Hi there,

I am following Esenthel for several years now and also used it for some smaller private projects (both 1.0 and 2.0).

The editor of 2.0 is much better than the 1.0 editor and 2.0 also has some pretty nice features. However, some really essential features that were implemented in 1.0 are still missing in 2.0, even 1 year after release!

The most important features for me are:

• Undo in World Editor: How are we supposed to create bigger worlds without undo support? This makes world editing extremely hard...
• Generating Billboards: Some games are using many, many trees. And therefore billboard generation inside the editor is needed.
• Cloth Support: How are we supposed to create dynamic and cool looking cloaks?
  

Thats why me and my team currently cannot use 2.0 for our next project, we have one huge world, that needs lots of editing, and without undo support that would be a nightmare.
Also, we have lots of trees and foliage we need to create billboards for, so sadly 2.0 isn't really an option for us :(

These are all features I used to know from 1.0, so while 2.0 has nice new features, it is also missing some very important stuff...
Am I the only one who thinks these features are essential? How do you guys edit your worlds without undo support? How do you create billboards? Do you still use 1.0 to generate billboards? Do you have custom tools?

// Edit: Sorry, just noticed that there already is a quite similiar thread -.-

None of these missing features would even remotely stop me from using 2.0.

- undo support, yeah it's annoying, have to be careful and think more, but in practice I found out that I can manage. (still, I hope it gets added soon)

- billboards: use 1.0, create your own tool, use a 3D app. (though it was a nice feature with the preview and all)

- cloth: create it dynamically with code, use 1.0, make your own tool.

I was able to move past these & other issues pretty easily as EE is very flexible, and should be even more now with the programmable editor interface update.

The undo support: Definitely needed.

The billboards: Honestly, except for "convenient" I don't see the point. It's the same as with the animation editor: You want to use a specialized 3D modelling program for this. Esenthel could generate it for you, but you don't have as much control over the final outcome.

(10-06-2013 08:05 PM)Tottel Wrote:  The billboards: Honestly, except for "convenient" I don't see the point. It's the same as with the animation editor: You want to use a specialized 3D modelling program for this. Esenthel could generate it for you, but you don't have as much control over the final outcome.

Exactly, it was so easy to generate nice billboards, and that's why I'd miss this feature. I don't need more control over the final outcome, because it`s just fine the way it was....

(10-06-2013 07:53 PM)para Wrote:  - cloth: create it dynamically with code, use 1.0, make your own tool.

Yeah, you are right, I forgot that you could also generate it in code (much better solution for our purpose anyway )

(10-06-2013 07:53 PM)para Wrote:  I was able to move past these & other issues pretty easily as EE is very flexible, and should be even more now with the programmable editor interface update.

Yep, EE 2.0 has some awesome improvements, that`s why I bought it in the first place. But for me the missing Undo feature is a killer argument, it is extremely annoying while creating complex worlds for your final game product...

The other thing is, we are quite a big team (at the moment 6 indie devs) and therefore the license model of 1.0 is much cheaper for us. We simply cannot afford to invest another 1,000$ just for licensing this engine. Maybe later we`ll switch to 2.0 and hopefully some of the missing 1.0 features are implemented then

Thanks for the opinion! I appreciate your thoughts
All of the features that you've listed are on the roadmap, and will be developed.

As I have never used version 1.0 I don't want to get too involved in this debate as I clearly don't have sufficient insight. That said, I feel I can comment on your first point:

Quote:#1: I have a hard time discarding the use of Visual Studio.

I started off using the Esenthel code editor and Esenthel Script when starting my project in version 2.0. There are a lot of things I really like about it including the scripting language (which I wouldn't really class as a scripting language but more of a shorthand for C++). However, as I got deeper into my code I started to notice a few issues arising with using the code editor which didn't quite allow me the freedom I am used to coding directly in VS. Grzegorz did offer some support (changing compiler options was one issue) but I found other issues that resulted in me feeling I'd be a lot happier coding directly in Visual Studio and C++.

