What is the FlowGraph editor for?

[Yue]

Looking at and knowing more deeply Leadwerks, my concern is what is the purpose of this tool?

[Monkey Frog Studio]

Take a look at the Doors tutorial in the Leadwerks documentation here:

https://www.leadwerks.com/learn?page=Tutorials_Games_First-Person-Shooter_Doors

Scroll down to the sliding door script section and it will show you how to use the Flow Graph.

[mdgunn]

It allows you to link together function calls into or out of entity scripts in one to many or many to one relationships most often between unrelated objects which have no knowledge of the other object.  E.g. a generic switch and a door.  You can also pass values though this is not well documented and technically unofficial (so subject to possible removal).  If you change an script I think it can break the flowgraph link and you have to link them back up, so works best on stable objects that may have been authored to have these open interfaces e.g. workshop items. 

My feeling is that a good few users find them to eventually be limiting and find other ways of doing a similar things.  E.g. objects gaining references to other objects (e.g. via collisions) and testing objects via existience of expected functions or properties in the scripts. 

In some respects (I think?) they are a bit like a super simple Unreal engine blueprint graph though I think they probably lack the depth and robustness.

These are just my own vague opinions.

 

 

 

 

 

[Monkey Frog Studio]

I'm a non-programmer who has to learn (am an artist by trade). I do like the idea of the Flow Graph in general. It should make some tasks simpler (like the door/trigger example in the docs and the door/switch example you bring up). It allows for generic, re-usable scripts, which is nice and, with proper planning, could be a real time saver.

[mdgunn]

5 minutes ago, Argent Arts said:

I'm a non-programmer who has to learn (am an artist by trade). I do like the idea of the Flow Graph in general. It should make some tasks simpler (like the door/trigger example in the docs and the door/switch example you bring up). It allows for generic, re-usable scripts, which is nice and, with proper planning, could be a real time saver.

Could be good for this situation yes.  The flowgraph lack some simple features that would help you keep a good view of what is going on, lacking ability to add user notes or groups that you could collapse to hide complexity, but for small projects it could be a good way to hook things up in a UI and keep you out of the code for some of the time.

 

[Yue]

What do you mean it's not official? I don't understand, that's not supported?

[Monkey Frog Studio]

I've not the knowledge (yet) to really talk about the Flow Graph, but I like the idea. I like the idea of reusable code and of "generic" code that serves a simple purpose that can be used over and over and linked up (via the Flow Graph) as needed. Code the door opening code once and use it for every single door you have. Make the LUA code so you can access variables in the Scene Editor so you can adjust the code (like the door opening upward, downward, left, right, or swinging open). So, with this way of working, you code once and use over and over again, using the Flow Graph to link up triggers, switches, pressure plates, etc., without creating new code. This could work for most things in a game, me thinks. I'll be able to speak more intelligently about it when I've actually been using both LUA and the Flow Chart. I plan to dive a bit into it this weekend.