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Playmaker vs. Game Creator vs. Bolt

Discussion in 'Assets and Asset Store' started by Vengusta95, Apr 23, 2020.

  1. Vengusta95

    Vengusta95

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    For seasoned experienced devs and all that know a lot about assets, whats your take on those 3 assets? I really want to take advantage of the current sale and start a project. If I could get some points for and against and your personal recommendations, I would appreciate it.

    My situation: I'm not a beginner w/ Unity and coding ( I also do android/web dev ) but would like to minimize it as I don't particular enjoy coding in games.

    p.s. if there's any other asset you would strongly recommend, I wouldn't mind hearing about it.
    Thanks.
     
    LittleSY and hopetolive like this.
  2. MrIconic

    MrIconic

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    I really like Bolt.
    >Runtime editing.
    >Automatic creation of blocks (after telling Bolt what namespaces/types to look at).
    >Ludiq and those who support him on Discord are an invaluable resource to him and us day-in and day-out.

    Playmaker can be easier and nicer to use (when you have the blocks you need) as everything feels polished. That comes a lot from the actions being pre-created and you string them together. Therefore, it's much easier to create something that simply just works. This can also make performance better at times because you're less likely to create a complex system that breaks down due to your own integration of actions.

    The problem is, eventually you'll want to branch out from the pre-existing actions in Playmaker. You'll either have to hunt around for integrations or code your own. In Bolt, you can put the script in the list, press go, and it's done.

    I bought Game Creator but have not used it yet. I personally plan on using Game Creator and Bolt together.
     
  3. Vengusta95

    Vengusta95

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    Thanks for replying.
    I also bought Game Creator, the automatic character creation with ready animation, camera and all the rest seemed really valuable for the reduced price. But why use both if I may ask?
     
  4. MrIconic

    MrIconic

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    Both? Which ones? Playmaker and Bolt?
     
  5. Vengusta95

    Vengusta95

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    Game Creator and Bolt. I thought all 3 have similar functionalities.
     
  6. Szaruga

    Szaruga

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    @Vengusta95
    I recommend uNode - it is a fully professional tool that allows you to visually create FULL clean code.

    Playmaker, Bolt, gameCreator, Flow Canvas etc ... - these are just performance-straining toys.
    They look nice (Bolt) and have a large user base (Playmaker), but these are only inefficient toys.

    //edit
    Of course, each of us may have different expectations and needs for such tools. Therefore, if you don't care about performance and optimization, then uNode is not needed.
     
    Last edited: Apr 24, 2020
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  7. MrIconic

    MrIconic

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    Game Creator has a lot of pre-built functionality (whether it be in inspector windows or scripts) that can be great to have. However, Bolt, Playmaker and so on are about creating your own "scripts" (whether literal or not) visually.

    @Szaruga I'll take a look at uNode. I think in the past it wasn't exactly comparable to Bolt but it looks like it has come a long way.
     
  8. Szaruga

    Szaruga

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    Yes, such things are good if you want to make a game according to the usual patterns.
    But everyone who has experience, knows that if you want to do something innovative, unusual or more complex - it's best to do everything yourself from scratch.
     
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  9. DoKiz890

    DoKiz890

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    If you're doing everything from scratch, be prepared to spend 10 to 20x as long and potentially write systems that would be even more unoptimized than playmaker actions.
    BP from UE4 is probably on the level of unode but it gets so messy with the systems and nodes people give up / say its too complicated to keep track of. Playmaker seems to be the most polished easy to use with premade actions written for you. Game Creator seems like a great kit to start a game project and actually get it done, including dialogue,items,inventory,save systems and everything. and it lays out the visual programming side of it pretty clearly.
    Bolt seems like unode/BP, not sure how it differs or the performance of any of these systems.

    But with the new consoles soon, GFX cards, and the GFX in newest smartphones getting close to ps4 quality (I think the ipad is stronger than a ps4)

    I don't see how visual scripting would cause performance issues unless you're trying to create the next AAA title lol
    Keeping the 3D object optimized and making sure you unload / object pool or w/e the assets in your game and any impact visual scripting has seems like it would be negligible...
     
  10. Szaruga

    Szaruga

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    It is an additional layer, the "intermediary", which loads and extends the time of code execution.
    This is the case with "Bolt" with "Flow Canvas" as well as "Blueprint" in Unreal Engine ...

