Ease of Development for Construct 3

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bellborn

  • Vote for Construct 3 Ease of Development

    No doubt, a lot has improved since C2. Just as it was too much work to find object references in C2 which is now possible with one click in C3. A lot of basic functionalities has been added in C3 over last year. Thanks Scirra Team for all that.

    But still there are situations where it feels like wasting more time than required to achieve a simple result. This not only impacts developer's efficiency, but impacts the flow of creativity. As Construct is preferred more by creators due of its simplistic coding, it is important for it to be simple enough to paint the vision.

    There is a platform to suggest and prioritize ideas for C3 https://construct3-21h2.ideas.aha.io/ideas. There are several ease of develpoment ideas here, whic can make C3 a lot effective and easier to handle, but many of them has been neglected so far due to low votes. Here is a list of such ideas collected from the platform with their links (Feedbacks and new ideas are most welcomed). If you relate to them, then please vote for them, instead of voting for new complex features. Remember that new features are exciting, but you can only utilize them, when you are not struggling with the basic game development. These ideas can benefit the majority of developers. Cheers!

    Cleanliness

    Organizable Project Item Tabs | Layouts, E.S, Objects, Families, Variables, Music etc.

    Hard to navigate through project bar list for a large game. Can be solved by simple tabs like Layouts, Event Sheets, Objects, Families, Plugins, Variables, Music, Files etc...https://construct3-21h2.ideas.aha.io/ideas/C321H2-I-358

    L Shape Debugger

    Debugger divides the screen horizontally in half which wastes screen area on sides and require a lot of scrolling to see things, which does not work well...https://construct3-21h2.ideas.aha.io/ideas/C321H2-I-364

    Merge the same behavior

    More than one of the same behaviors(Timer, Tween...), it creates long list in the actions popup. Merging them. Adding an option to choose which behavior...https://construct3-21h2.ideas.aha.io/ideas/C321H2-I-207

    Drop down file selection menu for arrays and dictionaries | Just like functions are no longer a plugin, arrays and dictionaries should not be plugins either. They should be standard data types that can easily be stored in variables, send in functions, etc...https://construct3-21h2.ideas.aha.io/ideas/C321H2-I-291

    Hierarchy View

    Allow to create hierarchy relationship directly by drag and dropping objects under/on top of each other in this dedicated view. On top of a lot of new QOL stuff it would allow, to efficiently find and select instances of the current Layout...https://construct3-21h2.ideas.aha.io/ideas/C321H2-I-311

    Auto collapse hidden layers in Z Order bar

    Layers in the z-order bar automatically collapsed if the layer is a) hidden, b) locked, or c) faded out by the "Show translucent inactive layers" option...https://construct3-21h2.ideas.aha.io/ideas/C321H2-I-356

    Accessibility

    Search with Keywords

    Current search for event editor is not able to find events accurately. It's very limited as it requires an exact string match, making it almost impossible to find what you want most of the time... https://construct3-21h2.ideas.aha.io/ideas/C321H2-I-253

    Find All References from Event or Instance

    Option of find all reference to an object by right click on an event using it or from an instance on layout. Similar should be for a signal / function / group / variable used in an event...https://construct3-21h2.ideas.aha.io/ideas/C321H2-I-362

    Find On Layout | On Selected Layer

    On find, we get instances on a layout. When clicked, they all get selected. Selecting only the objects on current layer... https://construct3-21h2.ideas.aha.io/ideas/C321H2-I-352

    Go To | Signal / Variable / Event Group / Layout / Object Mentioned in Event

    Currently you right click on a function event and there is option to "go to function". This option is missing for Signals, Variables, Event Groups, Layouts or an Object mentioned in an event...https://construct3-21h2.ideas.aha.io/ideas/C321H2-I-361

    Global Variables In Project Tab Folder (Just like objects, layouts, event sheets)

    Global Variables on event sheet cannot be put in a group to collapse. Should be in the Project Tab, to be more accessible and Folder, subfolders are better organized ... https://construct3-21h2.ideas.aha.io/ideas/C321H2-I-357

    Variable Folders + directly add/edit Variables from Property View

    Instance Variable workflow is really tedious when number of variables is large or when we want to edit Family variables of a selected Object Kind...https://construct3-21h2.ideas.aha.io/ideas/C321H2-I-348

    Missing Pieces

    Editor Zooming Input

    A manual zoom input or when changing the zoom with the mouse and Ctrl...https://construct3-21h2.ideas.aha.io/ideas/C321H2-I-338

    Track Undo/Redo

    Undo/redo is difficult to track where it affects. Clickable link/button maybe in notifications to move to the sheet/layout change...https://construct3-21h2.ideas.aha.io/ideas/C321H2-I-229

    Copy/Paste Event With Everything Linked to it

    Copy events and paste in other project, there is always a missing plugin or variable or something linked to it. Pasting events with all functions/plugins/objects/ variables it requires...https://construct3-21h2.ideas.aha.io/ideas/C321H2-I-365

    Debugger Stats for All Plugins / Behaviors / Effects Used

    Many statistics are not available in it like tween, effects, plugins. This leaves developer with trial and error method which is unnecessarily time consuming...https://construct3-21h2.ideas.aha.io/ideas/C321H2-I-363

