What's your biggest problems/missing features with Unity ?

To be fair as well, (especially since I feel kinda bad, because I wrote the last post when I was feeling kinda annoyed by Unity and it showed) they did say they would probably use something like using the terrain tools to actually make the mesh and then export it as mesh, so they could do their own LOD etc. So they found it user friendly, but kind of bad for actual in game use.

In any case, it's not like you're arguing that's it's amazing as it is, so we're cool. And a new solution is coming in the future, so it's aaallll goooddd...

 

Im am relatively new to Unity, coming from UE4, so please see this as an advantage for suggestions knowing that I have an idea of both worlds.

• Modernize the whole UI
  Coming from UE4, Unity feels like using windows 2000 ... I cant help it, but it looks very dusty and old - and the UI controls dont even scale with higher resolutions.
  
• Modernize the Asset Store
  This is a controverse one, I switched to Unity because of the sheer amount of assets available. But the website & store look like they are stuck in 2005 & could use a complete overhaul.
• Materials
  The process of creating materials is maybe normal to most Unity users, but it is kind of a nightmare for me. Since i come from UE4, dragging 4 images into a material blueprint and editing them (lerps, parameters, distance based tesselation, world aligned textures, etc) is completely natural for me. In Unity, this process is not intuitive, not even a little. If you want to change minor things (saturation etc.), you need to head back to photoshop. I know there are 2 material editors in the asset store, but they are not cheap and also this thread asks for "missing features". At least to me this is essential.
  
• Better AA
  First i thought my GPU is about to break, but the default anti aliasing of Unity is .... bad. In fact it is producing light glitches and flickering edges. And what makes me wonder the most about it: everybody seems to be fine with it since this is also visible in most demo scenes from asset store video previews.
• The "Example Content"
  I am really not picky when it comes to example content, but the demo scene with the car asset ... This is not example content but rather bad marketing. The first thing you see when you create a new Unity project with "example content" is a badly designed car mesh, glitching sound when you accelerate, terrible physics and flickering edges in the distance. While I understand what "example" means, this is not what anybody should ever aim for.

 

Did you try the TAA that they're working on now? It's pretty good.

 

Have you installed the latest graphics drivers for your video card?

 

WOW, i must say that you suprised me in a positive way cause i want to write this is something i want to see in Unity but, oh well here i have, CANT WAIT

 

I never used UE, what AA do they use? Imho Unitys SMAA from the ""old"" cinematic effects pack is really good! The TAA is supposed to be even better (but somehow it just doesn't work well for me :/ )
As for the materials: Agreed, I don't know anything else but even I know that the current process is far from optimal...

The comments about the UI and asset store page design surprise me. The last thing I want is some super-retarded "metro" design or some other complete nonsense. The current UI is as unintrusive as it gets. The fonts are small and paddings are tight, just as it should be to maximize the useful information per space.

Not sure if thats what you're aiming for, or rather something more similar to how the UE editor looks?
But tbh the UE Editor just looks different, not better or worse... maybe you can elaborate




edit:

actually, now that I think about it, the difficulty of managing and especially creating new materials from textures could be almost completely remedied by an editor plugin!

I think the only thing that I think is missing is being able to "Inject" custom GUI controls into the inspectors for example in the renderer section of a particle system. Or is that possible and I just don't know how?

 

Have you tried our new Post Processing Stack and it's TAA?
Info and link to download from this thread: https://forum.unity3d.com/threads/new-post-processing-stack-pre-release.435581/

 

By the way, if anyone here is interested in extra features in Unity, I would be grateful if you checked out my asset, Handy Hacks. It's a collection of features to help artists and designers.

I'll be submitting a new version with new tools soon, so I thought I would shout it out now before the price goes up

Hope you find it to be useful!

 

