Did you ever tried to import something as simple as text file (.txt) in Unreal Editor? Try it, I can wait.
This is ridiculous. If you, God forbid, want to work with JSON files and try to import one, Unreal will try to read it as something that you don’t know nor care about.
I want this JSON file as is, thankyouverymuch.
No, dear Unreal Editor, I don’t care you do not know what to do with that file. Or any file unknown to you for that matter. I do know what to do with it. All you have to do is to put file inside “as is” and make it’s content available for me in blueprints, C++ code etc.
While we are at it, why UE do not recognize ogg files? Unlike mp3, they do not have any excuse whatsoever for it. Adding insult to injury, while UE cannot play mp3, it actually IS recognized as game asset, unlike ogg…
That is not what the purpose of the import function is for, every file type that is imported must be a format that they have specifically programmed support for, all other files can still be worked with as an external asset file and there’s no need to import them.
First - I use json files all the time, it’s just that I have to explicitly tell engine to bundle them when packaging and have to manage them from outside asset manager. Reading packaged files using c++ is easy too, there are functions and classes in API and even JSON parser is available. Well, to be precise, I use “.json” files for data tables only and store my own json-based data not containing list of structs in custom file format that is actually json but differently named so engine don’t try to do anything with it on it’s own.
Second - you always could write your own importer for whatever format you like.
Third - data table is not a bad thing or something unknown and scary, it just coincidentally is that data tables could be saved as json and so engine thinks that json is used to store data table.
Thank you for your answers. If I understood correctly, there is way to have your other files in any format and interact with them. After some googling, is this that .pak thing? I got impression some C++ coding is required and that’s shame. I would like to have ability to interact with custom files without even dipping into C++.
If there is way to interact with unimportable files that do not require C++ project, I would be thankful.
