Hey guys,
I’m sure we’ve all faced this: A new project usually means different requirements, and therefore probably a different choice in assets. For example, I’ve spent hours on researching which of the available character controllers fits my needs. What if someone else already had done this for me and you, and put their findings somewhere, publicly available on the internet?
Imagine you are looking for a weather asset suited towards an FPS game. Most will instantly think about UniStorm, Tenkoku or SkyMaster. But what are the details? Which of them can be synchronized over the network, so that all players see the same sky and have the same weather? What if I wanted to have low hanging clouds the player could fly through - which of them could deliver that? And at the end of the day, which of them delivers the most of the requirements I have?
Imagine a blog with a more or less standardised format:
Introduction of Asset A
Introduction of Asset B
Evaluation Critera
Evaluation matrix
Result
The criteria would be different, but the “rating of fulfillment” (I didn’t think of a better name for that yet) would be the same across all comparisons:
++ (Feature is provided out of the box, or there is a tutorial or something equivalent offered by the author
- (The requirement is fulfilled partly ( >= 50%, whatever that might mean) by the asset
o (The asset provides the feature in a non-sufficient way or provides a basis to implement it by oneself AND there is at least some documentation by anybody on how to do it)
- (The asset provides or does not provide a basis for implementing the feature by oneself, or does provide it in a non-sufficient way and there is no starting point and no documentation about how to implement it)
– (The asset provides or does not provide a basis for implementing the feature by oneself, and there is no starting point and no documentation about it)
The evaluation matrix would be made of a table, the rows being the requirements and the columns being the evaluated assets. In the cells, there would be the rating and, if necessary, a short explanation, for example requirement X is rated with o, because there is a forum post by someone with details on how to do this (including the link to that post).
Of course there are “problems” with this format. It will be nearly impossible to include every possible requirement, and maybe there may only be a few requirements that are interesting for the reader. But maybe picking some requirements an imaginated game would have, and, if demand (maybe even at your request? :p) is high enough, re-evaluating some assets for different settings would be of value to some.
That idea got stuck in my head for quite a while now, and that’s why I’m now reaching out to you. What do you think about that idea? Would you want to read something like this, and would it at least partially help you in choosing the asset that is best suited for your needs?
Best regards,
Patrick
