An Introduction to Game Development using Unity [Galway]

Faerdan · 07-03-2011 4:08pm #1

This coming Monday 14th of March at 6pm (in 091 Labs, Galway) is the first in a series of workshops dedicated to game development. Game development can be an exciting and creative hobby, and the with rise of tools like Unity it is now easier than ever for one person to develop and release a game.

What is Unity?

Unity is a integrated 3D engine and authoring tool, designed to make game development as quick and easy as possible. Whereas in the past using similar engines/tools has also meant limiting your game in regards to speed, customisation or graphical prowess, Unity gives you a lot of control and a great modern, and fast, 3D engine.
And of course, Unity is also completely free (even if you sell the game).

Who should attend?

Anyone who has interest in game development.
It is expected that those who attend will have, at least, a basic understanding of a programming language (variables, loops, functions etc.).

What will I learn at the workshop?

The workshop aims to develop in participants a broad understanding of game design and implementation concepts such as game play, physics, sound and 3D graphics.
In this first workshop each participant will be creating a basic game along the lines of Marble Madness. All assets (3d models, textures, sounds etc) will be provided.
This will cover the following topics:

The Unity Editor Interface
Setting up a Project & Scene
Using the Inspector
Scripting object behaviours using JavaScript*
Using Physics (PhysX)
Adding Sound
Creating the HUD (GUI)

* For simplicity we will using JavaScript during this workshop, however if there is demand I will cover using C# at a later stage. Unity has it's own JavaScript/C# compilers and all scripts are compiled during the build process (not JIT), increasing the speed of the scripts in-game

What do I need to bring?

A laptop (or PC) capable of running Unity: http://unity3d.com/unity/system-requirements
Unity itself will be provided on the day, but preinstalling it would be good: http://unity3d.com/unity/download/

Where and when is the event being held?

At 091 Labs, 14th March from 6pm to 11pm.

How much does it cost?

The event itself is free, with a suggested donation of €5 to 091 Labs for non-members (to help keep these events going).

padair · 08-03-2011 10:55am

I would love to go to something like this but I am not in Galway.

DRakE · 08-03-2011 12:59pm

I'd love to go to this too but I'm not in Galway that often anymore

hal9000 · 08-03-2011 5:43pm

sounds interesting but ive only done a little programming before C++ and a bit of ASP back in my college days :pac: would I be wasting my time attending?

Faerdan · 08-03-2011 5:53pm

As long as you understand variables and loops you'll be fine.

hal9000 · 08-03-2011 6:25pm

I presume its Bring Your Own Laptop?

Faerdan · 09-03-2011 9:22am

Yes indeed, I forgot to mention that in the post.

We do have space for a pc if you've no laptop.

Faerdan · 15-03-2011 9:58am

Last night went very well.

We had seven attendees (with two others who couldn't stay due to other comittments) and by the end of the session each person had created a marble game where you maneuver a marble around a track collecting diamonds.

A simple beginning but not bad for four hours.

Next week we'll be improving on the marble game by adding an improved GUI (at the moment it's just text), obstables (a turntable maybe), turrets and boosters (doing these will teach about interactions between objects).

I'm not sure about the day, Monday is good for me but three other people who want to attend are busy on Mondays.

If anyone else would like to join us next week let me know and I'll get the project from last week to you so that you can have a look.

Dublin_Gunner · 15-03-2011 5:50pm

Any chance these workshops could be recorded and youtub-ed? (or any presentations used, linked to)

Would give those of us interested, but unable to attend in Galway the chance to learn some basics

Faerdan · 15-03-2011 5:52pm

I do like that idea. It looks like I'll be re-running the first (introductory) workshop some time in the near future for those who had to leave early or couldn't make it due to other comittments.

I'll see about getting a charger for my camera.

Dublin_Gunner · 15-03-2011 5:54pm

Faerdan wrote: »

I do like that idea. It looks like I'll be re-running the first (introductory) workshop some time in the near future for those who had to leave early or couldn't make it due to other comittments.

I'll see about getting a charger for my camera.

Would be very much appreciated! Been trying to get myself back into programming (haven't in years) but finding the motivation very difficult while trying to learn from pages upon pages of text!

Much easier to have someone show you the ropes!

Faerdan · 15-03-2011 6:03pm

I know what you mean.

Unity is very good, but the official tutorials are severly lacking. They give you a full completed project and a PDF document with a tutorial written by someone who seems to forget that the person using the tutorial doesn't know Unity as well as they do.

Everyone who attended the introduction really enjoyed it.

