5/10/10 - Assets in unity: 'Gameplay'

Here are some screens of the game worlds students are currently developing:

4/19/10 - Creating assets for platform game

We created several assets in Cinema4D for our game. Our game is based around our future lives, and personal interests, so many of these game-items represent things of personal significance for the creators.

3/24/10 - Create, animate gem-collect item "Carrot" and import into Unity

Created an animated collectible 'carrot' item for the game, and imported it into unity.

3/22/10 - Bunny jump animation

Learned some animation fundamentals by making a rabbit character jump.

FINAL PROJECT

Create a 3D First person (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Fm3ebiMXJmM&feature=related) platform game based on your life in a total of 15yrs

The platform game (or platformer) is a video game genre characterized by jumping to and from suspended platforms or over obstacles (jumping puzzles). It must be possible to control these jumps and to fall from platforms or miss jumps.

Goal: To complete three levels of your life. what you will be in 5yrs, 10 yrs and fifteen yrs

Assets: Every student must create their plat former in three section-each section should represent the style and goals achieved by that specific age. The Last section should be all the way at the top and should represent 15 yrs-for example: If you wanted to be a doctor by your 10th year;then you would have rooms and stairs ,ladders etc that would represent a hospital. All students must also have goal items in each section. madatory goal items are: Travel and high school diploma.

Scripts: dont forget to use Rotate scripts as a game play ellement-you can control the speed as well-think

about how you can use this.

this is what we will be focusing on for the rest of the year so keep focued and try and use what you ahve learned all year-let's go!!!!

Making goal Items for your game.

Try to have as many goal items as you can... Today I would like to start out with a simple high school diploma and a globe (You can use the ones above, or you can always just find some other ones in google). Create a square (no bigger then 125 on the Y-axis) in C4D and attach the jpeg on to the model and run it through the "Pipeline":

#1. Burn texture map

#2. Burn object (only select-single texture and illumination)

#3. Load up the correct channel

#4. Export FBX

#5. Dump model and textures (illumination and surface color) into Unity project

#6. Place in game; apply texture by dragging and dropping.

Now go on the server and into the "Scripts" folder. Grab all the scripts inside and dump them into the scripts folder in your Unity project file. Select object in the "hierarchy" and go to "component" > "scripts" > "rotate object," also to jazz it up lets attach a particle system: go to "Game object" > "create other" > "particle systems" and change the "random force".

Animation Fundamentals

Lately we have taken a slight detour in the course to focus more on our animation abilities in Cinema 4D; instructor Mohammed Allababidi has been guiding us through the fundamentals of proper animation. Last week, we learned about 'Timing,' 'Spacing,' and Placing 'Key Poses.' We learned about these topics via the animation of a bouncing ball:

3D Platforming

Today we continue working on our platform game. I want to reiterate a couple of criteria for your platforming.

#1. Make sure you develop some kind of ladder, plank, or base to elevate your self.

#2. Unitize the jump button (space bar) to achieve more complex game play.

#3. Start your first person camera high up in the sky and work your way down-

#4. Use your rotate to add complexity to your platforming and to make your goal items stand out.

#5. Script: make sure you have "gem collect" on your First Person Controller, and make sure your goal items are tagged with "gem" and have collision detection.

Scripts

Scripts are basically files containing commands that tell Unity how certain objects should behave. One script you're familiar with already, is the one that allows us to walk around our game world in first person (the "FPSWalker" script). We are going to be using some other scripts as well that we will have to import, so that we could make our objects perform other actions, like rotate. To do this, we have to drag our script file into our 'Scripts' folder, that's inside our Standard Assets.

Now, to apply the script, either drag the script over to the object you want to attach it to, or select the object and go to "Component" > "Scripts" and select the script you want











One of the scripts that we are going to be using is called 'GemCollect;' this script lets us collect items (or 'gems') throughout our game a'la pacman or super mario. You should all have this script already included in your Scripts folder, so using one of the methods described above, attach the "GemCollect" script to your 'First Person Controller', this tells Unity that your character is able to collect certain objects. Next, to specify which objects are the ones that we can collect, we have to tag them. First select the object that you want to be collectible, then in the 'Inspector', click on the Tag attribute, and select 'gem.' If the tag 'gem' isn't already included, we're going to have to add it by selecting 'Add Tag...'.

This will take us to the Tag Manager; there, we will have to add the tag 'gem' to the first unused 'Element' in the list.

Once you have that done, just go back to the object you want to be collected, and select 'gem' from the Tag menu as described above. Repeat this for all your collectible objects.

Unity pipe line!

I just want to go back and review some basics from last class :

The PIPELINE

Once you are done with your model...

- Go to "render" then "bake object," and check: Ambient Occlusion, illuminate and single texture.

- After your burn, double-click on your texture; what you will see is check marks in "ambient inclusion" and "illumination," but not in "color channel;" we need to reverse this.

