Unity 5.5 - my favorite version so far

I wanted to take a minute and pass out some praise for Unity 5.5. It is my favorite version of Unity so far. The new Graphics.DrawMeshInstanced method is awesome.

In my game, I am getting massive reductions in draw calls and massive framerate gains using Graphics.DrawMeshInstanced. This is a fantastic leap forward compared to the automatic instancing in Untiy 5.4 that often failed to instance effectively enough. With Unity 5.5, I am able to force it to group 500 items into a single draw call. This is fantastic. It opens the door to massively scaling the number of objects on screen while maintaining high frame rates.

I also really like the object highlighting in design view in the editor. It is a subtle yet very welcomed improvement.

Anyway, I just wanted to heap some praise on Unity 5.5 today. It is a fantastic release. Thank you Unity team!

 

https://blogs.unity3d.com/2016/11/29/unity-5-5-is-ready-for-you/

Hmm. Looks like I'll need to upgrade this time.
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Although... https://forum.unity3d.com/threads/unity-5-5-unusable-on-mobile-if-using-lightmaps.443666/

 

Don`t know what to think about it. My scenes are all pink and full of errors

 

I've read this a few times in the 5.5 beta forum. For whatever reason, this seems to be a rather common 5.5 issue and it seems it often can be fixed by deleting/renaming the "Library" folder.

Close Unity, rename the "Library" folder in your project to "Library_DeleteMe" and start Unity again. The next start might take a while, because Unity re-imports all assets and re-creates the Library folder.

Doing this fixed several issues in my project (HoloLens GUID issues (never used HoloLens though), broken shaders and pink materials).

 

I fixed it by selecting all shaders and clicking on reimport (right click -> reimport).

 

Aside from finding out it's now essential to have a reflection probe in the scene or I get garbage noise on everything, I haven't had any new issues crop up. Played with the look dev tool a bit since I spent all of monday making a model viewer. It probably needs another pass on usability, but otherwise it's pretty interesting.

 

Oh maybe I should update

 

Yeah... sounds like some of those updates are directly applicable to my current project, so I'm going to check it out later today.

It's also great to see an updated LineRenderer, and I'm always happy to see extra particle fun.

Also, I'll be super happy next time I work on OS X since it looks like VS Code gets first-class support now.

 

I've found and reported a bug in the particle system sub emitter functionality, but otherwise it's been great so far. I love the new post effects stack! And I haven't even touched the new features on the particle system yet, which was my main reason to upgrade. So far I'm really happy with 5.5 as well! Great job everyone who worked on getting this into our hands, thanks a lot!

 

I haven't touched the things that convinced me upgrade to 5.4...

I feel pretty spoiled these last few updates, since stuff that happens to be specifically relevant to me is getting added faster than I'm getting to try it out.

 

The only thing I'm really interested in is the new splash screen since it's just less... gaudy than the old one, but I'm mid-development right now so *makes farting noises with armpit*

 

By the way, less than 24 hours later I've heard the bug has been fixed, but it might take a bit for the fix to go through QA and make it into a patch release. I'm still very impressed how quickly it got sorted out!

 

Considering going back to earlier... I would recommend people (if they can wait) wait a couple of weeks.

 

I jumped from Unity 4 to the 5.5 beta as I am nearing completing a mobile game, so will need to be on 5 at some point for iOS compatibility, so best to do it before launch, and might as well go to the newest possible.

It is a mixed bag for me, and still prefer Unity 4. However, I really do like the new splash screen. That is a massive improvement. Perhaps even a little too generous, but welcome.

For balance (well, not really balance), the things I don't like include:

• Can no longer set Default texture format. Makes for more work and increase chances of errors on multiple mobile formats.
• My GLSL shaders do not work at all.
• Legacy particle system is due to be depreciated. The new system does not have the Systematic option, and I dislike the interface (I dislike all the non-standard interfaces that have appeared in Unity, but this one replaces something that worked well and was standard).
• Scene management changing but not being documented clearly (was stuck for ages because didn't find anywhere that said "using UnityEngine.SceneManagement;" was required).
• Documentation out of date for things that have changed slightly for no apparent reason, but don't work without changing. This was the worst for updating projects compared to Unity 2 to Unity 3 and Unity 3 to Unity 4. It was days rather than minutes.

EDIT: Some more features I forgot

• Unity Remote 3 no longer supported, so no connecting by wifi, which is often more convenient.
• Reduced options. One that I noticed missing was the Mipmap Linear Space setting.

That was more about Unity 5 rather than 5.5 as I jumped. I'd tried updating to 5 a few times before and returned to 4 as soon as possible. Unity 5 is a very nice piece of software, it just isn't as good as Unity 4. Unity 5 is about what I have lost, not what I have gained.

 

I'm quite sure there is a solution for this. Try googling asset post processor or something like that.

For your usecase as a pro owner working on mobile games maybe. For me Unity 4 free vs Unity 5 free was almost like paint .NET vs Photoshop.

 

I have been searching. I can find something for setting the default texture format. I want something for me to set each texture individually. I use a variety of formats in each project. Some can be compressed, some can be 16 bit, some need more. Some need transparency, some do not.

Even if I find a solution, it will not be as easy as using an option on the texture. Just as it used to be and Unity decided to take away. Apparently it is to stop people selecting formats that could be incompatible with a platform, or too big for that platform. So they took away control for those who know what they are doing.

Unity are chasing AAA at one end, and beginners at the other end. They seem to be forgetting the competent indie who are their core customers.

 

I have also been impressed with a bug I reported ages ago, not in that it was fixed quickly (I'm not sure) but in that they followed it up with me twice when unable to reproduce it. I'd have expected them to drop it when they couldn't reproduce it from the description or from the repro case I sent. They got in contact and I had another look, and my own repro case didn't work any more so I said I'd make another. When I hadn't got back on that in a few weeks they got in contact again to ask how it was going. (And now I feel a little bad, actually, since I've a sneaky feeling that's sitting in my growing pile of to-be-responded emails...)

Point being, though, the people on the other end definitely get my thumbs up!

 

I guess that's better than "dark and full of terrors."

 

I reported a bug when Unity 5.0 was early beta (alpha really). The bug was fixed in another beta update... and Unity just sent me an email yesterday saying the bug was fixed. Guess they're finally making their way through the list.

 

This. Asset bundles, the profiler, render textures... When I first upgraded to five it was like learning a brand new engine all over again.

 

I haven't gone past 5.2.2 myself. I want to, but I'm also terrified.

 

I feel your pain. I have a pretty large long-running hobby project that started in 4.3, and along the way I've migrated to 4.6, 5.0.1, 5.2.0, 5.3.2, and just now to 5.4.2. I rely on a lot of purchased code assets, and luckily most of them have been well supported over the years and have updated them for compatibility. But it is definitely nerve-wracking. Going to 5.0 was quite a challenge.

I have learned to wait for the x.x.2 versions at least. So I'm going to wait for a 5.5.2 or later. The last few versions I've been on have been quite stable for me, if that makes you any more comfortable.

 

Unity 5.5.0p1 was released today.
https://unity3d.com/unity/qa/patch-releases

 

You got to be kidding me 2 patches in the same day

 

What do you mean? They released a separate patch for multiple branches, both Unity 5.5.0p1 and Unity 5.4.3p3. It actually makes sense to do that, so people get access to patches in which ever branch they are working with.

 

I think your missing something or misunderstanding