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Another big new release of the Unity game engine has today been released with 2019.3, full to the brim with massive tech enhancements.
On the Linux side, which we're most interested in, is finally the inclusion of IL2CPP support (a Unity-developed scripting backend) on Linux builds of games and applications. Linux missing this caused issues for a few developers, so hopefully now publishing Linux builds with Unity might be better. Unity say that IL2CPP can increase the "performance, security, and platform compatibility" of Unity projects. OpenGL and Vulkan especially saw plenty of bug fixes too.
Sadly, this was supposed to be the big release that also made the Linux Editor properly official and supported, which was delayed previously however they still "expect it to be fully supported in 2020". Seeing that will be a nice boost, knowing that Unity game development on Linux will actually be welcomed. Aside from that, sounds like a pretty amazing advancement of this extremely popular game engine.
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The Unity team also made a brand new short-file to show off some of the advanced rendering features now available with 2019.3. You can watch The Heretic on YouTube.
One of the interesting additions is proper Google Stadia support. While it's Debian Linux in the cloud, it still requires a few special bits done and Unity supports the Stadia special features like State Share and Stream Connect on top of YouTube and Google Assistant integration.
While 2019.3 sounds fancy, it's a "TECH stream release" with all the latest bells and whistles so the Unity team recommend waiting for 2019.4 which will be a LTS (Long-Term Support) release which will arrive this Spring if you're wanting to update a live project. Otherwise, jump on in for the latest goodies.
We also went over changes to their XR (Virtual Reality, Augmented Reality etc) in our previous article as Unity will be dropping support for built-in XR, instead going with a plugin system. Valve will develop their own OpenVR Unity plugin for SteamVR.
See the official blog post here and feature highlights here. For an actual changelog, that's here.
Article taken from GamingOnLinux.com.
Last edited by Shmerl on 28 January 2020 at 3:26 pm UTC
Marc Di Luzio 28 January 2020 at 3:54 pm UTC
ShmerlDid new Unity finally start using Vulkan on Linux by default? For some reason VtM: Coteries of New York is using OpenGL, but adding -force-vulkan starts it with Vulkan renderer.
It's still OpenGL by default unless the game developer specifies.
Marc Di LuzioIt's still OpenGL by default unless the game developer specifies.
They still haven't stabilized the Vulkan path?
tuxintuxedo 28 January 2020 at 7:26 pm UTC
ShmerlI believe that's not the important part. Vulkan is not an all-purpose API, many developers simply don't need it when they can choose OpenGL, even on Linux. So I don't see why it would become default.Marc Di LuzioIt's still OpenGL by default unless the game developer specifies.
They still haven't stabilized the Vulkan path?
Is DirectX 12 also the default for Windows users?
Last edited by Shmerl on 28 January 2020 at 7:32 pm UTC
It's not really an indication of stability of the Vulkan paths within Unity if properly used, but reflects more the expectations and experience of people using it. Prime example: if something is a bit off with OpenGL, then defaults will likely kick in and keep the program running. Vulkan might flat out segfault instead, or possibly lock up the GPU.
So the safest default from a risk vs reward standpoint is probably still OpenGL. For now.
mirvSo the safest default from a risk vs reward standpoint is probably still OpenGL. For now.
That's not necessarily what the end user might want (possibly safest), if it costs performance. At the very least, actual game developers should then expose in the settings what API to use, and default to OpenGL if they think Vulkan is still more risky.
Last edited by Shmerl on 28 January 2020 at 8:23 pm UTC
ShmerlmirvSo the safest default from a risk vs reward standpoint is probably still OpenGL. For now.
That's not necessarily what the end user might want (possibly safest), if it costs performance. At the very least, actual game developers should then expose in the settings what API to use, and default to OpenGL if they think Vulkan is still more risky.
I think you assume a little too much technical know-how and QA on the part of Generic Developer. Sure though, they could change and add options, but it doesn't change Unity finding that giving a "please don't lock up the PC" default is probably safer. After all, a crashed program (which can happen more readily if Vulkan isn't used correctly, and it's still early enough for that to regularly happen during development) gives the worst performance.
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