Clickteam Fusion 2.5+ Reviews

Hi DrWho, from my perspective the biggest improvement I'm using a lot are this parent/child events and 260 named values/strings. I had no problems with this add-on/dlc so far.

I really like fact that you can know where the bottle-necks are in your application. 2.5+ seems faster. The 260 named values/strings is a big like for me making it easier to keep track of everything. You are able to name all the qualifiers and put icons on all of them. There is a new command "find all" that allows you to find a text in any object name, value, data or events, either in the current frame or in all the frames of the application. "Run App From Current Frame" is a new command allows you to run the entire app from the current frame. I could go on and on. Yes it is worth your money and I would recommend the DLC to anyone.

Marv

For me, most of the features are very practical and stable.
The only problem is that in DX11 mode, the layout of String objects will be wrong.
This bug has been in existence since 2.5+ release:

Spaces in the beginning of the strings are ignored in runtime, while it works properly in DX9.
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I would agree to all the above and I would add that now you can use Groups in behaviors (something I really appreciate, I even wrote a post about it). The Global Events are also very good addition but I think this is something of the new Update and not of 2.5++?

For me 2.5+ has made a huge difference, both in actual game fps performance and in ease of use with all new alt. values, debugger output (which is soo useful!), find all functions, etc.

Excellent add-on, in that all of the features are great. The major ones are obviously the variable limit and the global qualifiers, but there are many, many improvements. I'd argue that these features should have always existed as normal updates to the product, particularly things like the variable limit, though having said that, I was perfectly happy to pay an extra £40 to Clickteam regardless. Having used their products since 1996, I had no problem with that! Though, a bigger software vendor probably wouldn't get away with a DLC to a product like that.

Overall, if you are aiming to use Fusion 2.5 seriously, 2.5+ should be something you automatically purchase.

Quote from Progject

Overall, if you are aiming to use Fusion 2.5 seriously, 2.5+ should be something you automatically purchase.

I fully agree with this.
I'll add that using child events feels natural quickly. I really love this DLC.

New features are very useful. Worth the upgrade.

I'm a bit of a junkie when it comes to software updates. I'm always excited almost to the point of salivation when I read the changelogs of my favourite programs. It's always a happy time of year when Adobe does the big annual Photoshop update. I remember eagerly reading Winamp changelogs back in 2002, and the Fusion updates are always very good too.

But for me, Fusion 2.5+ is unambiguously the best new version and/or update of any software that I've ever experienced, ever. It literally addressed 9 out of 10 of my top 10 grievances with Fusion (eg. proper global events, custom qualifiers, more than 26 alterable values, flawless Find feature, more useful debugger), and added a ton of stuff I didn't even know I wanted on top of of that. As others have said, 2.5+ is simply essential for anyone who plans to sink more than a few hours into Fusion.

2.5+ may seem like an optional DLC, but that's just due to the circumstances it finds itself in. If Clickteam had these features built in 2014 they would have undoubtedly included them in the core 2.5 product, because mostly these aren't features that will benefit just a niche or power-users, but will improve the Fusion experience for all users. But in 2019, they couldn't just add the features to the core 2.5 product; they were the product of more than a year of solid work, and that labour cost had to be recouped somehow. But neither could Clickteam release this as a standalone product like, say, Clickteam Fusion 2.75. After hyping Fusion 3 so much for the past few years, the user base would have gone absolutely rabid if a new version of Fusion came out that was anything less than the full-blown Fusion 3.

So Clickteam took what I think was the best option available by making it a moderately-priced DLC. It's affordable enough for anyone who really values Fusion, but doesn't force itself on anyone. And it came with some significant bonuses for even those people who didn't buy it: regular 2.5 received some performance increases in the process (eg. more responsive frame editor, faster debugger), as well as a few welcome features (eg. dragging objects from frame editor to folders in objects panel), plus it's resulted in a welcome increase in developer-user communication, with Yves himself being highly present and exceptionally helpful on the forums ever since release.

I don't think Clickteam could possibly have managed this process better than they have. They could have played this hand poorly and got a lot of people angry. But they played it perfectly. They created an absolute beauty of an update that has made a lot of people happy, and they managed the customer-liaison side of it impeccably. There are a few minor drawbacks to the route they've taken though. One is that there are two incompatible species of MFAs now, and people making MFAs as examples to share on the forum or to sell on the Clickstore must now choose between using all of 2.5+'s useful features and remaining accessible to all of Fusion's users. Another is that the features in 2.5+ now ostensibly appear to be optional, as the very existence of this thread attests. The truth is that they are a must-have for any committed Fusion user, but this isn't necessarily obvious since they're offered as merely an optional add-on DLC.

I can't recommend 2.5+ highly enough. And it should perhaps be noted that I'm certainly no Clickteam sycophant by any means. I hadn't heard of Clickteam till 2014 so I don't have the childhood nostalgia or long-time loyalty that others may have to the company. But I've also got a lot riding on the success of Clickteam - I quit my career 5 years ago to work full-time on a Fusion game, so Fusion is much more than just a hobby for me - my arse, and the livelihood and wellbeing of my family, are very much on the line here. For this reason, I've been highly critical of Clickteam over the years, and it's all on the record in the archives of these forums - well, except for those posts that were deemed too critical and were deleted by the in-my-opinion-sometimes-too-heavy-handed hammer of the moderation team - here's looking at you Simon, and maybe you too Perry (for the love of God, don't delete this post too!). I've criticised Clickteam's marketing efforts, some of Clickteam's DLC decisions, Fusion's GPU performance, and above all, as an ex-UX designer myself, I've criticised Fusion's user interface. I believe I've mostly criticised them fairly and in good faith, but no doubt I've sometimes been in the wrong without realising it. I'm sure I'm far from their most popular customer or forum member.

So I hope it has some weight when I say, to anyone still reading this - you should buy 2.5+! Its features make a fantastic improvement to how Fusion works, and will help you work faster and smarter in this already great program (and unless you're 12 years old or living in Venezuela, your time is surely more valuable than your money!). And on top of that, you'll be supporting the efforts of a team who, despite their modest size, have done an absolutely stellar job of listening to their customers and improving a huge amount of those things that the community has been asking for for years. If you're a serious Fusion user, buy 2.5+ now. You'll almost certainly be glad you did.

[MENTION=15682]Volnaiskra[/MENTION], what the...

This was one hell of a ride / read there. Well said, nicely written and though long, I didn't want your post to end.

PS:I am amazed you quit your job to work with fusion in your game. Are you talking about spryke? Have you made other games too?

Quote from AftPeakTank

[MENTION=15682]Volnaiskra[/MENTION]
PS:I am amazed you quit your job to work with fusion in your game.

Quote from DrWho

I would say that quiting your job to work fulltime on your fusion project / game was a very risky but ambitious move on your part [MENTION=15682]Volnaiskra[/MENTION]

Eh, it's really quite easy when you're a lunatic

Thanks for your kind words. Yes, [MENTION=14419]AftPeakTank[/MENTION], I'm talking about Spryke, who feels like my third daughter at this point (and possibly even the most demanding one - which is saying something!). Making this game to the height of my ambitious vision for it is the sort of crazy, gargantuan high-risk endeavour that one can probably only try once or twice in a lifetime. I've pumped some 12,000 hours into it by my estimate, as well as a lot of physical and mental health. It could prove to be a colossally bad move financially, but even if the worst happens and it sells three copies, I know this won't be something that I regret on my deathbed. No matter what, I'll have given myself the opportunity to create my life's masterwork, and have developed a ton of skills and discipline in the process.