    Create a simple project where, for example, 1000 balls fall from the sky ...
    Make two versions, one using traditionally written clean code. And the other with "Bolt", "Flow Canvas" "Blueprints etc ...
    And compare liquidity and optimization.
    All these tools use an additional layer that must process what we do in these tools.

    However, uNode creates a CLEAN C# CODE, without intermediaries and without loads.


    No...
    For example, if I have an idea for my own unusual "inventory" system in the game - it's better to do something like this from the beginning, rather than bother with rebuilding or adding new functions to the system that someone else created - because it costs more work, nerves and causes more errors .

    Tools such as "Game Creator" are cool - provided you want to make a game - which will contain elements that the tool supports by default.
    However, any additional idea added to the project - causes more and more mess and less compatibility...
     
    Last edited: Apr 25, 2020
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  11. Mauri

    Mauri

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    When you generate it first, that is. So will Bolt 2. Can't speak for the other ones.

    In the end, pure scripted C# will - obviously - always be better than any visual scripting tool (including uNode).
     
  12. Szaruga

    Szaruga

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    @Mauri
    But the power of uNode is precisely that it creates a CLEAN C# CODE
     
    Last edited: Apr 26, 2020
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  13. DoKiz890

    DoKiz890

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    Wait, so why isn't uNode more talked about? I figured it was on the same level as the other systems.

    Is it alot harder to learn than systems like BluePrints (which IMO are really hard to learn)

    I admittedly don't know alot about programming, so my previous reply was based on what I have read online over the years. I seen people talk about how their game was serverly unoptimized with blueprints, and would lag.

    Does playmaker also use pure c#? I heard it's just c# scripts and connecting them together with nodes, not sure if it has performance issues or if its on the same level of pure c# also.
     
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  14. Szaruga

    Szaruga

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    This is complicated...
    Everything has its pros and cons.

    Tools such as "Playmaker" or "Bolt" - focus primarily on ease of use. This makes them good for beginners and works well for simple projects (where performance is not so important)
    I do not know "Playmaker" but "Bolt" or "Flow Canvas" - they contain an intermediate layer - which is "translated" during the game and reduces performance.

    It's best to write the code traditionally, but ...

    If you are a person who already has some programming skills, but you are tired of traditional code writing. And in addition, you like the visual presentation of issues - in this case uNode is a GREAT alternative.
    It is more difficult to use than "Playmaker", "Bolt" and other such tools, so it requires more skill - but it repays with clean C # scripts.
    All nodes that you create with uNode - during compilation are converted into a full-fledged normal C # script. - which you attach as a component to the project.

    I worked for several years with various visual scripting tools, including "Blueprints" from Unreal Engine. My friend, who is a great programmer, helped me - and he prefers to write code traditionally, but if he had to choose a visual tool - he would have chosen uNode without hesitation.
     
  15. PoseidonRain

    PoseidonRain

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    I also am looking into the Bolt vs Playmaker with the current sale going on. Thanks for pointing out uNode! I will look into that one myself also. If it really outputs clean C# code, that is excellent.

    While I would like to prototype things faster, my worry with the other options is that there would be a performance hit or I wouldn't be able to "dive into" the coding to tweak things once I was done prototyping.
     
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  16. MrIconic

    MrIconic

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    EDIT: This is just for people who are on the fence between Bolt/UNode and are looking for more information. You can ignore this post otherwise. ha~

    [Overview]
    Bolt 2 does exist but considering it's mostly in alpha (aka it breaks and/or has existing broken features included, and will potentially break between version upgrades) it's not really viable as an option to discuss. However, it does show where they're going and that's important to understand.

    UNode out of the box right now is the go-to asset for c# generation from visual script. You can literally create visual scripts in UNode, delete UNode and retain those scripts. However, this difference can make it not as comfortable to design, prototype and test systems vs. Bolt. To explain:

    With Bolt you can change your graphs at runtime. This allows you to create much of the system while in runtime. Test it, debug it, modify it all while the game is running. Then with Bolt 2 specifically you just click a button to switch to c# generation and you're done (generation is for performance and comparatively requires Bolt to be installed).

    So is there a clear winner between UNode and Bolt/Bolt2.

