Beginning 3D Game Development with Unity

1. Front Matter

   Pages i-xxii

   PDF

2. Exploring the Genre

   • Sue Blackman

   Pages 1-43

3. Unity UI Basics—Getting Started

   • Sue Blackman

   Pages 45-92

4. Scripting: Getting Your Feet Wet

   • Sue Blackman

   Pages 93-120

5. Terrain Generation: Creating a Test Environment

   • Sue Blackman

   Pages 121-179

6. Navigation and Functionality

   • Sue Blackman

   Pages 181-250

7. Cursor Control

   • Sue Blackman

   Pages 251-308

8. Action Objects

   • Sue Blackman

   Pages 309-405

9. Managing State

   • Sue Blackman

   Pages 407-438

10. Object Metadata

    • Sue Blackman

    Pages 439-452

11. Message Text

    • Sue Blackman

    Pages 453-504

12. Inventory Logic

    • Sue Blackman

    Pages 505-543

13. Managing the Inventory

    • Sue Blackman

    Pages 545-585

14. Finishing the Basic Functionality

    • Sue Blackman

    Pages 587-653

15. Getting Down to Game

    • Sue Blackman

    Pages 655-752

16. A Maze and the Final Level

    • Sue Blackman

    Pages 753-820

17. Menus and Levels

    • Sue Blackman

    Pages 821-906

18. Beyond the Basics

    • Sue Blackman

    Pages 907-937

19. Back Matter

    Pages 939-970

    PDF

Beginning 3D Game Development with Unity is perfect for those who would like to come to grips with programming Unity. You may be an artist who has learned 3D tools such as 3ds Max, Maya, or Cinema 4D, or you may come from 2D tools such as Photoshop and Illustrator. On the other hand, you may just want to familiarize yourself with programming games and the latest ideas in game production.

This book introduces key game production concepts in an artist-friendly way, and rapidly teaches the basic scripting skills you'll need with Unity. It goes on to show how you, as an independent game artist, can create casual interactive adventure games in the style of Telltale's Tales of Monkey Island, while also giving you a firm foundation in game logic and design.

• The first part of the book explains the logic involved in game interaction, and soon has you creating game assets through simple examples that you can build upon and gradually expand.
• In the second part, you'll build the foundations of a point-and-click style first-person adventure game—including reusable state management scripts, load/save functionality, a robust inventory system, and a bonus feature: a dynamically configured maze and mini-map.
• With the help of the provided 2D and 3D content, you'll learn to evaluate and deal with challenges in bite-sized pieces as the project progresses, gaining valuable problem-solving skills in interactive design.

By the end of the book, you will be able to actively use the Unity 3D game engine, having learned the necessary workflows to utilize your own assets. You will also have an assortment of reusable scripts and art assets with which to build future games.

Sue Blackman has been an instructor in the 3D field for nearly 20 years at art schools and community colleges. She has been involved with the commercial development of real-time 3D engines for more than 10 years. In the past, she has been a contributing author for New Riders Press (Max4 Magic) and written for AMC Siggraph on serious games. She has written product training materials and instruction manuals for developing content with real-time 3D applications, used by multimedia departments in Fortune 1000 companies including Boeing, Raytheon, and Lockheed Martin, among others. In addition to writing and teaching, Sue has been the lead 3D artist on several games for Activision and its subsidiaries.

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