It looks like Bethesda will keep using Scaleform for Starfield UI

[RaidersClamoring]

5 years ago, Autodesk discontinued development and support for Scaleform, the ActionScript/c++-powered Flash-derived UI platform seen in Skyrim, Fallout 4, Fallout 76 and many other games.

Judging by this employment ad Scaleform is still a household utility for UI at Bethesda and there is no other technology mentioned at all.

"As UI Programmer, you will…

Implement and support UI systems to support game systems, using C++, Scaleform, and ActionScript 3

Test and refine systems throughout the development cycle of the project

Work closely with design and art disciplines in the development of features

Write clear, maintainable, portable code

Participate in code reviews"

 

 

https://jobs.zenimax.com/requisitions/view/1810

(Yes it is an up to date ad : "Come join Bethesda Game Studios, the award-winning development team behind Starfield, The Elder Scrolls and Fallout.")

[HeyYou]

5 years ago, Autodesk discontinued development and support for Scaleform, the ActionScript/c++-powered Flash-derived UI platform seen in Skyrim, Fallout 4, Fallout 76 and many other games.

 

Judging by this employment ad Scaleform is still a household utility for UI at Bethesda and there is no other technology mentioned at all.

 

 

"As UI Programmer, you will…

Implement and support UI systems to support game systems, using C++, Scaleform, and ActionScript 3

Test and refine systems throughout the development cycle of the project

Work closely with design and art disciplines in the development of features

Write clear, maintainable, portable code

Participate in code reviews"

 

 

https://jobs.zenimax.com/requisitions/view/1810

 

(Yes it is an up to date ad : "Come join Bethesda Game Studios, the award-winning development team behind Starfield, The Elder Scrolls and Fallout.")

So does this imply that 3DSMax 2013 will still work with Starfield??

[RaidersClamoring]

That I don't know but it does imply Adobe Animate, probably Flash editors as old as cs6 too, and ActionScript 3 will still work for creating modded menus for Starfield, as will JPEXS, to decompile menus, as a consequence. So no new skillset required to create some equivalent of SkyUI and once the Script Extender team has a grasp of things, UI connectivity with Papyrus should be relatively easy. Here I'm simply assuming Papyrus is still around.

[HeyYou]

That I don't know but it does imply Adobe Animate, probably Flash editors as old as cs6 too, and ActionScript 3 will still work for creating modded menus for Starfield, as will JPEXS, to decompile menus, as a consequence. So no new skillset required to create some equivalent of SkyUI and once the Script Extender team has a grasp of things, UI connectivity with Papyrus should be relatively easy. Here I'm simply assuming Papyrus is still around.

Are they using papyrus for scripting again???? I was hoping they would move to something else...... and since they seem to be doing better with multi-core support, running the scripts every frame again would be cool to.

[RaidersClamoring]

 

That I don't know but it does imply Adobe Animate, probably Flash editors as old as cs6 too, and ActionScript 3 will still work for creating modded menus for Starfield, as will JPEXS, to decompile menus, as a consequence. So no new skillset required to create some equivalent of SkyUI and once the Script Extender team has a grasp of things, UI connectivity with Papyrus should be relatively easy. Here I'm simply assuming Papyrus is still around.

Are they using papyrus for scripting again???? I was hoping they would move to something else...... and since they seem to be doing better with multi-core support, running the scripts every frame again would be cool to.

 

I don't know for sure but it would make no sense to just can the entire language. I'm hoping for some upgrades, like stepping away from the operations-per-frame thing. If they improve it to such a degree they decide to rename it, that would be great. But I doubt it. They are prone to hanging on to outdated and or discontinued technology such as Scaleform as mentioned, Nif, 3Ds Max...

[ggcraig]

Hey friends, actually my first post here but I thought it was pretty relevant considering I just went through this process. To be up front, I'm the co-founder at a company called GameGlass... We actually create UI elements and interfaces for games to be used on second screens and other utilities.

So I actually dove into the files of Starfield last week, and I used JPEXS to decompile some of the SWF files baked into the game.

 

I can confirm that everything you would expect is in there, but here are my two cents around the whole thing.

 

Game UI devs really have it bad. Utilizing technologies like animate are extremely restrictive when tooling around this kind of stuff keeps improving, in every aspect, except for anything based around FLASH.

 

Seriously. The fact that companies aren't adopting more modern platforms or techniques to create UI is depressing.