    Cancel Build | Multiple Builds

    No way of stopping the build mid-way. Have to wait until the build completes before starting new. A simple cancelling option, or having multiple builds...https://construct3-21h2.ideas.aha.io/ideas/C321H2-I-354

    Delete Saved Game

    While testing, you need to test fresh game sometimes. Currently there is no way of deleting the saved game. Adding it in debugger could ease testing...https://construct3-21h2.ideas.aha.io/ideas/C321H2-I-353

    Reset instance variables

    Add 'Reset instance variables' action to reset the initial state of an instance. A dropdown option, initial or template. If the object already has a template, restore the variable back to the template object... https://construct3-21h2.ideas.aha.io/ideas/C321H2-I-340

    Toggle option to system layers action

    No need to write: if True :Set False else Set True. ‘toggle’ option should be support system layers action...https://construct3-21h2.ideas.aha.io/ideas/C321H2-I-284

    Children should be able to inherit Opacity from the parent.

    Every time opacity changes in a parent, one must find its children and only then apply the same opacity to every member...https://construct3-21h2.ideas.aha.io/ideas/C321H2-I-125

    Shortcut to Move in Z Axis

    It would be very useful if you have a shortcut to move on the z axis. Example: I hold z and drag the sprite and it changes the z value...https://construct3-21h2.ideas.aha.io/ideas/C321H2-I-232

    ***Add "Is Effect Enabled" condition |***Added In r299|

    Now that we have a universal Enabled checkbox for all effects (thanks for adding it!), Adding "Is Effect Enabled" condition to all objects...https://construct3-21h2.ideas.aha.io/ideas/C321H2-I-349

    Additional Features

    Group of Diverse Objects | Family of Different Object Types

    Families are created of similar object types. If different set of objects need a common plugin or common event. Groups of diverse objects...https://construct3-21h2.ideas.aha.io/ideas/C321H2-I-360

    3D Camera Viewport

    An additional and optional viewport window, that gives us full 3D camera controls. So not within the editor viewport!... https://construct3-21h2.ideas.aha.io/ideas/C321H2-I-366

    Multiplayer: Sync Interest Management

    While the multiplayer "sync" actions, allow for easy multiplayer setups, the lack of interest management makes it a NO-GO for almost any project...https://construct3-21h2.ideas.aha.io/ideas/C321H2-I-328

    Family Inheritance

    Instead of implementing actual inheritance, it could just supports perfect syncing of Members between a Parent Family and its Child Family...https://construct3-21h2.ideas.aha.io/ideas/C321H2-I-347

    Hierarchy | Child Anchored to Parent

    Anchor Position/Size of Child Objects to their Parent would allow to create complex auto-layout UI, supporting all aspect ratio and so on... https://construct3-21h2.ideas.aha.io/ideas/C321H2-I-314

    Quality of Life suggestion list (QOL and features)

    A List of QOL things I wish Construct would have in my daily use of this Engine.(They need to be added separately in order to be considered by C3 Team)...https://construct3-21h2.ideas.aha.io/ideas/C321H2-I-318

    Please feel free to suggest more ideas. If you see any of the above as essential, please vote for them by following their link.

    Thank you.

  • The suggestions platform has lots of great ideas, but i don't think highlighting them here on the forums will change the outcome that most of these suggestions will ultimately get, not just from the devs, but also simply because the platform just doesnt work.

    Besides Scirra's attention seems to be elsewhere at the moment.

  • Accepting or rejecting is team's decision, Voting is all we can do. I don't think they had created the platform in the first place if they did not wanted our ideas. Yes i have seen comments ruling out ideas before and yes some of those rulings could be faulty. Yes, there focus is on animate right now. But its not like they don't add ease of development features already, i just saw "Debug Search Box" added in r294, and it was a suggestion on the platform. Its just not on their first priority.

    The bottom line is that there is a platform to help scirra understand our needs in a prioritized manner, so i see hope in that, provided there are enough votes to send the message. If you like any of these ideas to be added, i suggest simply vote for it and see what happens instead of losing hope.

  • I do agree with posting on the forum, but I think having a wall of text with many suggestions isn't the best idea. I forget how the suggestions platform works, but I don't think I could even leave a vote on all suggestions posted here!

    I think things like "on collision exit" could be excluded, as these can be done with events already.

    2D camera seems like a huge idea for not much outcome, like merging existing things into a plugin sounds like a recipe for disaster.

    Merge same behaviour if 2 behaviours exist - It's a good QoL idea, but again worked around by naming your behaviours (e.g. If you had sprite that's in family, and has 2 tween behaviours, call one Tween_Sprtie and the other behaviour Tween_Family).

    I do agree with some things that cannot be overcome or help with huge projects, like cancelling a build, track undo redo, organisational tabs. I'll login and vote soon!

    I plan to do a forum post on some things I would love to see in the event sheet view, things that slow me down when working on a huge project which I cannot find workarounds for (maybe others might offer workarounds I never thought of when I post).

  • I don't think I could even leave a vote on all suggestions posted here!

