Noobs beware the Unity Trap!

Some of you know me as the guy who goes on about how Unity could be better, and I think that is because I fell for the Unity Trap, hook line and sinker...

Unity give you a cool/amazing sandbox with Physics/3D/2D/Audio and scripting all tied with an open limitless world view in the editor.

Now some of you will just know/understand/grasp the inherent limitations of modern CPUs/GPUs and understand that really you are in a clever illusion a limited space constrained by memory and processor bandwidth.

So I learned Unity and as my skills improved my dream games and what my Unity skills could deliver started to hit those limits.

The problem is that Unity will teach you about all how to build sandbox worlds and simulations that resemble/mimic reality. And your imagination will run away with what you can do, infinite vistas and worlds await your game development skill...

Reality check Unity should be teaching the limits to it's engine and how games are really smoke and mirrors. Then teach us how we can make seemingly infinite worlds within these limits.

Because Unity's physics/navigation/lighting system provide great ways to build worlds but they tend to be static and limited due to the inherent limits of CPUs and GPUs.

The Unity Trap, is getting the impression you can simulate large worlds, no games do this they all use clever smoke and mirrors. I just think Unity could do a better job of teaching us how to do the 'magic' of large game worlds.

So to Unity, please provide a learn how to write:

• A Endless Runner.
• A Flight Simulator.
• A Space Simulator.

In Unity to help others avoid the Unity Trap.

 

I don't see where Unity is actually failing to do it's job. The Learn and demo team are constantly pumping out resources. Honestly? gotta defend Unity on this one, I think they're doing OK.

I don't think it's Unity's job to educate people how to make every single game type. It's Unity's job to broadly help people understand how to use Unity. Likely 2 space games can be dramatically different: KSP vs Elite for example.

Not seeing this.

This is a problem in UE and CryEngine as well. It's solved by people having a broader education in game development, it's not engine specific as the same problem happens on all the engines I mentioned. Ram limits. CPU limits. GPU limits. The engine seldom limits people.

People build their own traps in all available engines and have done so since people have been able to create things. Everyone oversteps, it's part of the learning process. The term "Unity Trap" seems like something you made up!

You can't dictate because a massive game like Elite is doable by a single person. The engine has nothing to do with this. You could do Elite in text.

It's basically the person's own failure to realise that you need to design things that do not take a long time to make. This has nothing to do with the engine.

 

Well. I am now absolutely sure that we can do extraordinary things with Unity. In fact, the biggest shortcoming of UT is documentation. As i have already said, i learned a lot from Keijiro Takahashi and i think the Unity documentalists are 'overwhelmed' by the new introduced APIs.

So yes, i agree for new tutorials whatever they are ..

 

Where are these teachings to be found...? I wish they would, but all I see are reiterations of extremely simple games.

Unity's job is not to go around putting rubber mats under everybody. Their job is to provide an engine with a comprehensive set of features and solid documentation. I would be happy though if they made a big game framework like Unreal Tournament, to give people who have finished the 'rubber ducky' level of development something to sink their teeth into.

Overall I think Unity does an great job of initiating new developers, and have a fantastically approachable and comfortable engine to use, but they seem to spend 99% of their time on new customers and leave everyone else just to figure things out on their own. I haven't really bothered to look into UE much yet, but I get the feeling that if I had, the content they provide would have made me a much better developer by now, so maybe I should.

 

Unity docs team are expanding and working hard all the time non stop, check out the blog! https://blogs.unity3d.com/2017/01/26/unity-documentation-in-2017/

 

Isn't the real trap the @Arowx threads?

Anyway, got to go with Unity on this one. One does not blame the tool maker if a tool can do more then you need.

 

Well I am closing in on the full complement of coding frameworks I wanted from the asset store so I am happy with Unity.

I'm still waiting on $50 Android tablets/Android TV boxes and cheap entry level iPhones/Apple TVs to be Vulkan / Metal / OpenGL 3.x / DirectX 12 compatible with 2GB RAM to be able to forget most of those 'optimization techniques' and game effects limitations though.

 

Unity's dreams of the future of game development:

 

I saw the memo. But, I also saw that there is not much info here: (for example):

Https://docs.unity3d.com/ScriptReference/Graphics.DrawProceduralIndirect.html
Https://docs.unity3d.com/ScriptReference/Graphics.DrawProcedural.html
Https://docs.unity3d.com/ScriptReference/Graphics.DrawMeshInstanced.html

It sometimes gives me the impression that they are talking about things that very few people have mastered at home.

 

Nope.

You're the guy who tries to discuss buzzwords. Repeatedly.

All games use smoke and mirrors. Every single one of them. In games like GTA, for example, the town is empty. Cars and pedestrians except in area you can see, and disappear when you stop seeing them.

This is a homework level assignment you should be able to complete in a week or two after reading the manual.

 

It's a real shame you think this @Arowx. Whilst alot of our content is beginner friendly (remember we was all their once, wide eyed, ready to make our mmorpg until we realized Roll-a-ball is bloody hard at first) we have alot more content aimed at long time advanced Unity users for very specific things.

These docs are written by our enterprise support engineers who visit some of the biggest game studios around the world. The smoke and mirrors you may be referring to.
https://unity3d.com/learn/tutorials/topics/performance-optimization
https://unity3d.com/learn/tutorials/topics/best-practices

We also invite some of the smartest Unity users and devs to speak at our conferences about advanced topics and put all that in video form for everyone to take advantage of.
www.youtube.com/user/Unity3D/playlists


The Evangelism team (the team i'm with) word tirelessly to visit as many users as possible around the world whether it's conferences, user groups, studio visits, universities and show off feature demos and talk to experienced devs about issues or their success's with the engine.

We'll not teach you to build a very specific game (ie your space simulator) instead teach you different features and how they work then it's up to use your creative and technical skills how to make them work together

 

We've been down this road several times (even with this specific OP). I am going to close this before it ends up in the same inevitable place. Some important things to always bear in mind:

• There are no magic buttons.
• Making games is difficult.
• Results will vary.