 

For my specific example, I was trying to extract the SWF files assets (the SVG's for the most part) and convert them to more modern web based technologies. The idea was we could improve our workflow if we take what already exists and modify it to work within our platform.

 

Problem is that you cannot extract or create an animated SVG from adobe animate. Hell, the integration between animate -> after effects is also absolute garbage. Adobe HARDLY maintains animate, yet it's still a go to for game ui devs? Sigh.

 

This is more of a rant and a shout out to any game dev still being forced to follow this workflow, I feel for you.

[niston]

Yes SF still uses Papyrus.

It has some new bytecode instructions for locking (Guard*).

 

Champollion and Caprica are being worked on.

[zanity]

I was expecting the game to run dreadfully on my 5700XT at high (1440p)- it actually runs smooth as silk (at 75% scale), thanks to the wonder of Freesync, and the amazingly good framepacing of Starfield at lower framerates.

 

BUT the UI code- it is effing awful, and the slowest I've ever seen. It runs as if powered by a dead gerbil in a wheel. It looks terrible. It responds so very badly. But all Beth's employees that cannot code are given UI duties- as happens at too many AAA game companies. And from the appalling bugs in Starfield, the hopeless coders also wrote all the script code- NPCs that constantly face the wrong direction since simple vector maths is beyond such 'coders'.

 

Back in the early days of iD and Epic (Unreal), the real coders (the engine guys) used to bang out a full UI framework for their games in a couple of days. Today there's a wealth of excellent open-source libraries but one has to be technically competent to use them.

 

Starfield has a literal jaw-dropping number of technical issues of all types in the early couple of hours of main mission gameplay. Mainline stuff QA players would have witnessed time and time again. Stuff that modders will fix in moments once all the tools and documentation is available. And Todd didn't care- on a project that took longer and cost far more than Skyrim and Fallout combined.

 

Of course the boss man is going to keep to the exact same pipeline, and pretend to the press that all the witnessed issues don't exist. The wretched state of Redfall shows there is no concern about quality at any of the US divisions that Todd directly controls. And unlike Redfall, Starfield is a smashing success, allowing Todd to claim he is right in all technical decisions.

Edited September 8, 2023 by zanity

[CrEaToXx]

I want to add that some of the flash files are of even older version type than some of the FO4 files. I can only wildly guess here, but I think they were using some of the Skyrim files as template and worked on them with either CS4, or CS6.

[CyberFrostPhoenix]

I was expecting the game to run dreadfully on my 5700XT at high (1440p)- it actually runs smooth as silk (at 75% scale), thanks to the wonder of Freesync, and the amazingly good framepacing of Starfield at lower framerates.

 

BUT the UI code- it is effing awful, and the slowest I've ever seen. It runs as if powered by a dead gerbil in a wheel. It looks terrible. It responds so very badly. But all Beth's employees that cannot code are given UI duties- as happens at too many AAA game companies. And from the appalling bugs in Starfield, the hopeless coders also wrote all the script code- NPCs that constantly face the wrong direction since simple vector maths is beyond such 'coders'.

 

Back in the early days of iD and Epic (Unreal), the real coders (the engine guys) used to bang out a full UI framework for their games in a couple of days. Today there's a wealth of excellent open-source libraries but one has to be technically competent to use them.

 

Starfield has a literal jaw-dropping number of technical issues of all types in the early couple of hours of main mission gameplay. Mainline stuff QA players would have witnessed time and time again. Stuff that modders will fix in moments once all the tools and documentation is available. And Todd didn't care- on a project that took longer and cost far more than Skyrim and Fallout combined.

 

Of course the boss man is going to keep to the exact same pipeline, and pretend to the press that all the witnessed issues don't exist. The wretched state of Redfall shows there is no concern about quality at any of the US divisions that Todd directly controls. And unlike Redfall, Starfield is a smashing success, allowing Todd to claim he is right in all technical decisions.

 

Sadly those last two paragraphs are so true. I have had a problem with Bethesda since Fallout 4 even though I have enjoyed Fallout 4 and I am enjoying Starfield the laziness (for I don't know of another word to use) is astounding in their games since Fallout 4, but especially in Starfield. I am hearing sounds and seeing images from Fallout 4. I would really like to see the financial paperwork on where the money went to develop this game, because there is no way this can be compared to other AAA games. Unless they start using a different graphics engine then that piece of crap engine they say they keep updating this is most likely my last Bethesda game, so I really hope they get rid of their current game engine; but with Todd Howard in-charge that is not going to happen. :(