robahouston

With the new unity model I am leaning away from the platform for a lot of reasons, is there a possibility that you might make something for Unreal/CryEngine/Lumberyard and the like? I feel that many small indie devs like myself might make the exodus to another engine and I would hate to have to never be able to use ORK again. Though I seriously doubt this is an option I also wanted to know what the community thinks as well. Thanks for everything GiL, it's been a lot of fun.

gamingislove

What is the issue with the new Unity model?

gameintern

Unity hasn't changed in a long time in the area of "Model"? Pricing Maybe? It has always been free. It has only gotten better. Not sure what you mean.

I have been working on my game for a long time so any mention of Ork even looking at developing for another Game Engine scares me :)

Catacomber

I don't know why anyone would be scared about ORK branching out to Unreal or CryEngine--how would it affect you? It would probably be good and not bad for ORK. A lot of Unity vendors are quite active in the Unreal marketplace---the Unreal Engine marketplace charges a bit more for its assets so I imagine the creator gets a little more too.

I'm also experimenting with Unreal Engine 4---there are a lot of issues with Unity--bugfixes that get no attention---updates pushed out with what seems like little quality control---I'm slowly learning Unreal Engine 4. I know it's C++ but it can't be that difficult to convert code from C# to C++ is it?

It uses nodes as well.

The Unreal Engine marketplace has a need for something like the ORK Framework.

Also---for people that have been using Unity and buying a perpetual license--they are phasing out the perpetual license. That is a real shaft to a lot of users. A real, real shaft.

I'm currently using Unity free. I was licensing it on a monthly basis before they made so many aspects of the licensed model free---but if I needed to license it for any reason---and if you're building for mobile, it's tough not to use a licensed version and get a game to work smoothly on mobile---they just doubled the cost of the licensed model and if you build for ios or android you have to license both the pc and the ios or android platform--so we're talking about a major, major increase in pricing.

Someone in the Unity forum suggested they're trying to monetize their base---I've been with Unity a long time and they seem to do what they need to do to generate the revenue they want. Sometimes their new plans seem to hurt their licensees. That seems to be the current case.

I'm going to learn Unreal slowly hoping maybe things will improve with Unity.

There is a really strong marketplace and forum for Unreal -- a lot of Unity vendors sell there---but nothing like the ORK Framework for making a game right now. There's a gap for an engine that can make a good game in my humble opinion.

Yet I will continue to learn the Unreal engine by bits and pieces now and hope that more Unity vendors will move over.

I have a book. : ) I have some assets. It has a lot of wonderful free assets. Most of my Unity fbx files will work in the Unreal engine. : )

But no ORK. : (

I know a lot of people use the Unity free--but if for any reason you need to license Unity and more importantly if you had a perpetual license that is being phased out---the new licensing plan in my humble opinion really stinks.

I wanted to post what robahouston posted a few weeks ago but held off.

Catacomber

I'm hoping ORK will branch out. : ) Unreal 4 has an rpg editor but I haven't bought it and it is really nothing like ORK--it doesn't even use spells as far as I can see. Just hoping someday for ORK on the Unreal platform.

@robahouston------If Manufaktura 4K, Protofactor, Mr. Necturus and countless others are selling assets on the Unreal 4 Marketplace, I don't see why this is not an option for ORK for the future. It might take some time, but I don't see why it wouldn't be an option. I'm not ready to say, "it's been a lot of fun."

I made two games with ORK and Unity---I can't walk away just like that. But I am hoping gil will look at the Unreal marketplace and see if it would work for him.

gameintern

@Catacomber My apologies, I was being funny!

I really don't mind either way. Ork on UDK would be cool. I see a lot of tools that I use in Unity that UDK could benefit from. That goes for some tools UDK has that Unity could benefit from.

I have seen some great projects come from using ORK.
I am a huge supporter of ORK and hope that more people learn how they can create a turn based game in a 3D Game Editor. For me this has been a life changer! Thanks Gil!

robahouston

I am only a little disappointed in the new pay model they're using. If you buy pro you only get it for that year forcing you to buy pro again every year for the full price.

Branching ORK to unreal just seems like it would be a great idea because it expands gils market and unreal has need of something like this in its marketplace.

I am not going to abandon Unity, I have invested entirely to much time and effort into the engine (money too!), but I am looking at other engines now that don't make me use the splash screen and hide an editor skin behind the highest pay option. It's all a little silly and frankly when you're using this software for professional stuff no one likes looking at the splash screen of the personal edition. It comes off as unprofessional and most consumers will mind. Do I mind, yeah!

