Unity Game Development Essentials

Unity Game Development Essentials
| 2009-10-01 00:00:00 | | 0 | Game Programming

Build fully functional, professional 3D games with realistic environments, sound, dynamic effects, and more!

Kick start game development, and build ready-to-play 3D games with easeUnderstand key concepts in game design including scripting, physics, instantiation, particle effects, and moreTest & optimize your game to perfection with essential tips-and-tricksWritten in clear, plain English, this book is packed with working examples and innovative ideasThis book is based on Unity version 2.5 and uses JavaScript for scripting

In Detail

Game engines are central to the video games we know and love. From the artwork to the mathematics that underpin the frames onscreen, the engine calls the shots. Aside from offering one of the leading 3D game engines, Unity also provides a superlative development tool - a tool that can produce professional standard games for Mac, PC, and the Unity Web Player.

This book is a complete exercise in game development covering environments, physics, sound, particles, and much more, to get you up and working with Unity quickly.

Taking a practical approach, this book will introduce you to the concepts of developing 3D games before getting to grips with development in Unity itself. From creating 3D worlds to scripting and creating simple game elements you will learn everything you'll need to get started with game development for the PC, Mac, and Web.

This book is designed to cover a set of easy to follow examples, which culminate in the production of a First Person 3D game, complete with an interactive island environment. By introducing common concepts of game and 3D production, you'll explore Unity to make a character interact with the game world, and build puzzles for the player to solve, in order to complete the game. At the end of the book, you will have a fully working 3D game and all the skills required to extend the game further, giving your end-user, the player, the best experience possible. Soon you will be creating your own 3D games with ease!

What you will learn from this book?

An understanding of the Unity 3D Engine and game development Build a 3D island and set of mini-games for your players Incorporate terrains and externally produced 3D models to get your game environment up and running Build your own first person player character Combine scripting and animation to transform your static objects into dynamic interactive game elements
Add realism to your games by using particle systems Create a professional, easy-to-navigate menu and link the menu scene with levels of your game Add sound, lighting effects, realistic shadows, and other dynamic effects to your game environment Creating stunning user interfaces with textures and scripting

Approach

This book follows an informal, demystifying approach to the world of game development with the Unity game engine. With no prior knowledge of game development or 3D required, you will learn from scratch, taking each concept at a time working up to a full 3D mini-game. You'll learn scripting with JavaScript and master the Unity development environment with easy to follow stepwise tasks.
The printed version of the book is in black and white, but a full color version of the images is available for download here. The eBook version, available from Packt, is in full color.

Who this book is written for?

If you're a designer or animator who wishes to take their first steps into game development, or if you've simply spent many hours sitting in front of video games, with ideas bubbling away in the back of your mind, Unity and this book should be your starting point. No prior knowledge of game production is required, inviting you to simply bring with you a passion for making great games.

User review
Good for beginners,,.
The book is a solid offering, actually the ONLY offering, of paper references for the Unity engine. It is a clear, reasonable, well executed book that goes step by step from infancy to toddler stage in learning Unity. It thankfully doesn't spend a lot of time teaching common game programming concepts, but does cover them just enough to keep readers oriented in the right direction.


Much of the book is covered in the documentation available online, but in a sensible and orderly and readable fashion. The writer uses clear, understandable examples in most cases.


As a beginner book, it is stellar. What it begs is for another book to be written which covers intermediate and advanced topics. For professional development, there are quite a few topics that merit coverage (Asset pipeline, dynamic loading, professional code structure, advanced UI, advanced animation, render targets, build pipeline, advanced optimization and profiling, asset server, etc.) These are still untouched topics that could fill a second volume.




User review
See for yourselve
That book is a must, cause there is no other book anyway. It dose the job to teach some stuff like ray casting, collision detection etc,,. But some stuff are missing, like real explanation of every meaning of the line by line. More the book advanced and less explanation you get. If you never really programmed object oriented, not much knowledge of game design, you might think it is not such a good book. But if you have experience with unity you might find it interesting. The book aim at basic stuff, but it kinda assume you know how to program Flash and actionscript. I learned BASIC, so jumping with dots everywhere in the statement to get something dose it a head hacke for me.


