Bolt – Visual Scripting

@williamian Cool! I'm updating now.

@ludiq Well, to be honest, I really don't understand the state machines in Bolt currently. I don't get the transitions. I read the documentation and I will read it again, but I'll have to start off more simple than trying to recreate my raycast hook shot mechanic tied into rewired actions. That is probably a bit ambitious. But, I would like to ask about this in the Bolt forums as it seems more suited.

Cheers!

 

Bolt v.1.0.3 has been released. This update focuses on stability and bug fixes.

Bolt Flow v.1.0.2

• Fixed adding units from fuzzy finder not registering an undo
• Fixed serialization issue with unit definitions
• Fixed casting error in missing component prediction (#294)
• Fixed missing default values after nested macro deserialization (#299)
• Fixed events in super units not listening

Ludiq Graphs v.1.0.3

• Added graph title and summary in the machine inspector (#215)
• Fixed breadcrumb nesting issue when editing graphs on the same object (#303)

Community link: http://support.ludiq.io/topics/301-version-103/

Taking a short break:

Now that the dust has settled since release and that all the initial bugs have been fixed, I will be taking a short break. Developing Bolt was a very intense 9 months long solo marathon and frankly, I'm exhausted. I decided to take my first vacation in a long time to get some rest and come back energized and motivated.

I will be back in the first week of September. Until then, I will not be active in the community, but I will check weekly to see if there is any urgent, breaking bug. In the mean time, please try to help each other out!

I can't wait to implement the ideas we have in store. This is just the beginning, and the next year will be amazing for visual scripting in Unity!

Thanks again & see you all soon!

- Lazlo

 

I picked it up, been using it for a week or two now. I converted my playmaker project to BOLT to see how they differ and learn the workflow. My style is 90% code, 10% visual FSM, and BOLT fits in very naturally. If I code something it just shows up in bolt like it's part of it. So far Im impressed.

I'll probably give it another week and leave a review on the store.

 

Has anyone got the custom events working? Mine doesn't seem to ever get triggered. I placed logging statement in to verify this. Based on the simple description on the website it should be simple to implement: add a trigger event node (that obviously gets called), give it a name, indicate any parameters that will be passed (in my case, none), on another object with a flow graph have the custom event handler, specify the same name.

 

Well, seeing as the developer has decided to not support this asset for a few weeks (shortly after releasing it) I'll probably just go back to Gameflow for now. Maybe I'll use this for another project in the future. I'm sure he needs to the break but it's still a little too new to just leave it.

Edited to add: This is a very nice looking asset but unfortunately, I just have to get a lot done and can't wait for the developer to come back next month to support this. Hopefully, I'll have time in the future to work with this.

 

Why is the developer not supporting the asset for weeks? Last update was on Saturday. He is now on holiday but if it is really urgent I would try contact him directly cause he is not checking often the forum here.

 

StevenPicard, red2blue.

Lazlo the developer, spent 9 months non stop coding Bolt, by himself, as he mentions here in the post above and on his forum and was burnt out, he also mentions-

Taking a short break:

Now that the dust has settled since release and that all the initial bugs have been fixed, I will be taking a short break. Developing Bolt was a very intense 9 months long solo marathon and frankly, I'm exhausted. I decided to take my first vacation in a long time to get some rest and come back energized and motivated.

I will be back in the first week of September. Until then, I will not be active in the community, but I will check weekly to see if there is any urgent, breaking bug. In the mean time, please try to help each other out!

I can't wait to implement the ideas we have in store. This is just the beginning, and the next year will be amazing for visual scripting in Unity!

Thanks again & see you all soon!

- Lazlo

This is quite reasonable. He has already done two updates since release and has noted and is addressing any other issues mentioned in the forums.

StevenPicard, Have you joined his forum yet and asked your question there? http://support.ludiq.io/forums/5-bolt/

Lots of us are active there and may be able to help.

 

No, I didn't join the forum there. I over looked it and hadn't visited there yet. Thanks for pointing that out. Also, I didn't say it was abandoned and I knew he was just taking a break for a few weeks. Although he probably a needed break it does seem a little early after just releasing it (my opinion.)

 

I understand. I was simply pointing that out to any that may have gotten that impression. I certainly understand your situation if you are in the middle of a project. But yes, joining the forum and reviewing all the current posts there and asking your questions in the forums may shed light on your issue.

 

Thanks for taking the time to respond. I'll definitely jump on there this evening since I have to leave in a few minutes.

 

You are quiet welcome.

 

Hi everyone!

Still on break, but I'm doing a weekly check-in as I said I would.

Bolt has been featured on the #1 spot for new powerful assets!



