You Should Start Using Data Assets in PCG | UE 5.4

[@土星猫]

This is saving me years of my life, I absolutely love this

[@Procedural_Minds]

Haha. Glad you found it helpful. :)

[@TheJackalxy]

12:54 I think the error is because quaternion rotator are four quad vector array (x,y,z,w), while the rotator used in the data assets is a euler rotator composed by 3 vector. If i remember correctly even though quaternion are present in c++ they are not represented in blueprint

[@Procedural_Minds]

Huh, that's interesting. But when I sample the information with the A hotkey, it shows Rotation.Yaw / Roll / Pitch. There is no 4th. So it's odd that it's trying to get a 4 digit version. Possibly a bug. Either way got to figure out a good workaround.

[@Nialonh]

@@Procedural_Minds The reason for that is that Quats are not really human readable, so they should always be translated to XYZ when displayed. The reason they are using Quats is that it avoids a locking problem that exists in XYZ(Euler Angles). Great video:)

[@mihaiwilson]

Fantastic, love the clear straightforward approach.

[@Procedural_Minds]

Thank you, I'm glad you liked it. :)

[@mihaiwilson]

@@Procedural_Minds Seriously. Nearly lost my mind trying to do this kind of thing using loops. Your method has got things moving!

[@PotatoClips]

I believe you need a combine rotator node instead of add. It's similar in BPs because of the way quaternion math works. Adding floats together works, but adding a rotator to another rotator does a lot of behind the scenes math that doesn't translate to what you would expect. Combine rotators adds each axis angle individually and then recombines into a resulting rotator.

[@Procedural_Minds]

Interesting, good to know. Thanks!

[@jbach]

Thanks for this. Very much needed.

[@Procedural_Minds]

You're welcome! :)

[@jbach]

@@Procedural_Minds Especially achieving randomness without loops. This also seems to simplify randomness so instead of specifying min and max values, you just set one. If the value is leass than 1.0 it becomes a min value (and max =1.0). And if you set a vlaue greater than 1.0 then it becomes the max (and 1.0 is the new min). Am I correct? One thing, how would you get random offsets so your points aren't on a grid? Just use a TransformPoints?

[@Bizob2010]

14:06 I wonder if it's rather that you're passing it a rotation vector as opposed to just the yaw portion?

[@Procedural_Minds]

From what people have been saying, under the hood it's stored differently than it is on the user side. But if I did per axis that could possibly work.

[@alicechaix7936]

Thanks for the help ! The explanation is very clear ! ^^

[@Procedural_Minds]

Thanks, glad it helped! :)

[@carlospastor127]

Hello! Great video, thank you for teaching us about pcg, there is very little information even on the subject, one question, what is the difference between doing this method to generate a forest instantiating our tree variations in the range of the spline and doing it with a pcg and a spawn static mesh and add our trees to them and use a layer of the landcape so that it only makes them appear there?

[@Procedural_Minds]

This doesn't require a landscape at all. This is entirely independent. You can use it for trees, or you can use it for debris, or houses, or whatever else you'd like.

[@carlospastor127]

@@Procedural_Minds Ahhh true!! thnx u so much!!

[@SellusionStar]

Wow, what a convoluted way of doing it, epic... Thank you for figuring that out!!

[@Procedural_Minds]

Wait till the next video when I show how you do loops in PCG. It makes this look straight forward. lol

[@SellusionStar]

@@Procedural_Minds haha :D you had my interest, now you have my attention! thanks! great channel content by the way

[@Cloroqx]

Just a note: The original Biome plugin Data Asset uses Soft Pointers for the StaticMeshes. This ensures that Unreal doesn't load all the meshes added to your Data Asset into memory unless PCG specifically calls for them to be loaded. While this might not make much of a difference when you have only a few meshes, it will become significant as you add more assets.

[@Procedural_Minds]

That is interesting. I didn't notice this in the biome setup. I'll check it out. Thanks!

[@Cloroqx]

@@Procedural_Minds And I think the new Proxy node might be the key to directly setting rotation.

[@bramcardondbd]

Exactly what I needed! However, whenever I compile the Primary Data Asset (PDA) for new variables, it removes the Data Asset from the parameters inside the PCG Graph Settings. Any ideas on how to prevent that from happening?

[@Procedural_Minds]

You can set the one in the PCG graph to a soft object reference instead, then it won't clear out. But it is technically more expensive and meant for other use cases. If you're using it just to generate and not doing any runtime stuff, it should be fine.

[@hurin1576]

Thanks! u're my hero

[@Procedural_Minds]

Hahaha. Thanks! :)

[@Josh_Alfaro]

Question, so I’ve been dissecting Electric Dreams lately, and I couldn’t help but notice the similarities, they used these functionalities a ton. Do they use data assets to build their assemblies? Would love a tutorial going through it!

[@Procedural_Minds]

Unfortunately it's been quite some time since I've looked at the Electric Dreams demo. But if i recall it's 5.2 or 5.3. If that's the case then it couldn't be Data Asset driven as that was introduced in 5.4.

[@Josh_Alfaro]

@@Procedural_Mindsyou’re right, looks like a data table actually, not data asset

[@SegundoFernandez-f8x]

Great content !! What if I want to use this method to spawn BPs tho ?

