Scripting Gameplay in O3DE

Open 3D Engine (O3DE) provides two scripting technologies so you can add gameplay logic and behaviors in your project: Script Canvas and Lua.

Script Canvas is a general purpose, visual scripting environment. In the Script Canvas Editor, you lay out and connect graphical nodes that provide a visual representation of the logic flow. Script Canvas offers an approachable environment to author behaviors using the same framework as Lua and C++. You can use Script Canvas to create scripts without coding experience.

Lua is a powerful, fast, lightweight, embeddable scripting language. Lua facilitates quick iteration in your project because you can run your changes immediately without needing to recompile your source code.

How scripts communicate in O3DE

O3DE functionality is exposed to Script Canvas and Lua through the behavior context. The behavior context reflects runtime code, making it accessible to scripts through bindings to C++ classes, methods, properties, constants, and enums. The behavior context also provides bindings for O3DE’s EBus so you can dispatch and handle events through Script Canvas and Lua.

Functionality for both Script Canvas and Lua is added to entities through components. You can have multiple script components and mix and match between Lua and Script Canvas within your entities. This approach enables you to create small, manageable modules of logic and behavior that can be reused throughout your projects.

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