Dublin_Gunner · 15-03-2011 7:00pm

Wow Unity is very powerful. Just had a flick through the site there on my phone lol

Has tonnes of modern features. Im assuming its OpenGL based?

Faerdan · 15-03-2011 9:19pm

Even better.

You game is essentially platform agnostic, you use the build system to generate a native application for each target platform.

When building on Windows Unity uses DirectX and on all other platforms it uses OpenGL (OpenGL ES for mobile platforms).

So you could develop a game for web browsers and then later on buy an iOS and/or Android license ($400) and build it for those platforms too.

You might need to decrease the texture/mesh resolutions for the mobile version, and add tilt/touch controls, but that's about it.

Here are two nice videos of recent Unity additions:

Deferred Lighting
http://vimeo.com/14832454

Beast Lightmapping (Lightmap Baking)
http://vimeo.com/13361651

And here is a nice video for those interested in Unity on Android:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XrG9AEq1PCU

I think this is the coolest Unity game I've seen. The browser based Battlestar Galactica Online:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EMjFrUr5zIU
http://battlestar-galactica.bigpoint.com/ (Go here to play, it's in open beta)

DRakE · 16-03-2011 5:49pm

i'd love to get involved in this over the summer if i'm back in galway

Faerdan · 16-03-2011 8:33pm

It would be great to get a community of game developers (serious & hobbyist) going in Galway.

Then later in the Summer we could organise a GameJam, where people get together for 24 hours to create a game based on a theme (it's fun and helps to develop skills).

Faerdan · 16-03-2011 9:47pm

Hey all,

The next session is next Tuesday 22nd of March, and the workshop will be held every Tuesday thereafter (it suits people better).

If you didn't attend the first session, don't worry, we'll provide everything you'll need to catch up.

In the next session we'll be adding turrets, powerups and a proper GUI to the game.

We'll also be covering some of the work done in session one, in more detail.

hal9000 · 22-03-2011 1:06pm

Missed it this monday due to work

will there be an opportunity to do yesterdays workshop again?
Also check out
www.interstellarmarines.com
http://www.nplay.com/BeGone/for more unity developed games

Faerdan · 22-03-2011 1:20pm

Hey man,

The workshop is on this evening from 6pm, can you make it? (It'll be Tuesdays any more)

hal9000 · 22-03-2011 3:14pm

Faerdan wrote: »

Hey man,

The workshop is on this evening from 6pm, can you make it? (It'll be Tuesdays any more)

Dang! cant go this evening either

but I will be free from next week on, would i be able to d/l a sample project to cover this tuesdays work?

Faerdan · 22-03-2011 3:16pm

Yes of course, I'll upload it tomorrow afternoon.

Were you at last week's session? I don't have anyone's username.

hal9000 · 22-03-2011 4:09pm

yup, was there last week, guy who won the snickers

Faerdan · 22-03-2011 4:12pm

Ah, I do remember your name, but I'll keep it off here in case you don't want your true identity known.

I'll get some notes and a copy of the updated project to you tomorrow.

Faerdan · 23-03-2011 10:39am

Hey guys,

We had two people who were new to the workshop, one who missed a good chunk of last week and another who wanted a better grasp on the basics, so we ended up covering a lot of last week's content, just in more detail (we did things like having the diamonds/pickups add themselves to a counter on the Marble (for the target score), added a diamond pickup sound, and had the diamond shrink when collected rather than just disappear).

We also made better use of functions to tidy the code, and had more interaction between object components in the scripting.

I'll upload a sample project within the next day or two (with the above additions).

So next Tuesday (29th March) we'll be covering the content that I had prepared for this week.

-Mark

DRakE · 04-04-2011 11:31am

how are these workshops going? any links to anything created so far?

Faerdan · 04-04-2011 2:01pm

They're going quiet well but I haven't had time to put anything together to post online.

At the very minimal I'll add comment's to one of the lad's sample projects and upload that.

Faerdan · 04-04-2011 2:02pm

Hi all,

Sorry for the short notice but I have to postpone this week’s Unity workshop to next week (it’s my partner’s birthday and I hadn’t clicked that the 5th is tomorrow).

We'll be back again on the 12th April.

Thanks,
Mark

Faerdan · 11-04-2011 2:02pm

Hi all,

Due to a number of committments and work being very busy I'm going to have to put the Unity workshops on the backburner for a while.
I would like to continue them again in May but I'll just have to see how things go.

I'm always available to answer any questions or just have a chat about Unity, feel free to e-mail me at [email]faer_dan@g_mail.com[/email] (remove the underscores).

Apologies for any inconvenience caused.

Regards,

Mark

An Introduction to Game Development using Unity [Galway]

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