[@Procedural_Minds]

Then just swap out the Static Mesh Actor Spawn Actor and plug your BP into it. :)

[@SegundoFernandez-f8x]

@@Procedural_Minds Wow Thank You so much !! Tried to figure it out the hard way :)

[@Josh_Alfaro]

Great stuff. I am admittedly a noob dev. What are some of the advantages of using this rather than just a spline sampler? Is it the bool and other variables that would let you spawn things with more complicated logic? Probably a stupid question but I don’t immediately see the benefit

[@Procedural_Minds]

Spline sampler is just how you generate the points, data assets store all the information you can use for those points you generate.

[@Josh_Alfaro]

⁠@@Procedural_Mindsbut you can do all the same things with a transform points node no?

[@Procedural_Minds]

@@Josh_Alfaro This isn't about showing how to transform your points, it's about showing how you can now store all the information in a data asset and easily swap them out for different variations using the same base.

[@SarahLenker-fz1fm]

Any idea how to set the Data Asset from a parent blueprint? I don't want my artists setting the data asset directly, I'd rather give them an Enum on the blueprint and set it inside

[@Procedural_Minds]

Then data asset might not be the best use case for you. I don't believe you can do it dynamically. The main use case of data assets is to be able to easily swap different premade configurations.

[@tallere1781]

Hi is it possible to read data from a structure instead of a data asset in pcg because i want to change values in a struct format on the pcg

[@Procedural_Minds]

I don't believe it is possible, but once you make them attributes in PCG you can modify them any way you want separately.

[@tallere1781]

@@Procedural_Minds Oh okay Because right now i have a dataset with multiple structs that are indexed that has a lot of information and i just wondered if i could eliminate the step to make a dataset and just change the struct in the PCG area but thanks anyways!

[@Procedural_Minds]

@@tallere1781 Since replying I actually took at the 5.5 roadmap. You can edit the Data Assets in PCG now. So you can probably use that to get the result you want. Assuming you can update to 5.5 once it releases. :)

[@astralstormgamestudios1259]

I kind of like the "old" way much more .. is there any fps gains in doing it that way?

[@Procedural_Minds]

What do you mean by the old way? Using grass landscape nodes and foliage?

[@astralstormgamestudios1259]

@@Procedural_Minds bad grammar from my side , I understand the difference between using data table and the hard coded way, I dont really need to be able to switch out any assets quickly

[@rabellogp]

I spent so much time trying to figure out a way to do something similar to this with what we had in 5.3... Unfortunately I still can't migrate to 5.4 in some of the projects I'm working on with PCG.

[@Procedural_Minds]

Yeah I've wanted this myself since PCG came out. Hopefully you'll be able to update to it soon or find good workarounds.

[@jochenfong3056]

why not use save graph instance? i think it better than dataAsset

[@Procedural_Minds]

They are for different use cases. I can preconfigure data assets to be certain setups that I want and swap between them as simply as dragging and dropping using only one graph.

[@tehf00n]

Just to add, if you weren't using Data Assets previously then you need to learn Epic's Best Practices. If Epic do it, you should do it. Obviously there is more than one way to skin a cat in game dev, but in my 14 years of experience I've learned that what you think is right is most likely wrong unless Epic did it first. They spend time, money and human resources on figuring out the best method before it even lands in preview. And in the case of PCG Biome's setup, it saves a lot of time switching things around to test if you use data assets.

[@Procedural_Minds]

I'm using data assets for my game. They weren't available for PCG prior to this update.

[@tehf00n]

@@Procedural_Minds I know, although you could implement them, the Biome setup has added that method. I meant in general though, not you specifically. Most people I see on a daily basis aren't doing 10% of best practice and Data Assets have been one of the methods Epic has been staunch on implementing in their system. I'm guilty of skipping on best practice myself sometimes when I'm in a rush or prototyping. But I tend to iterate back and do what Epic does.

[@kryogenicgames]

very helpful ;)

[@Procedural_Minds]

Thank you! :)

[@Ionut-l7c]

if errors in the graph still don't disappear, restart engine; worked for me

[@Procedural_Minds]

That's a great tip, thanks for sharing! :)

[@Ionut-l7c]

@@Procedural_Minds happy to help. btw is there a way to place meshes at random location on level?

[@Procedural_Minds]

@@Ionut-l7c You can do it with just blueprints or have your bounds of the PCG graph cover the full level if you're using world partition for example.

[@Ionut-l7c]

@@Procedural_Minds thanks alot!

[@bernhardhelbling3412]

Sorry - but why so complicate. There is almost no advantage of the "data assets system" ..... there are other less complicate systems.

[@Procedural_Minds]

What other system is there for quickly swapping full meshes and settings? I'd love to learn.

[@R4venshore]

Honestly, as a hardcore Unity dev I expected a lot more from UE5. The PCG are full of errors and buggy behavior, a lot of it scream to be improved so much. In the time I spent trying to get this going I could've written a PCG with splines in C# 5 times that still uses Scriptable Objects for data assets and dynamic generation...

[@Procedural_Minds]

This is a new and beta feature that isn't ready for production. So I wouldn't use this as the benchmark for completed and fully implemented Unreal features.