Participants in the game design venue will be responsible for learning the Unity platform, as they will be required to submit a game for the showcase in April. Students will use the Unity Learn platform to learn how to program, edit in Unity, and publish their games, as well a long list of skills to help them work in teams. By April, students will be capable of designing, building, and programming a game using the Unity platform completely from scratch.
Structure
The game design learning materials are broken down into several milestones, each of which represents a concrete step toward becoming an experienced game designer. Milestones are accompanied by projects to demonstrate your knowledge and several learning objectives to keep track of what you’ve learned.
Within each milestone, resources will be provided for your benefit. These resources are not required. Feel free to skip around and learn at your own pace. If you think you understand a topic enough, attempt the milestone and test your knowledge. Many resources will come from Unity Learn, but some extra enrichment resources will be provided.
The learning materials are split into two sections – recommended and optional. Recommended units are important for beginners to Unity or programming, while optional units provide a lot of extra, useful content but are not important for beginners to do immediately.
Recommended Track
| Milestone | Topics | Links |
|---|---|---|
| Milestone 1 – Game Design Principles | – Principles of Game Design – Prototyping – Feedback and Development Process – Mechanics and Rules | Milestone 1 |
| Milestone 2 – Unity Essentials | – Installing the Unity Editor – Creating a new Project and Scene – Basic Scripting – Basic Primitives and GameObjects – Basic Interaction Management | Milestone 2 |
| Milestone 3 – Create with Code 1 | – Code Comprehension – Logic Structures – Unity API Programming – How to Use an IDE | Milestone 3 |
| Milestone 4 – Create with Code 2 | – Advanced logic structures – More API Programming – Implementing Custom Types – Debugging C# Code | Milestone 4 |
| Milestone 5 – Manage Scene Flow and Data | – Scene flows, and Managing Multiple Scenes – Data Persistence – Version Control | Milestone 5 |
| Milestone 6 – Apply Object-Oriented Principles | – Principles of Object Oriented Programming – Polymorphism, Inheritance, Abstraction, Encapsulation – Efficiency and Optimization – Profiling Code with Unity | Milestone 6 |
IT-Showcase Schedule
| Time | Item |
|---|---|
| 9:00 AM | Primary Challenge Submissions Due (a submission link and instructions will be released in Discord on/before 4/17/24 @ 5:00 PM) |
| 9:00 AM | Real-Time Challenge #1 Released |
| 9:00 AM – 12:00 PM | Primary Challenge Presentations (work time if not presenting) |
| 12:00 PM – 1:00 PM | Lunch |
| 12:45 PM | Real-Time Challenge #2 Released |
| 1:00 PM | Real-Time Challenge #1 Partially Due |
| 3:00 PM | Real-Time Challenge #1 & #2 Due |
| 4:00 PM | Awards |