Introduction to Mobile Gaming

This 1-day course will introduce beginners to Unity and its suite of 2D mobile features. Students will build a 2D mobile game from the ground up and learn how to implement the following: sprites, animation, game mechanics, analytics, monetization, and publishing. By the end, students will have built characters, scenes, animations, and game mechanics for mobile deployment of their game.

Who Should Attend

• Anyone looking to develop games for mobile platforms.

Prerequisite

• Practical working knowledge of computers and basic Mac OS X or Windows skills.
  

Course Outline

Note: The curricula below consists of activities typically covered in a class at this skill level. The instructor may, at his/her discretion, adjust the lesson plan to meet the needs of the class.

Lesson 1: Setting Up a Project for Mobile Games

• Distinguish features that enable mobile development versus other platforms
• Identify the platforms the Unity Engine can deploy to plan building content once and deploy across platforms
• Identify trade offs made for mobile deployment versus PC/Console deployment
• Identify optimization considerations to the provided assets and why they were made for the 2D mobile game project
• Effectively navigate the Unity Editor to create a simple mobile game
• Identify the different Editor windows and their purposes
• Use common hotkeys and shortcuts to navigate in the Editor
• Configure a Unity Project for 2D Development

Lesson 2: Creating Animations and Players

• Use the Unity 2D toolset to set up characters and scenes
• Use the Sprite Editor to slice Sprite Sheets for use in the Scene
• Apply 2D colliders for Physics interactions
• Configure Prefabs for use throughout the Scene
• Use Tilemap to build multi-layered Sprite based Scenes
• Use Scriptable Tiles to Adjust Sprite Z-positioning to create a parallax effect
• Create in-editor animations to generate animations for scene elements and the character
• Import character sprite sheet animations
• Create keyframe animations to create smooth transitions for the character animations
• Enable the control of multiple animation sequences with the Animator
• Enable the Sprite Packer to automate and optimize textures applied to Sprites
• Create Scriptable brushes for the platforms

Lesson 3: Creating Game Mechanics

• Build 2D game mechanics that enable mobile gameplay
• Use scripts to implement gameplay
• Configure a Cinemachine camera to create a follow camera
• Apply and configure mobile gestures (touch, tap, and swipes) to implement Player controller
• Build a simple UI to display gameplay behavior

Lesson 4: Finalizing the Game

• Plan for using services to improve long term game play and build mobile monetization and business strategies
• Identify monetization services for mobile games
• Identify retention services for mobile games
• Identify Google Cloud save for storing information for multiple devices
• Create a basic plan for implementing services for future 2D mobile game development

Lesson 5: Unity Services for Mobile Games

• Prepare for mobile deployment
• Publish the completed 2D Game to Android and iOS