That sounds like an interesting challenge! I definitely won’t have a chance to work on something like that until after release, but even if I don’t, I’m excited to see what people manage to come up with when they get their hands on Sprout.
The goal of Sprout’s Modules is to keep the plugin extensible enough that users can fill in the gaps for whatever project specific use cases they have in mind.
I’m curious to hear what you’re working on and how you think Sprout can help if you’re able to talk about it.
Yeah, that Houdini stream was awesome! It also got me thinking about the similarities between Sprout and Houdini. I haven’t really used Houdini much but its clearly a beast of a program and it does a lot of things that Sprout obviously can’t/wouldn’t ever do (fluid sims, animation, rigging, landscape, etc etc).
In terms of asset creation and level design though, I think Sprout is like Houdini but with the bonuses of being able to use Blueprint/Unreal code and the Niagara approach to data.
Houdini has more advanced mesh processing (although 5.0’s Geometry Scripting is going to open up a ton of new potential for Sprout). But for example that pipe HDA from the stream would be hard to achieve in Sprout because of the really cool intersection work they do.
Some bonuses to using Sprout that stick out to me:
All of your modules, spawners, whatever would be written in C++ or BP.
You have access to anything in Unreal, any Plugins, and your own game specific code
Sprout supports editing simulation results (Moving, sculpting, editing) in a non destructive way
Sprout has a heavier focus on foliage creation so those tools are more developed than Houdini’s
Sprout has a dedicated editor and UI as opposed to working in the details panel.
For example, here is a simple tool that I wrote to scatter mesh instances and lights using a Sprout and a very basic Blueprint.
Scatter Tool
You could use this tool or write one like it to scatter Pickable berry bushes in a field, you could use this to procedurally scatter meshes, decals and particles along road/river splines in your world. You can sample physical materials with casts, you could cull based on intersections with bounding volumes, etc.
All this being said, I see no reason why the two couldn’t be used together in some really awesome ways! As always, I’m really exited to see what users can come up with!
Also, you can spawn stuff on stuff which is fun no matter what program you use.
My notifications are completely bugged! This hadn’t popped up until now. We are progressing nicely in the current beta phase and will be expanding it to more applicants in the near future.
We are REALLY REALLY focused on releasing as soon as possible but also on not releasing something buggy or impossible to use.
For anyone interested, feel free to sign up here : Beta Signup