    [Bolt/2]
    If you're newer to programming or you're newer to Unity/game developing I'd strongly recommend Bolt. It's easier overall. The fuzzy finder is insanely good if you don't type things exactly right or don't know exactly what you're looking for. The runtime ease feels great and avoids having go in and out of playmode. The community is invaluable, I can't stress this enough, they are very welcoming and helpful. The product is still growing but has a lot coming up. Unfortunately, Bolt does not play well (if at all) with trying to export graphs. It's possible but can be annoying to achieve. It's also very easy to accidentally nuke Bolt by removing something from the project because it will fail to serialize graph(s) and you have to crawl through the .asset file to remove the reference(s). The difference between Bolt 1 and Bolt 2 can also be hard to comprehend if you start with 1 and try to move to 2.

    [UNode]
    If you're more experienced with programming or you've worked in Unity for some time or you've used Bolt before I'd recommend UNode. It loses some ease of use (so isn't as beginner friendly) but gains a powerhouse of features. The biggest, biggest, reason I have for liking UNode is exporting creations into code and back again. It's almost THE feature of UNode. It also handles using, namespaces and general organization in a much better way than Bolt does (especially Bolt 1.x). The UI isn't as good (and is somewhat buggy in 2019.3) but the vertical graph in UNode seems good but is also bugged in 2019.3. The fuzzy finder actually annoys me coming from Bolt but this might be personal preference since I'm used to Bolt's method. However, the good in certain circumstances outweighs the bad because you can do everything you can do with Bolt in UNode and more. With time and some learning you'd then see no reason to use Bolt. The difference being is that if you're not used to unity/visual scripting/programming then you might not like UNode enough to complete a project with it. If you are used to those things then this is likely the choice for you.

    [Both]
    -You could be like me and buy both. I'm thinking of using Bolt to design and prototype various systems and then using UNode to finish them as code.
     
    Last edited: Apr 29, 2020
  17. humadi2001

    humadi2001

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    man I'm gonna switch to Unode because of this pic *inheritance*
     
  18. el_Guero

    el_Guero

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    I started to use Playmaker and even though I like it a lot, it seems abandoned as a project. In their forum they are talking about Playmaker 2 since 5 years now and it seems there's still a long way to go. Kinda they missed the train to continue improving it (which I hope I'm wrong).

    But I come from Buildbox, which its version 2 has been completely codeless and version 3 has low code javascript available. Playmaker seems to work well for me since it's almost like Buildbox 3 but with more power in a much more professional environment.

    Still a lot of struggle ahead of me I know, but Bolt never would be an option for me since it's basically coding with a mouse.

    Game Maker, I honestly haven't tried. It looks very similar to Playmaker, maybe even more to Buildbox 3. It might have been a good option but for some reason I went with Playmaker first. I think I like the fact to be able to setup my own systems with Playmaker which ultimately will give me more freedom.

    Coming from Buildbox, I think what all of them have in common is that it's not really a drag and drop platform. With Buildbox you can open the engine and just start to work on your game (concentrating on game design). Everything is already prepared for you. Scoring system, level system, UI system, heck the entire game manager is something you never will deal with.

    Add to this that with Playmaker (or any other tool mentioned here) you still have to deal with Unity's bad UI/UX. :)
     
  19. frbrz

    frbrz

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    You answered your own question. The only asset that you have mentioned and would fit your description is Game Creator.
     
  20. Mitch_Heinsenberg

    Mitch_Heinsenberg

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    Playmaker, Game Creator and Bolt are all completely different (I own all three)

    Bolt is "traditional" visual scripting. The individual blocks are literally pieces of C# code. You kind of have need to know how to code to use tools like Bolt. Yes, you are not "typing" in the code, but connecting blocks on the screen.

    Playmaker lets you set up "state machines". The logic behind Playmaker is very different compared to Bolt, Playmaker has its own very special workflow. Watch a few tutorials if you want to understand what I mean!
    For a game designer, Playmaker lets your prototype faster. It's great for things like UI-menu interactions, and other things. Playmaker is just a joy to work with. I understand why it has such a loyal following. Playmaker has integration with many other popular Unity assets, and so on.
    For example, setting up a basic 1-st person controller literally takes 5 minutes with Playmaker!

    Game Creator is what you need if you want to start creating a cookie-cutter game straight out of the box! With Playmaker, you need to spent the 10 minutes setting up the controller and hooking it up to a game object.
    With Game Creator, you literally press a button, and the thing spawns a character in your scene, complete with camera, controls and animations. If you are just starting out, it's great! For example, if you are going into a game jam, and you have a weekend to put a game together, Game Creator is great for that.
     