I recently got the Yooka-Laylee toybox demo on steam and they used the personal edition. As soon as I saw it I thought 2 things, incomplete and unprofessional. That is an issue for me in the future.

Lastly, Unreal is really unparalleled when it comes to making high end AAA games. There is a pedigree there that is deserved, and while Unity is amazing for a lot of things I think they're going to lose some momentum by changing their pay structure to something so ridiculous, the worst part being that they're not even clear in that structure. It shouldn't take paragraphs to clear up how someone pays for and owns (rents really) your software.

Rant complete.

Having said all that, Unity is still a great option and because of their new pay structure I am looking more closely at other engines. Due to me having clients that want to use Unreal for their release platform, I am curious if GiL would ever make something like ORK in Unreal? I still haven't gotten that answer yet. I am also going to follow this discussion so I can answer faster.

Thanks to everyone who responded. Your comments were informative useful. Constructive criticism is the best criticism.

Shadow_Fire

Long ago Gil said something quick about that topic. His response is at the bottom.

http://forum.makinom.com/discussion/1108/get-well-soon-gil/p3

robahouston

Leave a Comment

Shadow_Fire said: Long ago Gil said something quick about that topic. His response is at the bottom.

Thanks for this! I remembered it vaguely but couldn't find it. He didn't say he wouldn't and he didn't say he would. Hoping there will be a definite yes/no.

Keldryn

I'm guessing that his stance hasn't changed. Not only would it be a huge investment of time to rewrite it in C++, it also means that he would now have to maintain two separate versions, which also has to factor into his "is this worth my time" calculations. Maintenance costs will often overshadow initial development costs given enough time.

Also, C++ is a gigantic pain in the ass. As a professional software engineer with 16+ years of experience, I can't fathom why anybody would choose to write code in C++ over C# if they don't have to. I'm not necessarily talking about large AAA teams where people have distinct areas of specialty. For an indie dev, productivity outweighs small performance gains pretty much any time.

Catacomber

I'm so far pretty happy with Unity 5.4.0.

I don't think the Personal Edition splash screen equates to unprofessional.

I have some games on my iPad that are made with it that got very good reviews.

And if you have a game you believe in and you really are ashamed of the PE splash screen you can do a Kickstarter or otherwise crowd fund to afford to remove it.

One thing I don't like about Unreal is that their assets in the asset store seem higher priced and you have to swear you won't use them on any other platform but Unreal while you can freely use Unity assets in Unreal.

I've been with Unity for awhile now and it's a lot like a marriage--you're in it for better or worse --sometimes it's better and sometimes it's worse. Sometimes you want a divorce but then you make up.

I really like 5.4.0. :)

gamingislove

Well, it's still neither a yes or a no from my side. Naturally I'd be interested in expending my market to other engines if it's viable.

Once ORK 2.8.0 (grid battles) is done, I'll take Unreal for a test drive :D

Raiulyn

It would be interesting to see when GiL do take a shot at Unreal. There isn't a noteworthy RPG kit for Unreal like how ORK is to Unity.

Personally, I tried and it didn't end well. I don't know why but I can't 'get' into it no matter how many hours I mess with it. Trying to get into C++ from C# is scary and confusing to say the least. Like other programmers have said, C# is the simpler and more accessible brother of C++. Unreal's Blueprints do ease the pain but performance wise, it's better to code by hand (From what I've read anyway).

Catacomber said: I know it's C++ but it can't be that difficult to convert code from C# to C++ is it?

The best way I can explain is this: Converting code from C# to C++ is like trying to communicate with a foreigner in broken Engrish(Not a typo but an actual term). Or Simplified to Traditional for those who understands Chinese.

robahouston said: It's all a little silly and frankly when you're using this software for professional stuff no one likes looking at the splash screen of the personal edition. It comes off as unprofessional and most consumers will mind

Rather than the splash screen, I think it was because of the bad reputation from the games Steam Greenlight cranked out. It's often I see the so-called 'Asset flip' turned game and/or 'Simulator' slapped onto the name of a game then the Unity logo comes up. Because of that, people most often associate Unity with bad games like that.

robahouston said: I recently got the Yooka-Laylee toybox demo on steam and they used the personal edition. As soon as I saw it I thought 2 things, incomplete and unprofessional. That is an issue for me in the future.