    You don't need to leave a vote for every suggestion, just the ones you want on scirra's priority list.

    To be clear again, some of these ideas may not be a feature addition but a change in the editor, to considerably reduce development time. Some could be request for a shortcut to time consuming workarounds. For example : You can also custom search for finding a function by its name, but "go to function" simply takes you to it, it makes sense and ease the development which otherwise would have been a bit frustrating.

    Having a wall is the only option here, it is a tally of all such links. It could be updated if more suggestions come or if older ones get build. Please make sure to post your ideas here if you like to see them in this list.

    Removed the ideas as per suggestion. But merging camera and scroll to plugins idea does not necessarily require merging them, one could be updated with other's features and the other can be depreciated.

  • Just a couple of points.

    The Suggestion platform is still 21H2. The fact they didn't even update it to 22H1, and we are now in 22H2 should tell you something about what they think of the suggestion platform.

    There seems little correlation between vote count and the ideas Scirra has implemented in the past.

    > I don't think I could even leave a vote on all suggestions posted here!

    You don't need to leave a vote for every suggestion, just the ones you want on scirra's priority list.

    People already have, and have run out of votes.

    Perhaps if Scirra reviewed more suggestions and closed those that won't be implemented (or reset the platform as they said they would), they could give those votes back to people so they can use them else where.

  • The Suggestion platform is still 21H2. The fact they didn't even update it to 22H1, and we are now in 22H2 should tell you something about what they think of the suggestion platform.

    This does raise alarm bells about the suggestion platform. We haven't had a 22H1 but we are now in 22H2. Half a year missed.

    I know Scirra looks at it, but should I post my suggestions now, knowing I might have to add them again if it gets updated? Who knows...

  • little correlation between vote count and the ideas Scirra has implemented in the past.

    should I post my suggestions now knowing I might have to add them again if it gets updated?

    I am hoping Ashley and scirra team would clarify on that.

    For now, i am assuming that old platform is still the place for posting new ideas, so i have added some more suggestions i deem very essential for editor and debugger. (Added to bottom of the list in post). Let me know what you think about them.

  • the platform is still used by Scirra, just last week we got slide along solids for 8-directon which was a highly voted feature on the platform. Shortly before that we got a first implementation of templates which is the highest voted request on the platform and still in further development. (smaller request like enable/disable editor toggles for effects have been added as well)

    So The platform is definitly still actively used.

    But I agree, it's weird that we haven't got a 22h1 or 22h2 platform yet.

    Currently the platform is a bit bloated with multiple similar suggenstion, things that are out of date or features that already exist.

  • We do regularly look at the suggestions platform. The main problem is the community submits far, far more ideas than we could possibly implement. It's just totally impossible to imagine that we could do even a significant fraction of the submitted ideas. Unfortunately this is sometimes interpreted as "Scirra ignores suggestions", and adding yet more ideas to the list makes the problem worse. I don't really know what we can do about that - I've tried hard to explain clearly how it's used and what to expect in the suggestion guidelines, including emphasising that it's best to focus on a small number of realistic suggestions, rather than a large number of all-encompassing ideas. I'm reluctant to shut it down though, as it is a source of genuinely good ideas.

    As noted in the guidelines the original plan was to completely reset it every 6 months to keep it manageable, fresh and relevant. However I think 6 months is too short. I'm leaning towards annually resetting it, which is around about now. Unfortunately two more problems are that I wanted to keep old suggestions archived, but they just get completely clogged up with really awful spam, which forced me to remove public access from the old platform, which limits people's ability to refer back to old suggestions. Secondly I'm also wondering if it would be better to do the reset in say January and align it to calendar years.

    Anyway, managing the impossibly huge mountain of ideas everyone comes up with is quite a difficult problem. I should emphasise many of the ideas are great and I'd do many of them if it were possible. Unfortunately we are bounded by the laws of physics. I'm still not certain how to manage it. Posting forum threads like this don't mean we have any extra time, so won't really change anything, other than perhaps collecting a few more votes for the ideas you advocate for, but remember everyone has limited votes - as a measure to try to avoid everyone voting for an impossible volume of work.

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  • Seems like discussing the ideas here before submitting the request works pretty well.

    Especially since individually we may not know what's feasible let alone doable.

    Its also better for refining the idea itself.

  • Yeah, discussing ideas collaboratively in the forum to refine them and make sure they are robustly justified is definitely a good idea before submitting a suggestion, and I'd encourage that.

  • Why not use the forum to facilitate ideation rather than Aha? The forums already have a voting on posts system, post tags, subforums to segregate completed, accepted, and submitted ideas - it's tied to an account that all paying users already have and easily naviagable

    Plus it's indexed by Google and will increase dwell time...

  • The forum is still missing lots of features like limiting voting, sorting the suggestion lists various ways, managing the status and official responses, and so on. I spent quite a while looking for a suitable service and that was the only one that did most of what we needed when I last looked, but that was a few years ago, so perhaps some other service has turned up?

  • The suggestion platform mostly works. Voting has issues though. There's too few votes to dole out, or suggestions that are socially engineered with too many.

    Maybe add a section to the forum called suggestion discussions.

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