This full semester course covers core fundamentals of developing games in the Unity game engine, including level design, importing art assets, writing code in C#, game design and planning, and much more. Over the course of the class, learners will build several complete games and many other small “side projects” to implement new lessons and improve their skills.

In the class, I draw from my years of experience in the game industry and as an indie game developer to help learners see the incredible potential of the Unity engine. I will also draw from my experience as a computer science and high school mathematics teacher to hone and develop critical thinking skills of taking a big problem and breaking it down into a series of smaller, more manageable, problems, which is the heart of what writing code is all about.

Key topics covered in this course are: 

Unit 1 - 4 weeks
- Using the Unity Editor
- Creating basic movement scripts
- Detecting contact and collision between objects

Unit 2 - 3 weeks
- Using Unity navigation systems to handle basic AI
- Scene and level transitions
- Special effects and post processing

(Two week break)

Unit 3 - 5 weeks
- Creating control systems for 1st person or 3rd person
- Lighting and level design
- Implementing animations

Unit 4 - 3 weeks
- Creating reusable components
- Scene and performance optimization
- How to plan for a project before beginning
- Debugging and balancing gameplay


Here is the official Unity tutorial for installing Unity Hub and a version of the Unity Editor: 

https://youtu.be/rE03nC4K_Eg

Here is the page to download Unity Hub (be sure to choose Unity Hub download): 

https://unity3d.com/get-unity/download

Be sure when choosing to install the Unity Editor version that Visual Studio is selected to be installed also.

For this class, we will be using the latest version of Unity 2021 (the Unity tutorial is a couple of years old and shows installation of Unity 2018), but the basic idea is the same.

Students will also need to create a Unity ID as part of the setup process. Students should consult with parents in the creation of a Unity ID. Students should choose the free “Personal” option for the type of account, not the student account.