[Animation Breakdown] Pushing Flash to its limits | (Part 3) | Why do you still use Flash, then?

I'm continuing on from the previous breakdown. I wrote too much stuff so I separated it into its own post.
FAIR WARNING:This will likely just be yapping about Flash, JavaScript, and HTML5! It may be very boring and a pointless read unless you're interested in Flash and HTML5 Canvas as engines.


-=[ Flash is old... like, hella old ]=-
To the surprise of no one, Flash is now old. But how old, you may (not) be asking? Well, it's actually over 30! Technically. I mean, that's how old Flash is in total. AS1 is so archaic that it's basically a whole other language.

The Flash I'm familiar with (ActionScript 3, 2006+) is actually only 17 years old which is still ancient in terms of rendering engine, but not 30. See, all of these things I'm using in my animations were slowly added to Flash between 2007 and 2020, when Flash stopped getting proper updates. They weren't all in from the get-go, which means some of these features are still relatively "new"... in comparison to the 30 year old AS1 and 17 year old AS3. I mean, imagine using a 17 year old build of Blender to 3D render, or using a 2011 copy of Sony Vegas to do modern day video editing? Sure you can do it, but why?

This is all to say that I'm not surprised we're seeing creaks and leaks in Flash these days. Not many people make Flash animations anymore at all - websites can't even load Flash animations without using a 3rd party addon that, let's be real, not many, companies will spring for unless they're an old Flash games website.
People who want to move on have moved on. They learned Godot, Game Maker Studio, HTML5 canvases, or other alternatives.


-=[ Is HTML5 really as bad as I make it sound? ]=-
To tell you the truth, no. it's not that bad at all.It was just made with less of what made Flash unique in mind, choosing to instead be compatible with most browsers and using existing HTML5 architecture. This is actually a great idea, because in theory a HTML5 Canvas will never go out of date - it will just evolve with the web. When HTML6 comes along, I'm sure we'll see a new Canvas version to support it.

If you were making an interactive clickable experience for a website, HTML5 is incredibly powerful and versatile. All it requires is knowledge in JavaScript and if you were already familiar with websites and using Flash for what it was initially meant for, then this was your natural progression. HTML5 Canvases are perfect for making interactive banners, web elements, or neat little games in your browser; all without the insecurities that Flash inherently had in it.

HTML5 is actually really fun, and I love it for website stuff. It's great, and you can do some proper magic with it if you're good enough with JS and you've got a properly set up website architecture to take advantage of it. It's constantly evolving too, so it's perfectly futureproofed.


-=[ We're pushing Flash to its limits because it was never meant to be used for this ]=-
Flash was never made to handle games of larger scopes. Flash games an easy entry way into making games, but I'm not going to sit here and say it's a game engine. Truthfully, it's not. It's a glorified code system you can point specific functions to. I mean, the capabilities of its math function is incredible. Doom-the-Wolf pushed Flash and AS3 to its actual limits years ago with a mostly AS3 driven game which means most of the animations were handled by AS3 and not done in the timeline.

When Doom-the-Wolf (the initial creator of 'Interactive Pregnant X' games) created his expansion mechanic, he basically exploited Flash's vector graphics. When I took to learning from both Barn-Flakes and Doom, I started using things that neither Doom nor Barn used much of at all. The two of them are very programming orientated, so they did a lot of motion using code. I, however, was not - I launched into Flash with little to no knowledge on programming, so I did everything manually. I actually specifically remember getting one of Barn's animations and he had programmed his menus to move using code I still don't understand to this day!

Anyway, random diatribe aside, the reason I'm hitting a lot of Flash's limits is because it wasn't made for fancy graphics like this. Blur filters were not meant to be used as frequently or as intensely as I use them. For a small advert, yeah go nuts. For what is basically a game? No, you're better of not using it.

Yeah, HTML5 is actually the natural evolution of Flash. It's perfect... if you use it for its initial intended purposes. In fact, you can make AMAZING games with HTML5! It's incredibly versatile, and it's great for beginners and intermediate programmers!
I don't like it because I was already misusing Flash, and HTML5 wasn't made for my desires in mind. HTML5 is not a vector-based system like Flash was, which already complicates things. But still.


-=[ The future of Flash the 2020's ]=-
I will likely use Flash for years to come. I do believe that eventually Flash will remove the ability to create create Flash or AS3 files altogether. I mean, we saw this when Adobe Flash became Animate. If you use AS2 (Like Lusty still does) then you're limited to Flash CS5.5 which is... actually pretty good.
Once Flash is completely abandoned, I will likely either pick up Godot or I will just stay stubbornly on the last available version of Adobe Animate. (Yarr harr, and whatnot).

But the outlook is not grim! Flash was on borrowed time, but with Ruffle becoming as popular and widespread as it is, it's gained a second wind. As long as you can still download the Flash Player and while Ruffle is still being worked on, Flash games will live on. And I will make the same old stuff.