Just a few days break for an important project that came up at my “real” job π
I’ll probably continue posting on monday.
Day 8: Consecutive
So far I’ve taken more days off than I have posted updates. Time to change that!
Alright, day 8 of my little challenge and we’re -almost- halfway through the second tutorial.
On todays menu:
Chapter 07: Creating Shots, Chapter 08: Shooting Shots, Chapter 09: Boundary and Chapter 10: Creating Hazards.
As always, you’re more than invited to follow along and get to know Unity yourself. The tutorial videos are short and very well done, so you’ll be able to progress quite fast.
Here’s a screenshot todays work:
In gaming updates:
World of Warcraft is getting somewhat boring, but that’s not really surprising. Right now I’d like to level my prot warrior to 100 and just tank everything, but that takes time. We’ll see. I’ll probably take a break until a couple of content patches have arrived and the next expansions release date has been announced. By then there’ll be plenty of new content for me.
Until then, I’ll probably try to finally finish Dark Souls (only Gwyn left) and try out Issue #10 in The Secret World. Issue #9 was somewhat of a letdown, especially considering it’s f*king ζ±δΊ¬, but they absolutely deserve another chance.
Day 7: Dagnabbit
Business as usual, let’s just say I’m making “some” progress π
On todays menu of my journey through tutorial 02:
Chapter 05: Adding a Background
and
So far not a whole lot happened, but it’s looking a little bit prettier and I can move the ship around.
This is how it looks right now:
Day 6: Ship model, camera and lighting
Little progress, but still progress π
Today, Chapter 03: The player gameobject and Chapter 04: Camera and Lighting were completed. Basically the same procedure as in the previous tutorial, but slightly more complex. Using a premade model instead of just a primitive object, more lighting and a different camera setting.
This is how it looks so far, pretty boring:
Tomorrow I’d -really- like to complete the next four chapters in one sitting, so hopefully you can look forward to:
Until then!
Day 5: New Tutorial
Today I got started on the next tutorial: Space Shooter
So far I finished Chapter 1: Introduction and Chapter 2: Setting up the Project
I had a bit of trouble with the importing of the assets, Unity would crash at different points during the process and I never figured out why. This cost me some time, so I
Tomorrow I’l try to get Chapters 3-6 done, to make up for todays slightly reduced speed.
So nothing special happened today, unfortunately π
Day 4: First tutorial completed (still way too slow)
The first tutorial is done.
This should really have been completed in just one session, but I’m working on improving my time schedule. Especially since the later tutorials are more lengthy and complex, I’ll have to improve my productivity a lot.
Today I finished parts 7 and 8 of the first tutorial on the Unity3D website. Still, all really simple stuff, and I remember most of it, even though Unity has changed slightly since I last used it.
If you want to try out the game, you have four options:
(use the arrow keys to control the ball)
1) Play it in the browser, which requires the Unity Web Player plugin (I think).
2) Download the Windows version. Note: You have to exit the game with Alt+F4 after you’re done.
3) Download it for Linux
4) Download it for MacOS
Options 3 + 4 are untested, so…yeah, I don’t know if they work or if I uploaded the right files.
Tomorrow: Space Shooter
This tutorial uses premade assets and has twice as many chapters, so I have to stop being so lazy!
Day 3: Too slow…?
Today I did parts 03-06 of the first tutorial, so I’m almost done with the very first, very simple example.
However, I feel like I’m taking way too long. This should really be a quick one-day project and tomorrow will be the third day I’m working on it. The problem isn’t the difficulty (there is none), but my free time, of which I should have plenty. At some point in the day I’m losing a couple of hours…gotta figure out what’s going on there π
Anyway, here’s a screenshot of the current progress. Once I’m done, I’ll put a compiled download of the tutorial “game” up on this blog. Don’t expect anything, this is basically a “Hello World” application.
Day 2: Small steps
I’m a little bit unsure how to proceed with the blog from here on, because I’d like to post daily, but that would mean shorter postings. I guess I’ll figure it out over time.
Okay, back to business.
With a slight delay, I started with the first tutorial on unity3d.com.
The introduction is just an overview and completed very quickly.
Assignment 01: Setting up the game
Very simple and quick, a basic scene is set up with some lighting and some tips are given about organization of game objects.
Assignment 02: Moving the player
This tutorial explains how to set up some easy controls and link them to the player object.
Didn’t get very much done today, but better something than nothing. More tomorrow.
DevDay 1: Getting started
Okay, today I’ll talk about how I’m going to progress in the beginning.
As already mentioned earlier, I’ll be using the Unity3D engine, which is very popular both with independent developers as well as bigger teams, both for prototyping and actual development of a fully fledged product.
It’s a complete engine with almost everything on board required to make a game. You’ll also want some method of creating assets, which is why I’ll learn Blender on the side as well, but not right from the beginning.
This is the Unity3D website, where the basic version of the engine can be downloaded for free. You also have access to a number of tutorials, which I will be using in the upcoming days.
Blender can be found here, it’s also free and quite popular. But I won’t be covering this right away.
The Unity3D download is about 1GB. I’ve got everything installed and set up and will report on my progress through the first tutorial tomorrow!
Changes…?
Hey everybody, I’m still alive.
Of course I’ve been playing a lot of WoD and I actually enjoy it quite a bit. The questing is a lot of fun, maybe the best leveling experience ever in the game, and the endgame is enjoyable as well, with the new group finder. If I quit before it turns into a grind to get another .4 iLvls for my character, it’s an excellent expansion.
But I’m actually here to announce some changes coming to this blog. Until a while ago, I haven’t been able to work towards my future dream of becoming an indipendent game designer/developer. Now that my time schedule has recieved some drastic changes, I’m finally able to invest some time into making games.
The problem is, that I’ve forgotten how to use most of the tools I started learning a few years ago, before I had to use the time for something else. That means, I’ll relearn everything from scratch, starting with Unity3D and most likely Blender as well. I’ll probably improve my Gimp skills as well, because even though I’ve been using the software, I’m not doing much with it.
So, my plan is to once again post daily on this website. Either about my personal progress or about my thoughts on the world of game development in general.
I won’t post on weekends, because I probably need some time off as well π
I hope it will be fun to read the new content and maybe even interesting to follow me along as I expand my skills.
My goal is to create a couple of “practice” games, mostly by following tutorials from the web and books and by the end of the year be able to put together a small game by myself, using my own assets. I actually hope to reach that goal much sooner and I’m afraid I might reach it much later π
So, thanks for reading and see you tomorrow!