It's already the #6 most popular visual scripting tool on the store. I'm thrilled and humbled by the reception and reviews so far, thanks everyone!

Hi Steven,

I entirely agree, it's not ideal for an asset developer to be taking some time off so early after releasing a new product, and I normally wouldn't. But I've burnt out before in my life when crunching for long periods of time and I wanted to make sure that it didn't happen with Bolt. My take is that it's better to have me rested and motivated to support the asset in the long term, even if it means I have to take a moment for a break after release.

As it's been mentioned here, I mostly answer questions on the community because it does a better job of keeping issues separate and keeping track of their status. Please post a bug report for custom events not working, I'll definitely have a look.

 

Thanks for taking the time to respond. I appreciate it.

I've been there before being burnt out on programming. It was so bad it took me a few years to start getting normal again (I just couldn't pull the hours anymore.)

My hats off to you on a such a nice and consistent looking asset. It's a very polished product.

 

Hi,
also a long time playmaker user, 3D artist here.
I really like playmaker, but there is one thing that annoys since a long time.
Is it possible with bold to export code?

 

Hey Elin42, have a look here http://support.ludiq.io/topics/222-compare-bolt-vs-alternatives/ if you have not and if you have not joined or been to the forum your answer will probably be there.

http://support.ludiq.io/forums/5-bolt/

 

Hi Elin,

No, Bolt does not generate C# script files. If it did, it would have to sacrifice many features, including live editing. However, rest assured that its reflection and runtime code has been thoroughly optimized.

 

You could include a manual export to code option, that only generates the code on user request. What are the technical reasons for this not to work?

Merely asking out if curiosity

 

Hi everyone, doing my second weekly check-in. I've answered all questions and reports over at the community: http://ludiq.io/bolt/community

Yes, that could be possible. However, some graph features like asynchronicity might not be possible to convert. But to be perfectly honest, the biggest thing holding this back is that it's a massive endeavour that could imply many weeks if not months of work. It's not something I've firmly decided against, but it's very low on my list of priorities.

 

Hi out of curiosity is it possible to make visual scripting tool for say like java ?

 

Theoretically yes, any language could have a visual scripting layer on top of it. I'm not an expert in Java reflection however, so I'm not sure if it could be as deeply integrated in the language as Bolt is for C#/.NET.

 

Back from vacation!

I'm very well rested and excited to get back to work on Bolt.
You can expect a good pace of updates in the next few weeks!

Speaking of which, I added a public roadmap on the community:
Click here to see it:
http://support.ludiq.io/topics/392-roadmap/

 

v.1.0.4 has been submitted for review!

 

Really enjoying this. HOping to transition away from Playmaker and into this on my next project.

Maybe it's in there and I just haven't found it yet, but one feature that I think would be really helpful is to make the Live Debugger able to step through all the states one-by-one. The predictive and live debuggers are great, visually helpful, but I could still see it being hard to follow specific bits of logic in bigger graphs without a step-by-step analysis tool.

I'm not sure Bolt has this implemented or if there's a plan to get it in there. What say you, developer?

cheers
-g

 

Answered on the community!

 

What is the difference between Bolt and Nottorus (https://www.assetstore.unity3d.com/en/#!/content/59656) in your opinion?

 

I haven't used Nottorus, but from what I can gather from their promo / documentation:

• Nottorus compiles C# files, while Bolt runs purely on reflection. This means:
  • Nottorus doesn't support live editing
  • Nottorus requires a compilation step
  • Nottorus can only debug graphs that were compiled for debugging
  • Without benchmarking it's hard to tell, but compilation could make Nottorus slightly faster
• The design for Bolt is closer to Unity's native design
• Major price tag difference (Nottorus is $200, Bolt is $70)

 

I know that's a stupid question, but what means "reflection"?

Is the result faster as something like PlayMaker?

 

Hi DeepShader! Not a stupid question at all.

Reflection is basically analyzing the codebase at runtime -- think code that's aware of itself.
It's very powerful, because it allows Bolt to use everything in the codebase, not just predefined actions like in Playmaker.
However, it's usually slower. But Bolt includes many cutting edge optimizations that make it 5-8x faster than traditional reflection, meaning it's often comparable in performance with direct C# code.

 

Reflection is something like a sandbox?

So I'm not sure how PlayMaker handles this, but does this means Bolt is the faster than PlayMaker?

 

With Bolt you can create every function that is in unity or in a script inside your project, how i understand it.
In Playmaker you can only use the defined actions from Playmaker.

Playmaker is faster. But also way more limited

As example, if you want to controll your Timeline, you need to download the Timeline actions from the ecosystem to use it in playmaker. Or you use the set or get property or Invoke / call method.
When i worked with playmaker and some other 3rd party plugin it was always more a hack to get it to run.
With Bolt i have so much more controll and its way more clear in the Flow Machine.