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  21. leeseungju9000

    leeseungju9000

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    GOD Thank u for uNode it's Great! for lazy programmer like me
     
  22. MrIconic

    MrIconic

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    After Unity acquired Bolt and disassembled the dream that would've been Bolt 2-- UNode (the more/most difficult(advanced) learning curve overall) is my primary tool now.

    Without delving into creating a follow-up to my previous post I will say this about it..

    I moved to FlowCanvas/NodeCanvas and those products combined are wonderful. If you need a less difficult tool that will still produce solid results they are it.

    The downside with nearly every visual graph product is it being unusual to move graphs from one project to another. For example, create an auto-updater that you want to then establish within 3 different projects. Then make a change and want those changes across those three apps. Despite how it may be done in those assets.......

    UNode quite literally exports graphs to scripts and imports scripts to graphs.
     
    Last edited: Apr 13, 2021
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  23. nickwing

    nickwing

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    After reading the posts and looking at uNode i also want to give my 2 cents:
    I am a C# Programmer/Architect for 20 years and do games as a hobby since 1992.
    So, i‘m a bit tired of boringly writing code and looking at Junior noobs creating Spaghetti and unreadable code…
    Or ugly naming variables,functions etc. I also know Uml from the architect perspective.
    So for me uNode is very interesting for coding software visually. It allowes designer, product owner, architects and coders to look at the code, understand it more, and also enforce architect patterns.
    If you are a coder you can have your fun with uNode in Unity.
    But, uNode itself has nothing to do with game creation and that makes it odd… if you want to visually create a game it‘s a no-go. If you want to visually code it‘s cool.

    by the way: after putting game creation aside for years because i was tired of programming, game studio on the Nintendo switch got my fire back on. This is REAL visual creation. Sadly only Nintendo is so creative and there does not exist a single tool dor PC‘s that does this like that. Only flowlab a little bit, but they are too restricted yet.
     
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  24. matiasges

    matiasges

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    That's the problem with uNode. You need to know really well how to code in order to use it.
     
  25. Dungeon_Rider

    Dungeon_Rider

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    Question for you guys. I am by history primarily an artist. Blender, Sketchup, Autodesk Sketchbook, Bryce 3d, Premiere, Photoshop/Gimp, once interested in creating comic books but have trasitioned back to my childhood dream of making video games. I was terrible with math in highschool, and it discouraged me from continuing to create video games. I understood stuff like QBasic and that was about it. I almost am afraid to admit that I have been using coppercube 6 for awhile now, and for whatever reason
    I start working on learning code/visual code in Unity and UE4, and I keep thinking, how could this be applied to coppercube? And I start to get a lot better at it. For whatever reason my mind likes the simple api, the lightwieght editor, the small friendly user community.
    If I've truly invested a lot of time in it, shouldn't I continue working in it? I know it's laughed at and hasn't done much, but there are users who have created navmesh scripts, some who have managed to develop openworld games, I love that I can draw out a floor plan of an area, directly import buildings i've made in google sketchup, and it all comes into to coppercube and IMMEDIATELY has collision, textures, and everything on it right away. It's running more smoothly every week, because people have close-knit circle to provide feedback for each other, everyone knows everybody else. So what is your advice, do you think someone can actually work off a lot of rust and eventually perhaps code successfully again? I understand most of what I am doing in javascript.
    C# has not itimidated me to the point where I am frustrated. But I keep nagging myself, I have purchased a lot of books for Unity and UE4, I should develop games in Unity or UE4.
     
  26. MrIconic

    MrIconic

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    This is true.

    Forgive me. I have never used coppercube. Not to get off topic too far but-

    Unity, in its normal form, is just fine, ok, decent.

    When you realize how it is very modular and you open up the asset store and plug in five, ten, twenty different assets it becomes something to behold- and then it will break. It will break because you updated Unity; it will break because you updated a random asset; it will break because a new import changed a random project file that defines your project.

    However, when you can make it work you can make so many amazing things.

    That's why we can talk about UNode, Game Creator and Bolt. You can use any, all three, or none and it is still Unity- just one that works best for you.
     