It's doing better than Mighty No 9, for starters.

robahouston said: Lastly, Unreal is really unparalleled when it comes to making high end AAA games. There is a pedigree there that is deserved

Unreal has its own fair share of bad games, mind you. Look no further than a game called 'A NEW RECKONING' on Steam.

Lastly, It doesn't have to be Unreal though. There are other options to expand to like Godot Engine. An open source engine that can go head to head with GameMaker and maybe Unity in the future.

What I'm trying to say is: Yes, the splash screen is horrible to look at but blaming it and its engine for making your game look unprofessional and incomplete is dumb. It's how you use it that matters.

robahouston said: It shouldn't take paragraphs to clear up how someone pays for and owns (rents really) your software.

That's kinda how all digital stores(Steam, NetFlix, etc) operate, mate. Digital products don't get owned, rather rented for a lifetime as long as you have your login/password. That's including if the services are still alive to last a lifetime.

Keldryn

@Catacomber said: I know it's C++ but it can't be that difficult to convert code from C# to C++ is it?

The biggest issue is likely to be memory management. Pure C++ requires you to allocate memory when you need it and then free it up when you're done -- which is extraordinarily painful after working with managed code like C#. In managed code, the Garbage Collection takes care of deleting objects from memory when they are no longer being referenced.

UE4 does have its own Garbage Collection (implemented using Reflection), so as long as all of your classes derive from their base UObject class, you can let GC take care of freeing up any memory that you've used. If you use anything that doesn't inherit from UObject, then you have to manage your memory usage for those classes manually.

I don't have a huge amount of experience with UE4, but it sounds as though it works a lot like .NET managed C++, although it would still be compiling to native code and not the Intermediate Language (IL) that the .NET languages compile to. Garbage Collection can be a pretty significant performance hit, so you're going to lose some of the performance benefits of using C++.

Still don't miss coding in C++. :-) That's honestly a hugely significant reason that I don't want to switch from Unity to Unreal. The .NET languages (C# in particular) were designed for developer productivity first and foremost, and (at least to my way of thinking) that is the most critical factor for small indie teams (and individuals of course). If, like many on here and the Unity forums, you are wearing the programmer hat, the designer hat, and the project manager hat then anything that helps you actually get the job done is going to take precedence.

@robahouston said: Lastly, Unreal is really unparalleled when it comes to making high end AAA games. There is a pedigree there that is deserved

I absolutely agree with this. However, to put it bluntly, nobody is going to use ORK to build a high end AAA game. Nobody is really even going to use Unity to make a high end AAA game. Unity's greatest advantage is that it was designed with developer productivity being of prime importance. I'm well aware that I could make a more impressive looking game using Unreal -- but I would never actually finish it. Unity and the Unity Asset Store open up a lot of doors that were previously closed to most of us.

If an ORK for Unreal Engine were put to a vote (which I realize it would not be; that's GiL's decision alone), I would vote against it simply because it would come at the cost of reduced support and longer development cycles for the Unity version. ORK would greatly benefit from a new database structure that allows multiple developers to import, export, and merge changes, for example. This is a massively breaking change and would only come to pass in a hypothetical ORK 3.0. No matter how you slice it, a parallel Unreal version would push this hypothetical ORK.next much further into the future.

(Rant over) ;-)

Catacomber

Apart from our individual desires about ORK on Unreal, I think it's really as we all know a question of whether it would be good for ORK to be on Unreal.

There's nothing like it there now.

It wouldn't have to be ORK as we know it to be marketable. It could be a lighter version even and still be better than what's out there now.

I don't think we would have to worry about reduced support for ORK Unity-- Gil works himself to death.

Ultimately it's his decision. And what's good for him.

robahouston

If the cost is too high he could always change ORK to a subscription model. Heh, but seriously please don't do that GiL.

Seriously though, the unreal community is really great and GiL could probably find someone to handle the Unreal side. It isn't unusual for a business to require personnel for specific tasks like platform conversion to sustain brand growth. Not to mention GiL could pay that person a percentage of sales rather than a salary. Also, the Unreal store is a place for expensive (premium) assets and something like ORK would be a premium and GiL could reasonably charge 150-200 per seat. Minimum.

Either way there are options that leave GiL able to sustain the original market, us and Unity specifically. The future is exciting and the current unty subscription model is freaking awful.