So I changed. I have re-written parts of my code since making the move but certainly not all. I am still able to make use of the Esenthel features where I want to and have, to be honest, experienced little issue with making the move. All game object based data tends to get passed as object params from the Editor but where I needed access to UIDs for instance outside of normal game objects (in order to instantiate new game objects for example) I simply created a configurationObject and create instances of those to pass data to my program utilizing the parameter passing functionality of game::obj and control access via a configurationManager. That's proved really useful for other configuration items and allows me to set these up completely within the World Editor. Even manual insertion of UIDs is still easy as you can copy and paste these directly from the Editor.

All in all I'm very happy I made the move. I appreciate your project is going to be many times the size and complexity of mine, as mine is still in its infancy, and the time taken to undertake a move like this has to be taken into consideration, but essentially I see no reason why you can't use Visual Studio to code your version 2.0 project directly. I do also appreciate that there are other factors involved some of which you have outlined that act to build a bigger picture and contribute to you being wary of making the move. If I had a mature project based on version 1.0 I think I'd be wary too!

Hi,

The file names will not be stored as human readable format, never.
It is because they are stored internally as UID's, so they can get renamed in the editor, moved into different folders, without breaking things, and also it allows for real-time collaboration done easily.
The file names of the files is simply the UID of the element in text based format.

Quote:#1: I have a hard time discarding the use of Visual Studio.

There is absolutely nothing stopping you from using Visual Studio for coding of the 2.0 projects.
I have already said in other thread, you can use Ctrl+MMB to get the element UID, and then Ctrl+V it in Visual Studio.
I have even offered auto adding of a comment with the resource file name, but no one was interested.

Quote:#3: My project has dozens of text files (config files) that point to asset files under the data folder

You can make a tool that converts the human files names to UID's with the new Network Editor Interface.

Quote:Also, some of the config files should not be encrypted so users can access them directly

No, the correct way would be to make a tool that users use to edit data.
Having users fiddle with text files is 'beginner' move (please note I'm not talking about your skills, but I am talking about approach of expecting users to edit text files), please imagine if instead of me creating Esenthel 1.0 and 2.0 editors, I would have told you instead "I'm not making an editor where you can create stuff visually, please just supply text based data for worlds, objects and all of your game".
Can you imagine dropping the editors, and create the game in Notepad?
The professional way is to make editors, where the users setup data visually.
Now with the Network Editor Interface, you can make such editors, because you can access the project elements, their names, ID's and types.
I am merely giving suggestions as how I would recommend doing addons/editors.

@aceio76,

#1 - See Pixel Perfects post above
#2 - Don't re-convert your 1.0 assets, just keep them external and load them from Str instead of UID
#3 - Same here, keep them external, no need to re-code anything, except maybe path corrections
#4 - if you do all of the above, you don't even need to use 2.0 editor, you can author in 1.0 and keep your addons, while getting the benefits of the 2.0 engine.

But judging from your posts, you seem to be pretty far along with your game and as you stated there's nothing stopping you from progressing further with 1.0, given all that, if I were in your shoes I wouldn't even bother, I'd just continue with 1.0 - unless there's something in 2.0 that's really worth the trouble and would make a big difference to your game, but I wouldn't know what that could be...

Hi!

Quote:Since I think I am "just" catching up with this, what is required for me to continue using my VS projects to access the 2.0 imported (and encrypted) files without converting into Code Editor? Are there VS project examples that show how to access the 2.0 assets?

I'm sure it was mentioned on the forum a few times, I did some search:

http://www.esenthel.com/community/showth...5#pid41145

http://www.esenthel.com/community/showth...8#pid42788

Basically just hit F8 on a simple application located in your project, which will export it to VS, then just move it outside the _build_ folder, and there you go.
Please browse the 2.0 tutorials, the most basic one for starting an application, you can copy it to your project, and use it as the base for VS exporting.