The book would be 5* if it explained how to get by yourselves in the script reference (the help file about scripting in Unity) and find your way there. But it don't do so, after reading the whole book, I can do the examples mentioned, but I am not sure about all of them or how to create my own cause everything he describe is not explained all the time.


The author feed us, but dose not teach us how to go fishing by yourselves. But the book is a must, if you are looking for a book, it is because you want to know more about unity, that is the right way.

User review
Unity Game Development Essentials is here. Now Read the F***ing Manual
Will Goldstone's Unity Game Development Essentials (UGDE) has arrived. It's the first book about the [,,.] Unity Game Engine by the person whose videos were the first and most comprehensive Unity videos to date. Will also runs [,,.] and [,,.] is a crisp and detailed primer into the powerful Unity engine, 3D programing and game development all at once. Will shares his hard-earned insight and productivity tips as he guides you through learning the Unity IDE. In the early chapters you will learn the various tools available for developing realistic terrains complete with varied trees and grass. You'll take a deep dive into the First Person Controller and its components including the CharacterController. As Will puts it, `If you know how something is put together then you're able to fix it when something goes wrong`.

Unity Game Development Essentials guides the learner through importing a 3D model into Unity with animations intact. You can then control the animations from the code. Speaking of code. You'll cover how to use Javascript to add functionality to your game from requiring the player to have met conditions to earn rewards to deciding if he'll be warm by bonfire for the night. Will explains it in such a way that developers coming from a Flash background will feel at home enough to reach for Control-Enter. Everything from making your variables accessible from the Unity workspace to manipulating your public static variables from other objects and updating your Heads-up display receives a generous yet concise coverage. Subtle reminders and reviews of key procedures help you walk away from the book with a habits that will make you productive and a foundation that prepares you for exploring the Unityverse.




One of my favorite parts of the book is the coverage of Collision detection. You first use colliders, with an initial examination of `isTrigger` then use Raycasting finally followed by a deeper discussion of the role of `isTrigger`. This is reviewed and summarized in the section of the book that made crystal clear the previously elusive decision-making algorithm between OnCollisionEnter(), OnTriggerEnter() and RayCasting.


My only complaint about this book is that I wish it could have gone on to some of the more advanced topics. I've read tutorials about physics and springs, and animation but the clarity that Unity Game Development Essentials provides is unmatched and I would love to be as comfortable in those advanced topics as this book has made me with the topics covered. On another note- the clarity of this book and the thorough coverage of a standard set of approaches sets expectations. As this book get more well deserved circulation asking a question that is explained within might earn someone a serving of RTFM. I wish I could have taken the 3 short days that it took me to read this book several months and many long fruitless and error filled nights ago. The first book in the Unity Game Development arena sets the bar high.


If you're a Flash developer interested in 3D in Actionscript you may also want to read Papervision3D Essentials by Paul Tondeur. It's a great book to ease the transition into 3D thinking and provides a lot of information that applies equally to 3D development in Unity.




DISCLOSURE: I Would like to thank Packt Publishing for providing me with a copy of Unity Game Development Essentials for the purpose of reviewing the book.Unity Game Development Essentials




User review
Great reference
This book is exactly what I was looking for. There is a lot of reference material for Unity out there but to have a project-based book as well written and thought out as this is priceless.

User review
Essential reading
Will Goldstone has a way of clarifying and simplifying concepts that at first seem obscure. He's a natural teacher and his book is a great primer for those serious about delving into the Unity game engine. And for those new to scripting, it will all begin to make sense after working through his exercises. There's a lot to learn to master Unity, but this is a great place to start. I keep wishing I had Will sitting by my side while I learn to use Unity, but in a way, I guess I do since his book is sitting next to my computer keyboard as I write this.