 

Thank you, that sounds nice. But isn't it slow, that Bolt/Nottorus/... needs to build a cache every time you want to add a command (it looks like Bolt and all the others will catch all possible commands every time you add a command)?

 

Bolt v.1.0.5 has been submitted for review!

• Added constructors at the root of contextual fuzzy finders (#471)
• Added new scalar normalize unit
• Changed super units with nested events color to green
• Changed header display for variable units
• Fixed type downcasting only working for object
• Fixed nested state machines not updating (#432)
• Fixed nested graphs not creating AOT stubs (#465)
• Fixed custom event argument count error (#466)
• Fixed various small recursion related issues
• Fixed variable units not pre-filling name (#434)
• Fixed unscaled delta time for On Timer Elapsed event
• Fixed scene variables singleton error with additive scene loading (#472)
• Improved error message for member units edge case

Community thread:
http://support.ludiq.io/topics/440-version-105/

 

Hi DeepShader,

The unit database is cached since version 1.0.4 so loading all options takes under a second. If you modify your codebase and want to access the new nodes you created, you must update your unit options database, which takes about 5-20 seconds depending on your machine.

 

Ah ok, are there plans for integration of a behavior/dialog-system?

 

These are major new types of graphs and there are no plans for them on the roadmap yet, however I'm not against the idea and they might be added in the future.

 

Thank you

Is it possible to use Bolt with Behavior Designer in any way?

 

I don't think that's possible at the moment.

 

Maybe you could create a connection?

http://opsive.com/assets/BehaviorDesigner/documentation.php?id=10
http://opsive.com/assets/BehaviorDesigner/documentation.php?id=5

I think this would gives Bolt a push

 

Thanks, I'm aware I could create integrations, but if I start integrating with 1 third party visual scripting tool people will ask that I integrate with all the other ones, and this is very time and resource consuming to code and maintain. If Bolt ever has behaviour trees, it will be through its own implementation, with the same graphical style and full integration with the rest of the tool.

 

I understand, but I think behavior-trees a really needed, because it's one of the things that speeds up development much.

I really love Bolt, but it would need to much time to use only Bolt in the way it is now to set up A.I./movement/etc for NPC and so on.

 

Working on flow animations at the moment Should be ready for next version!

HD GIF: https://i.imgur.com/VelkJBt.gifv

 

Any info when this update will be released?
Thinking of buying Bolt, but want to do so after 1.1

 

If all goes well I'll submit 1.1 for review this afternoon, so it should be available this week.

 

Bolt v.1.1.0 has been submitted for review.
Changelog:

Bolt Flow v.1.1.0

• Added Active connections animation (#453)
• Added Active node colors fade out (#397)
• Added Smart output contextual options (#518)
• Added Prominent unit settings labels (#267)
• Added Automatic units resize based on content (#460)
• Fixed Scene variables disappearing (#490)

Ludiq Graphs v.1.1.0

• Added Shortcut to navigate to parent graph (#348)
• Added Zoom to selection keyboard shortcut (#461)
• Added Zoom graph to cursor position (#349)
• Added Automatic edge pan (#516)
• Added Shift to lock drag axis (#517)
• Added Group resize handle from top edge (#452)
• Added Elements centering on paste (#271)
• Fixed Dragging when duplicating groups (#269)

Ludiq Core v.1.0.3

• Fixed Constant fields crash (#506)
• Fixed Unused references (#492)
• Fixed Void type bug (#483)
• Optimized Plugin container access
• Optimized Inspector draw speed

Community thread: http://support.ludiq.io/topics/519-version-110/

 

New video showing Bolt in action!

 

Nice trailer

 

I just wanted to echo DeepShader's thoughts on behavior trees. I would love to see this feature implemented, as well.

 

The new Bolt tutorial is ready!

Create a full platformer game without writing a single line of code.

Link: Platformer Tutorial



Includes:

• Player controller (movement, jump, animation)
• Health points, damage, traps and death
• Enemy AI (patrol and chase)
• Doors & keys
• HUD, pause menu and main menu
• Projectile attacks

 

Hi,

I am interested to BOLT, however i've some questions :

1) currently i have PlayMaker, Can i use this alongside with Bolt ? i mean, no conflict ?
2) You said BOLT only support 2017.1 and above which means only FOR newest .NET Framework ( cmiiw), so How about old device/old Android phone , Can using APK that built with BOLT ?
3) I have protype that write 100% using C#, Can BOLT replace some or all coding to BOLT ?

Thanks...