• .NET Core / Standard: A big big step for Unity.
• Deprecate Unity APIs that already exist on newer .NET: Don't reinvent the wheel so you can use your resources for other tasks. Form example, System.Numerics that does already include Vector2/3/4, Quaternion, etc... Math class and son on... Try to integrate .NET serialization like DataContracts with existing serialization.
• Getting rid of reflection for Monobehaviour messages: Implement something like uGui. Example: IAwake, IStart, IUpdate...
• Code Coverage with NUnit: https://forum.unity3d.com/threads/t...de-tests-and-code-coverage-with-nunit.447941/
• Improve Mac App Store publishing: https://forum.unity3d.com/threads/t...-to-app-store-steps-included-dec-2016.444107/
• Keep working in uGUI new features: https://forum.unity3d.com/threads/where-did-the-ui-team-go.350267/#post-2869438
• Nested prefabs: It's a joke that you can find threads from 2009 speaking of this...
• Better text rendering: See Text Mesh Pro, we want that!
• New Splash Screen features: https://forum.unity3d.com/threads/splash-screen-scripting-control-and-progress-bar.440033
• Better Touch API: We want TouchScript in Core. It's been developed by a Unity Staff member on github.
• More and more activity on Bitbucket/Github regarding pull-requests: If you see projects like UI they have many pull-requests that are not answered so people get's frustrated and will not contribute more on this. You need to see how Unreal acts on this matter. If you see Unreals each version release notes there are many features that are being contributed by users.
• Better serialization: Why Unity don't use JSON .NET in core?
• Android Activity events listeners to avoid subclassing UnityPlayerActivity: So asset store developers don't make this really bad practice (it's a problem when two assets try to do this and also you don't have source code). Implement something like Prime31 solution: https://gist.github.com/prime31/0908e6100d7e228f1add https://gist.github.com/prime31/10747997
• UnityWebRequest and async texture loading: There seems that there is no way to decide with format to loaded the texture with like it is with WWW.LoadImageIntoTexture and also there is no way to load external textures asynchonously.
• Take seriously Plugins development and Asset Store publishers folder structure: Starting Unity 5 it wasn't required to have plugins in "Assets/Plugins/{Platform}" directory but Asset Store publishers keep doing this converting that folders in a mess because it get's really hard to remove or update a plugin without knowing what files it's from each plugin. You need to "instruct" your Asset Store reviewers to check this and invalidate submissions. Also in case of Android with Gradle AAR packages asset developers can have it's own AndroidManifest so no Asset Store package should override "Assets/Plugins/Android/AndroidManifest.xml" file. You have a very big publisher (Vuforia) doing it very bad and you don't have done anything: https://www.assetstore.unity3d.com/en/#!/content/74050
• Mobile APIs consistence: There are local and remote notifications implemented in iOS but not in Android. Game Center it's implemented but no Google Play Games.
• Update Roadmap: There are items that have not been moved from the begining of this Roadmap (Terrain System, Nested Prefabs, ...)
• Documentation it's really frustrating: There are cases where you want more information on how are implemented internally like (that has no Android information for example): https://docs.unity3d.com/560/Documentation/ScriptReference/SystemInfo-deviceUniqueIdentifier.html but you don't know what to do to get this information. I know that you are going to say that opening a issue it's the way but there are cases where are unanswered for months and are a simple question that can be answered by a developer in a matter of seconds. If you go to documentation forum you see threads opened months ago that are still the same way. It can be that difficult to document a page, a paragraph... Why don't you adopt a up/down voting system so developers can put more info in documentation pages? It's really important.

And there are more and more features missing or abandoned that it's really depressing. You can also see that some quoted threads are from months or years ago...

 

I would like to preface this with the fact that Unity is damn amazing. Compared to what I was doing before I started using Unity (in Unity 2.x times) it was a godsend. On top of that everything (Except the last one) here is something I can improve and do myself including editor tools, which is how Unity is supposed to be used. So, here we go:

Prefab Inheritance

Would be nice to template prefabs and expose only specific things on the parent prefabs to allow child prefabs to customise.

Input System

No run time re-binding is pretty terrible. Looking forward to the new one and getting rid of my custom solution.

Terrain System

Better tooling, core system and shaders.

Asset Store -> Package Manager

Why is the asset store (Something that creates revenue itself) so bad? Let's have a non-web based UI and more of a focus on packages and dependencies.

Lets also have ways to include\remove 'fluff' from packages (Like example assets included in the package) so we can have smaller repository sizes.

Modularisation!

Once we have a proper store\package manager lets modularise what we can of Unity itself. Not every game needs all of those 2D systems, not every game needs the terrain system. Put as many built in Unity systems you can as free external packages. Hopefully this will reduce build size as well.

Realtime Collaboration

This would be like Esenthel Engine or MaxPlay (Now defunct).

Customisation of Build Data

I would like to customise how the data appears for a build.

For example in a moddable game it would be better if the assets or scenes were not built together into non-human readable formats but were json linking to assets directly on the users file system.

Window Build Startup Times

When loading a Unity game my entire system hangs for a few seconds, this doesn't happen with any other game\game engine. What is happening here?

Regarding your modern UI request, I feel Unitys is more compact\modern while Unreals is big\clunky\old.

I think because of peoples preferences we should just be able to theme the whole editor and UI items.

The UI does need to scale with high resolutions though.

