cannon

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    Complaining about the performance of the Flash exporter and then suggesting that we all move to WebGL is simply bizaare. I know IHBT, but I'll bite, and maybe get some exercise beating dead horses a bit more.

    Unity will export to WebGL once/if ever it makes sense to do so.
    It simply does not at this point in time.

    I tried running a WebGL demo of Safari just now. It brought me to a page that told me I need to enable WebGL *manually* to see anything. I'm pretty sure my target market is eager to go googling over the web to figure out how just to run my game.

    As for IE? It does not run WebGL at all, nor will it any time soon. Microsoft has spoken out against WebGL. The DirectX in IE that you keep talking about is only used to accelerate 2D rendering, and not as a way to enable 3D on the browser.

    The other reason why everyone is porting to Flash is that because of Alchemy, it's much cheaper to port C code over to run on the AVM, far less than rewriting everything in javascript.
     
  40. Dreamora

    Dreamora

    Joined:
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    Posts:
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    No it does not have that.
    Only AIR has that.
    Flash asks for updates when it hits content newer than the current version.

    And even if it had: no rights to install means no rights to install and hence also no update without a network administrator entering his data.
     
  41. Swearsoft

    Swearsoft

    Joined:
    Mar 19, 2009
    Posts:
    1,632
    The only things someone needs to consider is Facebook (I think we are talking close to 800m users), not even the large Flash portals.

    The second thing is: Adobe spent years making Flash a web standard, it's not easy to do the same with the WebPlayer. So until they reach that level (it will need several years - if ever - to gain the same market penetration) Flash makes sense,

    You see "Flash is needed" on your newly installed PC and you don't second guess. Flash is trust. Unity is still "WUT???" for a lot of people. Remember 99% of players aren't developers, most of them have a PC setup for them, not by them and it has Flash installed because when they went to Farmville it asked for flash, so they have flash.

    Even you recognize flash will be here for 5-10 years. Do you think 5 years is a small amount of time? Do you know how many flash titles you can put out in that amount of time?
     
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    Deleted User

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  43. tripknotix

    tripknotix

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    dreamora the new Flash 11.2 updates in the background without asking you.
     
  44. holyjewsus

    holyjewsus

    Joined:
    Mar 7, 2011
    Posts:
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    not on mac, I don't think it does.
     
  45. Noisecrime

    Noisecrime

    Joined:
    Apr 7, 2010
    Posts:
    2,051
    Wow, How on earth can you burn through '$17 million in several venture rounds plus an investment of an undisclosed size from Motorola Mobility' in year or two with only 20 employees? I mean I know having a proper game development business can be much more expensive than you might think and having 20 employee's isn't cheap, but still, thats a heck of a lot of money to burn through.

    Mind you its not very clear reporting, venture beat lists it as $7million in the last year, then there is the question of whether it was from the start of the business (2007) or when they invested in HTML5. Still can't see how they managed to spend it all.
     
  46. Demigiant

    Demigiant

    Joined:
    Jan 27, 2011
    Posts:
    3,239
    Had to join this discussion...

    Personally, I love Flash. I used it intensely for more than 12 years. First for the web, then to develop Flash plugins, then for touchscreens. For what concerns 2D, there's nothing more powerful, in terms of coding + graphics (with the right memory management, running Flash fullscreen on a touchscreen dual monitor system - 1920x1080 each - was incredibly fluid since FlashPlayer 10, even with lots of fullscreen animations).

    HTML5 is very cool, but as of now, if you want to reach everyone, there's simply no game. It's just a beta not fully supported, and in no way you can do what you can achieve with Flash.

    That said, I will never use Unity to Flash, because it looks quite pointless to me. I understand that it would be useful for small online games, in order to reach a bigger audience. But only for that: for bigger online games, I believe that the audience is quite different, and ready to download the Unity plugin if they don't have it. Also, it would be an audience that would be more impressed by a better running engine.

    Anyway, cheers, and viva Flash, viva Unity, and down with Adobe (they're behaving quite badly lately, on my opinion) :)
     
  47. mlyons

    mlyons

    Joined:
    Dec 31, 2011
    Posts:
    51
    The Unity Plugin is being used in internal networks in organisations for massive online projects - just look out for World Science Day.

    But personally I just hope for that day when we don't have plugins at all.
     
    Last edited: Jan 10, 2012
  48. Cameron_SM

    Cameron_SM

    Joined:
    Jun 1, 2009
    Posts:
    915
    Well I'm already in talks with companies to licence a full version of the game from my flash-in-a-flash comp entry that they saw via twitter, they're mostly keen on it because it's flash, they don't really care what I used to make it.
     
  49. mindlube

    mindlube

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    Oct 3, 2008
    Posts:
    993
  50. fholm

    fholm

    Joined:
    Aug 20, 2011
    Posts:
    2,052
    I'm sorry, but what? Not that I really care about this, but 2011 was the first year in about ~7 years that the desktop gaming (PC specifically rather) market made more revenue then the console one. I can dig up the market stats for you tomorrow.

    Whops, found it right away (or rather one link, there are many more like it and they all say the same): http://www.techi.com/2011/09/consoles-vs-pc-gaming/