  27. Havok_ZA

    Havok_ZA

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    A revived thread - but I will add to it since people may still want to know :)

    Bolt - meh - same as coding but with a mouse as someone said. Versus coding...It helps with Syntax that's it imho. May as well learn to code.
    I sometimes wish people who push visual code would realize that artists, game designers, non-coders need easier ways to create things and coders don't like visual nodes.
    Game Creator and PlayMaker falls in the - easy game building systems category - for designers and non-coders who want to make games. They can still logically think and design the core functionalities and come up with cool ways to "Lego block" things together. Where coders will just build the blocks needed by writing code into a editor. Way quicker.

    Game Creator is great and yes if you have specific types of games in mind, 3rd person hack n slash, shooter puzzle and 3rd person point and click it gets you set up really quick and can make some pretty cool interactions. Check out RVR on YouTube.
    However PlayMaker you can think up really cool stuff that doesn't actually exist and re-use that as a "block".
    I like both. One can probably with a bit more effort get further with PlayMaker in making anything really, where Game Creator is a bit more set as to what types of games you want to make. PlayMaker has a lot of well known commercial titles under it's belt. Not sure, but I don't think Game Creator has.....yet. Some great things in the pipeline from community members.

    Game Creator is REALLY active though in the Discord channels and extra little scripts the community make and with lots of 3rd party asserts now getting made for it (paid)-however it also has it's own paid for addons... so its modular. Need an Inventory - there is a gret one as a paid addon, need a dialogue system, there is an addon.

    Playmaker...need an inventory system. You can, and have to, build your own.

    It really depends on your needs and your hopes and dreams (Read: How ambitious is your project.)
    Imho If it wasn't for tools like Playmaker and Game Creator, Unity will have a lot less users. Honestly.
     
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  28. damvcoool

    damvcoool

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    I think a new contender should be also added to the mix, NodeCanvas seems to offer a lot of What Game Creator offers in terms of Actions/Conditions and Triggers, but with Visual Scripting.

    now having used GC and Bolt, I honestly prefer GC but with the StateMachine Module as it makes it far more usable.
     
  29. Havok_ZA

    Havok_ZA

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    Agreed - the state machine module does make it a lot more usable and a little bit less back to front. I have not really checked out NodeCanvas - IS it not just like a Bolt alternative? Or is it more like a PlayMaker / GC alternative?
     
  30. ChaosCraft

    ChaosCraft

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    So (to possibly resurrect a dead thread)
    Can anyone offer advice to me on my best choice...
    The game is basically a card-game, so timing and speed are not critical.
    I am a very experienced coder (40+ years), and comfortable with C#. The use of visual scripting here is not for my sake.
    The goal is a simple system the artists and writers can use to describe what happens when a specific card is played.
    The idea I have is that they can link various steps that are written in c# so the steps will make sense to them.
    For example, I've built this in Bolt/UVS. It's to play a card where you transport someone out of a location, and cause an explosion damaging all the remaining creatures there.
    upload_2022-8-8_17-11-51.png
    Nice and easy for the designer.

    This is not "write the game visually". Just script behaviors of individual cards using standard components.

    My issue is lack of documentation with Bolt/UVC. In particular the lack of detail on how the basic flow model works internally.
    I want to reach a node (for example SelectEntities), then (after due setup), wait for player action (in this case, accepting target selections/deselections until confirm or cancel is clicked), then pass the result out.
    The point is - all the real process is hidden in the "SelectEntities" node, but that means the flow has to be handed back to the game at that point.
    So if uNode is clearer about how that works, I'd look at switching. I need the node linking to be easy enough for comfortable use by non-tech folk, but I also need to be able to do big-job nodes such as SelectEntities.

    If this should be easy in Bolt, please someone, point me at something that explains how. (for example how to create a reusable node that is a graph itself. - reusable being the key here)
    If this is easy in uNode, then maybe I'll give that a go.

    Lastly, if someone knows, how does uNode pricing work? pay per game? pay per developer?
    I'd like to install it and experiment on a separate codebase before pulling the code into the main game, but I don't want to pay for each place I'll use it.
     
  31. kdgalla

    kdgalla

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    I don't know, but Bolt (since it is Unity's own visual scripting module) has it's own forum here. If you have any questions about how to do something in Bolt you might be more likely to get an answer there.

    https://forum.unity.com/forums/visual-scripting.537/