 

This is the lowest importance features that should be adressed, why some UI could interfere with your creativity ? When you start making a game you forget the UI.

 

First off, Unity is a great tool, so kudos to the team! I've worked with the engine for several years, and aside from the tiniest of font sizes for the main editor (PLEASE give an option to increase it), my biggest problem is forgetting to stop playback in the editor before making changes to the hierarchy or inspector. Spending 20-30 minutes happily making changes and trying to save only to have the editor say "You must exit play mode to save the scene" is frustrating beyond belief!

To be fair, I have no idea as to how to really address this issue, but I imagine most Unity devs have had this problem.

Regarding the font size, my 45-year-old eyes are begging the team to include the ability to increase their size!

 

got 2 tips for this, first of all go into the settings, and set the play mode tint to something noticeable, in my case i make it darken the UI a lot. Secondly if you only changed one component during runtime you can easily copy all of its data in the components context menu, than paste it pack as values after leaving playmode.

 

Just wait till you start making changes to code while playmode is active. Far too often lately I've swapped back only to wonder why I'm receiving error messages only to quickly realize my code is fine and that I simply forgot to press stop.

 

I've been using Unity for over 4 years, and I've finally, only this past month, changed the play-mode tint and it has been a HUGE improvement for this problem. I used to think it was a silly or juvenile feature, but not so. Just pick a loud colour you don't hate.


Rocking that purple tint. #NoRegrets.

You can actually copy entire game objects (Or whole groups of game objects) that you changed during play mode. Once you exit play, just ctrl/ command + v and you're good to go

 

Thank you!!



The feature I miss the most, is probably isolate selected, and also quick align/snap.

Secondary, it's an option to save out a screenshot with g-buffers, and at 32 bit (per channel).

 

I wasn't aware of the setting that you and passerbycmc mentioned. I shall certainly give that a try.

I knew that copying a component's values and pasting them into the same component was a workaround, but I'd not considered doing it on multiple game objects.

Thanks for the tips!

 

Yeah. I've got the Tee-shirt and mug regarding code changes while the editor is playing. Sometimes errors just abound after doing that.

I typically try to press the Play button when activating the Unity editor (if its playing) to stop said errors from occurring.

 

If the UI interfered with how things were done I'd understand it. But yes, this seems to be complaint about form rather than function.

 

Are there any examples of what people mean by 'Modern UI' regarding game editors? I am very interested to see any designs regarding that topic. It seems Unity is pretty far ahead IMO.

 

It'd be nice if the Project Settings windows would open in their own tab and not the Inspector. It's annoying to try and set script execution orders and having that window close while you navigate in the project folder to the scripts folder. Preferably a Project Settings tab with buttons at the top to quickly switch between the pages.

 

Regardless of why the editor freezes, it is frustrating. In my current project, the Unity Editor does partially freeze right after any code changes I make. My PC has an I7, 32GB RAM, and several SSD drives. It is a fast PC, but the editor is largely unresponsive for at least 10-15 seconds after each code change I make.

 

I agree it's frustrating, no argument there. I think my point was that it's not just a matter of "move it to a different thread" or whatever, and that it may well in fact already mostly be on a different thread. I could be wrong, but I'm not sure that it's possible to seamlessly unload, replace and reload code that is currently in use.

 

Since artists keep asking for visual scripting, I guess I'll be nagging for this. BUILT IN



But seriously, I need this one ↴

 

I don't think it's exclusively artists that ask for visual scripting.

 

For small projects visual scripting more convienient than code, but I don't think it a good idea to write anything remotely complicated using visual scripting. I never used one though, I just make a guess base on some shader forge shaders that I've seen compare to how I would write them in code.

 

Funny, cause there actually are such things as "Make Art" buttons.

Here is one example of someone else's procedurally generated spaceship script.

I thought of using this (or something similar of my own work) in Away Mission, to either create good looking spaceships I choose by hand, or to procedurally generate them so every game is unique.

 

But they're not built in, I need my built in Make Art button.

 

Jokes aside...thinking about it... it actually would be pretty cool if Unity had a few "Make Art" buttons that would procedurally generate placeholder art for use in video games. An intelligent extension of primitive meshes / primitive sprites, if you will. They did kindof already do this.

 

There is a lock icon at the top right of the inspector. Go to the script execution order menu entry, click on the lock in the inspector, and it will not change the inspector when you click on something in the project hierarchy. Now click on the little icon directly to the right of the lock, click "add tab -> inspector". That's right, you can have more than one inspector and you can lock some of them to stay permanently on things, like for example the main camera or whatever you're working on at the moment. My mind was blown when I found out about this. I also use 3 instances of the project folder list next to each other, so that I can easily drag and drop stuff between folders or keep them focussed on different places I'm jumping back and forth between.