- Open up "ambient" and "illumination," then go to "clear"

- Go to your desktop where C4d has placed all your textures for walls etc. They will be labeled and have two textures for each section. Open them up in Photoshop, Cut and paste one on top of another and go to"multiply," then save of the psd as "walls texture" etc. Repeat this until all your textures are done.

Go back to C4d; in the texture attributes, hit "color" and load up those textures for each wall, ceiling, etc.

Now we are ready to bring this into Unity!

Also, remember that "light maps" add directional light, and require a burnt light map to work; Go to "terrain" > "add light map"

MESH HAVE COLLIDERS:

Lets' make sure we're not just able to walk right through our models; go to: "Component" > "physics" > "mesh have coliders"

A quick overview of Unity:

Unity navigation: Rotate, move and scale - very similar to cinema 4d, except you need to hold down "ALT" simultaneously for zooming in/out, and rotating the camera around the scene.
Layout screen: We have two working areas #1: all gray = working area #2: all blue (below the gray) = game screen
Main Camera: This is what should be in the middle of the sc reen-when you touch it you should have an axis-we call this now the "translate tool"-you mayemploy all move tools on this.
Inspector window: Very similar to our attributes menu in C4d, touch anything in the translate menu and it's attributes will show up in the inspector to your right.
Terrain: Go up to the top menu and click on terrain-go to "create terrain" then go to "terrain resolution" changes the resolution to 500m/500m square go to height map and change that to 30m. Manipulating your terrain: Go to Inspector window based on terrain and check out your options to move terrain-we have first the "raise height tool" - notice your various options for brush size etc.
Brush tool: This is a way to add textures to your terrain. you also can use this to apply tress etc. touch it and notice "edit texture" in the right corner-click on that then touch the triangle to it's right to get all the textures available to you. all your textures and assets will be in the bottom right next to game window-we call this our "toy box'-please save a version of your project into "Assets" and you will see it show up in you "TB"
Trees: When adding trees, don'tforget the bend factor; you can get trees the same way as getting textures.
Lighting: Go to "create other" and get "directional lighting" rotate it around to get your desired look-then go to "terrain" and then "render a light map" to secure your new lighting onto your land (remember-when you use light -make sure you always render a light map)
Sun: "create other " and add "point light" - you are going to need to add a flare on this - try "sun" under flare in theinspector window.
First person: Delete your camera by holding down ctl and hitting delete grab FP from TB and drop it onto your translate area. position it at 250/70/250 so itdrops into the center off our game.-Adjust speed and height in inspector. Play game: press play in the game view-walk around (remember, you must stop game before making anychanges.)

Sky: Go to "Render settings" click and let go-look to your right and find "Sky box" in your Inspector window.-click on that and grab a sky.

Water: Go to "pro-standard assets" in your toy box-make sure you position your water right and make sure you set the scale value to 1000/1000 (depending on your space)

Particle systems: Go to "Game object"-then "create other" then "Particle systems" look in the Inspector and see all the variables to control your PS-your going to mostly be concerned with upping the numbers on emitter 15/20 and emission 20/30 also try "world velocity" to give it a natural look

Unity 101 (Part 2)

Last class ,we learned how to manipulate and move through our terrain. Today i would like to go a step further by adding a sky, trees and water.

All items that are associated with terrain are under "terrain" in the top menu.

To add a sky, go to"edit" > "render settings," you should then see a section called "skybox."

Adding trees is also simple; go to the attributes of the terrain, and the tree button should be pressed as you select your desired tree. Place trees down by clicking on the scene.

Water is equally as easy; you will find water in your "pro standard assets," so just drag and drop the water, but you must change the size in the inspector.

Currently, our scenes are very dark; with out adding "directional" light, we cant see anything,

so go to "game object" > "create other" > "directional light," and move the light to obtain your desired look, then make sure you burn the light map by going to "terrain" > "create light map."

Last thing we learned was how to reverse our normals in order for our models to be inserted into Unity properly. Remember to make a copy of your object first, and then reverse its normals by making it editable on planes, and right-clicking to select "reverse normals."

Unity 101

Last class we started to learn unity. Today I want to go over what we learned.

In the top left corner, you will see everything you need for navagating through Unity. You have Object move, Scene move, rotate, reduce and enlarge.

You can also adjust the view by hitting the axis the the top right.

We also learned to get a terrain into our scene: from the top menu select "terrain" > "add terrain." As you can see, its attributes are on the right; these can be changed to manipulate your terrain.
Inserted objects were also something interesting we learned. Go to 'Insert object', then select 'cube'. Try placing the cube down onto your terrain using its axis.

First person: We grabbed this first person perspective camera and inserted that into our game from the menu below.
Press play above your scene and move your camera around using the keys.

We will go over all of this again for todays class; and remember, if you want to find an object in your game, simply click on the object in the manager, and press "f".

Congratulations on a successful mid-term!

You all had wonderful videos-This hard work shows that you all are ready to start building your game and now going beyond just 3-D.
here is some of your hard work: