Introducing the Unity Feast!

With the close of our annual iOS Feast, we here at raywenderlich.com feel like we’re just getting the party started. Not to let a good party die, I’d like to welcome you to our first ever Unity Feast!

The Unity Feast is designed to take you from a complete beginner to Unity, to making your first game – all within a week. And the best part – it’s completely free!

Here’s how you can be a part:

• Do 1 Tutorial a Day: Every day this week, we will be releasing a free Unity tutorial on our site. Go through each one to learn the basics of Unity development.
• Enter the Unity Game Jam: After reading the tutorials, you’ll know enough to make a simple game on your own. So enter our Unity game jam over the weekend to make your first Unity game.
• Win Prizes: Our Unity Tutorial Team will judge the games submitted in the game jam; the maker of the top-voted game will win a $50 Steam gift card and a new Apple TV! :]

Here’s a peek at the menu for the upcoming week:

1. First Course: Introduction to Unity
2. Second Course: Introduction to Unity 2D
3. Third Course: Introduction to Unity Animation
4. Fourth Course: Make a VR Game With Unity and Google Cardboard
5. Fifth Course: Introduction to Unity Particle Systems
6. Sixth Course: Introduction to Unity UI System
7. Dessert: Unity Game Jam

Let’s take a closer look at what’s inside!

First Course: Introduction to Unity

To start off the Unity feast, you’ll be served a tasty introduction of the engine. This tutorial is geared towards the new Unity user. The tutorial introduces you to the interface of the engine, and then you will make a game much like asteroids.

This tutorial doesn’t require any coding skills at all. It’s a gentle introduction that will get you up to speed relatively quickly.

Second Course: Introduction to Unity 2D

In the second course, you’ll be introduced to Unity’s 2D features. This tutorial will cover the basics of creating 2D games as well as understanding the 2D physics engine and animation system.

This is all done by creating a lunar lander game that is both fun to play and easy on the eyes. :]

Third Course: Introduction to Unity Animation

Animation is a huge component of making a successful games. Thankfully, Unity provides an excellent animation system. It is both comprehensive and fun to use.

In this tutorial, you’ll learn the ins and outs of working with the animation system by building a game that tasks with you with throwing pies at clowns. Doing so, will teach you the process of making objects move through 3D space. It will also cover the creation of state machines to manage your animations.

Fourth Course: Make a VR Game With Unity and Google Cardboard

Coming up fourth is a nice tutorial on VR (virtual reality). Whether you like it or not, VR is the next driving trend in gaming and Unity is hoping to be the preferred engine for creating VR games. Google Cardboard is a fun easy way to get started with VR without having to spend hundred of dollars on a dedicated VR headset.

This tutorial will walk you through the steps of using Google Cardboard to create a simple 3D game on your iOS device.

Fifth Course: Introduction to Unity Particle Systems

This tutorial is going to be tasting a little grainy. That’s because you’ll be eating lots of particles! Particles are ways to add that extra juice to your game to make it look awesome.

In this tutorial, you’ll learn the basics of working with Unity particles by creating both fire and an explosion. Don’t worry, you won’t have to take out an insurance policy to go through this one. :]

Sixth Course: Introduction to Unity UI System

For a long time, Unity was really hard to make user interfaces. It was clunky that required you to write lots of code in designated methods. While third party solutions did ease the pain, it wasn’t a solution that was fully embraced by the community.

With Unity 4.6, we saw the introduction of a brand new UI system that addressed all the previous issues. In this tutorial, you’ll walk through the basics of updating a game with the new UI system.

Dessert: Unity Game Jam

After chowing down a large meal, there’s nothing like having a sweet sweet dessert. In this case, you’ll be having jam and not just any kind of jam, but rather, a great big helping of a “game jam”.

The Unity game jam is a great way to practice what you’ve just learned by reading the previous tutorials. It will be a great learning experience, a ton of fun – and hey, you may win some prizes!

The Unity game jam will start on Friday, November 20th and ends at midnight on November 22nd. Your job is to create a 2D game in Unity, using some artwork we’ll provide to you. You can, of course, add your own art but the games should in some way make use of the provided artwork.

Winners will be announced on Friday, November 27th. The top winner will take home a new Apple TV and a $50 Steam gift certificate. Runners-up will also be receiving prizes as well.

Stay tuned for more details this Friday. Get ready to have fun, be creative, and well, knock our socks off!

About the Cooks

Finally, I’d like to take the time to thank the Unity team. The Unity team is composed of a group of passionate Unity developers. We were only formed in this summer and as you can see, in the past few months, we’ve cooked up some wonderful tutorials.

While you can find out more about them on our about page, I thought I’d take the time to introduce them here.

Joachim Baur

Sean Duffy

Georgi Ivanov

Todd Kerpelman

Brian Moakley

Pedro Pereira & Orlando Pereira

Barbara Reichart

Eric Van de Kerckhove

Joa Baur is a German software developer. He started to code some 20 years ago (anyone remember Macromedia Director 4?). Nowadays he primarily uses Unity3D and WebGL to produce commercial applications such as configurators and product presentations.

Other favorite passtimes include reading/watching scifi and listening to EBM music or his daughter playing the trumpet.

You can take a look at his projects over on his website or play his logic puzzle game COMBIN3 (made with Unity) on Android or Windows Phone.

Sean is a software engineer by day, and hobbyist game and tools developer by night. He loves working with Unity, and is also a Unity Asset Store developer with a special focus on 2D tools to help other game developers. Some of Sean’s more popular Unity Assets include his 2D Shooter Bullet and Weapon System and 2D Homing Missiles assets.

You can find Sean at his personal blog or on Twitter

Georgi is an independent iOS developer and consultant with background in server-side development. Every so often shares thoughts and experience on his blog. Whenever he’s not building apps, he spends his time reading interesting books or concocting a new kitchen disaster.

You can find Georgi on Twtter and LinkedIn.

Todd Kerpelman used to be a halfway decent game designer, until he tricked Google into hiring him on as a Developer Advocate, and now he spends his time making YouTube videos. He figures it’s just a matter of time until they discover he doesn’t know what he’s talking about, so he’s stockpiling snacks in the meantime.

Brian is not only an iOS developer and fiction writer, he also holds the honor being Razeware‘s first fulltime employee.

Brian joins Razeware with experience from companies such as ESPN’s online fantasy team and Disney’s Internet Group. When not writing or coding, Brian enjoys story driven first person shooters, reading some great books, and he runs his own “Let’s Play” channel on YouTube.

Pedro Pereira and Orlando Pereira are two Portuguese game developers and founders of the Wicked Cat Studios. They both graduated in Informatics Engineering at the University of Beira Interior, Portugal. Currently, they have several projects together, in the fields of mobile computing, namely using the Unity engine.

Barbara Reichart is currently doing her PhD at TUM, where she teaches software engineering and iOS development. In her free time she develops games (Treeo Games). Her first published game is Tw!nkle. You can also follow her on Google+.

You can find Barbara on Twitter.

Eric is a belgian hobbyist game dev and has been so for more than 10 years.
He started with DarkBasic, RPG Maker, Game Maker & XNA and now he makes games using Unity.
Eric also takes interest in 3D modelling, vector art and playing video games.

• 
  

  Joachim Baur

  

  Joa Baur is a German software developer. He started to code some 20 years ago (anyone remember Macromedia Director 4?). Nowadays he primarily uses Unity3D and WebGL to produce commercial applications such as configurators and product presentations.

  Other favorite passtimes include reading/watching scifi and listening to EBM music or his daughter playing the trumpet.

  You can take a look at his projects over on his website or play his logic puzzle game COMBIN3 (made with Unity) on Android or Windows Phone.

• 
  

  Sean Duffy

  

  Sean is a software engineer by day, and hobbyist game and tools developer by night. He loves working with Unity, and is also a Unity Asset Store developer with a special focus on 2D tools to help other game developers. Some of Sean’s more popular Unity Assets include his 2D Shooter Bullet and Weapon System and 2D Homing Missiles assets.

  You can find Sean at his personal blog or on Twitter

• 
  

  Georgi Ivanov

  

  Georgi is an independent iOS developer and consultant with background in server-side development. Every so often shares thoughts and experience on his blog. Whenever he’s not building apps, he spends his time reading interesting books or concocting a new kitchen disaster.

  You can find Georgi on Twtter and LinkedIn.

• 
  

  Todd Kerpelman

  

  Todd Kerpelman used to be a halfway decent game designer, until he tricked Google into hiring him on as a Developer Advocate, and now he spends his time making YouTube videos. He figures it’s just a matter of time until they discover he doesn’t know what he’s talking about, so he’s stockpiling snacks in the meantime.

• 
  

  Brian Moakley

  

  Brian is not only an iOS developer and fiction writer, he also holds the honor being Razeware‘s first fulltime employee.

  Brian joins Razeware with experience from companies such as ESPN’s online fantasy team and Disney’s Internet Group. When not writing or coding, Brian enjoys story driven first person shooters, reading some great books, and he runs his own “Let’s Play” channel on YouTube.

• 
  

  Pedro Pereira & Orlando Pereira

  

  Pedro Pereira and Orlando Pereira are two Portuguese game developers and founders of the Wicked Cat Studios. They both graduated in Informatics Engineering at the University of Beira Interior, Portugal. Currently, they have several projects together, in the fields of mobile computing, namely using the Unity engine.

• 
  

  Barbara Reichart

  

  Barbara Reichart is currently doing her PhD at TUM, where she teaches software engineering and iOS development. In her free time she develops games (Treeo Games). Her first published game is Tw!nkle. You can also follow her on Google+.

  You can find Barbara on Twitter.

• 
  

  Eric Van de Kerckhove

  

  Eric is a belgian hobbyist game dev and has been so for more than 10 years.
  He started with DarkBasic, RPG Maker, Game Maker & XNA and now he makes games using Unity.
  Eric also takes interest in 3D modelling, vector art and playing video games.

The Unity team does have some open spots. If you’d like to join our awesome team, feel free to send me an email at: brian-at-razeware.com