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New here, looking for more info

Discussion in 'General Discussion' started by =ChrisB=, Jan 25, 2006.

  1. =ChrisB=

    =ChrisB=

    Joined:
    Jan 25, 2006
    Posts:
    2
    Helo all, I come from FPS Creator from TGC, and am looking into a few game engines.

    1: How does Unity compare to Game Studio A6 Pro?
    2: Is it mostly p&c, or is it mostly coding/scripting?
    2: Is there an included model editor?
    3: Is there an included scene/terain editor?
    4: How easy is the scripting language to learn?
    5: How many diferant types of games can be created with it?
    6: Does it support multiple player models?
    7: Are drivable vehicles supported?
    8: How functional are the shaders?
    9: How responsive are the characters/dynamic objects to the light/shaddowmaping?
    10: How does the build game proces work?
    11: Is it possible to have options, save/load and the like menues?
    12: Is there a limit on the world size?
    13: How good is the included physics engine?
    13: How functional are the particles, and how easy is it to add them?
    14: What types of media formats are suported? 3DS? OBJ? .X (I dont asume it is, due to Micro$oft vs Apple issues:twisted: )? MP3? OGG? AVI? MPEG? MOV?

    Finaly, how does it shape up to Gamestudio A6 Pro?


    Thanks for any awnsers,
    =ChrisB=
     
  2. jeremyace

    jeremyace

    Joined:
    Oct 12, 2005
    Posts:
    1,661

    Welcome to the Unity forums!

    1. I have 3D GameStudio A5 standard and in my opinion Unity is much more user friendly and powerful. I don't know about A6, but comparing the scripting in A5 to Unity, Unity wins hands down in my opinion. I am not fully aware of what Conitec added to A6, but you can be sure the physics will be better in Unity. I suppose it all comes down to the type of game you are creating, visually I think Unity wins, but it doesn't currently have any built in portal systems. That's not saying you can't write your own in Unity, but it's something to consider.

    2. It depends. For basic functionality it can be point and click, but to do anything cool you will have to do a bit of scripting. (Scripting in unity is easier and more powerful than GameStudio in my opinion)

    3. Yes and no. The editor is where you position your objects, lights, etc, but you do not create geometry with it. For that you use an external 3D package. There is a list of 3D apps that can get content into Unity here: http://unify.bluegillweb.com/scriptwiki/index.php/3dApps

    4. You can script in Javascript, C#, or Boo. I use javaScript and find it very easy and well laid out.

    5. Basically whatever you can imagine. Some will be harder than others but there isn't really a limit.

    6. You have full access to the .NET networking libraries through scripting so you can code your own, or use the plugin system if you buy PRO, but there is no built-in support at this time beyond the .NET libraries. Somewhere on this forum was a discussion about porting an external networking library to unity. You might wand to search and cheack it out.

    7. If you code it, it will work. ;) Definately

    8. The shader system is very powerful. Check the shaderlab docs on the site and the shaderlab forum for more info.

    9. I don't fully understand your question here, but FWI Unity doesn't have built-in shadowmapping yet. It is something you could probably get running with shader code though. Unity has vertex and per-pixel lighting.

    10. Heh, very nice, you select you build target (OSX standalone, widget, or PC if you have pro) and hit build. That's it. Done. Finished.

    11. Yes.

    12. Not as far as I know, but there are always limits on how much data you can throw at the GPU at once. Again you could write a LOD system to handle that if you needed to.

    13. Excellent physics. Unity uses the Ageia physics engine which is the best one out there as far as I know. Epic is using it for the new Unreal engine, as are many others.

    14. Yes. And any bugs that are found are squashed very quickly by the devs. So no worries there.

    15. They will probably do that sometime. Right now their focus is making Unity rock, and constantly improving the player. If you get Unity Pro you can deploy your games to run on PC though.

    16. This is the best community I have been to. Very non-jerk-like, very helpful. The Devs are all over these forums like ants (sorry guys, best I could come up with) and everyone is willing to help out where needed.

    17. Try from 5mins to next day of posting on the support forum. The devs are very attentive to help people out very quickly.

    18. Can't be too specific here, but Unity is made to run on a large array of machines. While you want a pretty good machine for making the games to make your life easier, your built games will run on a large range of machines usually. Maybe someone else can tell you more about that.

    I bought GameStudio A5 and played around trying to learn it, checked out the aknex user magazine and so on, but it wasn't until I bought Unity recently that I actually started to get some cool things running. I personally found the aknex engine scripting too limiting and tricky. Scripting in Unity is a dream. Again this is just my opinion of it, but I am sure a lot of people would agree with me. If you are doing large, strictly indoor games, then Aknex6 might be a better choice for you, but I think unity is the best.

    I hope that helps, good luck!
    -Jeremy
     
  3. Guest

    Saweet! Lol, I kinda just dumped FPS Creator (sarted acting up, AGAIN). Well, I had a game in mind, kinda pased of the earthsea trilogy. So I guess I should lookinto this more?

    I'm kinda getting the hang of 3DS MAX rite now, but maybe should get some other world building apps?

    Unity sounds like it is alot better then DarkBASIC Pro, mainly beause DBPro is all coding (eeeew!). But moving rite along.....


    Heres another question, what type of media formats does unity support?
     
  4. jeremyace

    jeremyace

    Joined:
    Oct 12, 2005
    Posts:
    1,661
    As far as I know you can use 3DS max to get your content into Unity so you shouldn't need to get any other 3D software. As long as you have the plugin to export to FBX you're set.

    As for media formats, check here: http://otee.dk/whitepaper.html

    -Jeremy
     
  5. DaveyJJ

    DaveyJJ

    Joined:
    Mar 24, 2005
    Posts:
    1,558
    Yup, Ron (the other monkey) uses Studio Max to get all our content into the game worlds we build. He did just a new 20" iMac though a few days ago (the Intel one) so he'll be using othe tools shortly.