 

As long as we're making wishlists, under the "editor" column, right after high-DPI / high-res support, pencil in "better multi-monitor support" (for Windows, at least, I have no idea whether it's also hosed on the Nixes).

 

It's pretty janky on MacOS too, at the very least

 

Yeah but they're not persistence after you close the editor. It not like we need to access player setting a lots in one session anyway.

 

I like to have 3 or 4 project t windows myself, and having 2 inspectors can be useful at times too.

You can save layouts though... its one of the options in the layouts drop down. I have one saved for single monitor, and one for duel monitor. Also, even if you don't save a layout, your project should keep its layout between sessions if you save your project. It's strange to hear that yours aren't persisting.

That said, I have noticed that my saved layouts tend to disappear from time to time, which is quite annoying.

 

Thanks. I'm aware of that. My thought was that those settings are more inline with the likes of Lighting and Navigation, which I have tabbed with the Inspector, though I'd like to see them on the same window with 'tab buttons' to switch between them.

 

Great point!

Example: When working across two monitors with the Scene view on one screen and the Game view on the other, you can't minimise the main window without also minimising the other.

Example: You also can't click either view without both popping to the foreground, so you can't use the Scene view while keeping your code editor in front of your Game view.

 

I generally agree with this, too. In my mind the Inspector should be used to inspect objects that exist or can exist inside your game. If something isn't one of those then it shouldn't be in an Inspector. Go ahead and use Inspector functionality if that's a good way to go, just make another one to put it in instead of using the one I'm already using to look at my objects. Call them "Object Inspector" and "Project Inspector", and make the latter a floating window by default.

On a related note, more explicit controls for the Inspector would be great. At the moment we've got "locked" and "unlocked" modes. Unless they already exist and I don't know about them, some way to update what is shown in a specific locked Inspector without having to toggle it unlocked and back again would be great. Additionally, when there are multiple things being Inspected, each Inspector should have a color and object highlights should reflect the related Inspector's colour. Bonus points if they also linked somehow with a line (though with the dockable interface that might not be practical).

 

On those notes, it would be nice if when opening what is already in a locked inspector would just select the locked tab and not select the tab AND show it in the unlocked inspector.

 

But not locked inspector. After you reopen unity it just become a blank inspector. It would be better if player setting have a dedicated window like lighting window, or just make the inspector lock persistance

 

Oh, I see what you mean.

 

Ok, I've got a bit of a weird one:

Is it just me, or is it SUPER annoying that applied changes to prefabs change the prefab root's transform location?

I've never needed a prefab's position to be anything other than 0,0,0. But since game dev is messy, the prefab instance I'm tweaking is usually somewhere random in the world. So, I apply changes, then immediately select the prefab and zero the transform. Really wish I didn't have to do this.

I totally understand that this is the smallest of potatoes that I could bring to the table, but I just thought I would "Let it all out" as the OP suggests

 

Bump

 

Physx baking. Could use the improvements from Physx 3.4.

 

There are many small things that UT could implement, I was amazed when I saw they implemented that selection outline, also that math operation in input fields. It seems like we are getting an universal transformation tool just like Maya's, which is very nice too!
One thing that would be nice is tabs (aside from regular pane tabs) to work with many different layouts and multiple scenes at the same time, or we could edit a prefab in an empty scene without needing to close our scene which will be in the other tab. Or even to edit UIs without needing to zoom out, click on the 2D button in the scene view, hide layers, etc, etc. Something like this:

 

Automatic mesh LOD

 

Looks like they snuck some stuff in at some point. Didn't see anything about it in the release notes.

1) You can now reorder components with drag and drop.
2) You can drag components out of the selected game object's inspector and drop it onto a game object in the hierarchy.

 

1. Mesh terrains (with holes / overhangs) as standard.
2. Thread-safe Transform, GameObject, Texture2D.
3. Whatever's needed to eliminate Instantiation Freeze
4. Less buggy multi-monitor support (editor).
5. Faster asset-bundle access / extraction / instantiation.

 

Simplygon is good answer to that. But there is always some edge cases which it does not handle well. I believe on fbx import it already supports Maya's lod groups which is a good way to get lods in and configured.

 

The UI system is graphically.. just S***e. I know you're supposed to make your own designs for it and I do, but even something like increasing the font size by a factor of 5, and shrinking it shouldn't be needed.

 

That's needed?