Course Introduction and Planning

1. Course Introduction

2. Planning for Success

Planning for Course Completion

• Plan for 30-60 minutes per week to work through the course content

• Plan for 2-4 hours per week of game development in the Unity Engine

• Download the Course Toolkit

Coursework Activities

• Watch Videos

• Plan and prepare game development milestones

• Complete and submit assignments

• Provide peer review

• Share and reflect in discussion forums

Planning Your Time

You will work at the pace that works for you, however we do recommend to make sure you finish your game that you plan to spend 4-6 hours per week on the course over 8-10 weeks. Some assignments take a bit more logistical planning and time then others. Use this sample timeline to help you plan.

Suggested Timeline for 8 week game production

Important Information

• The course is self-paced and you can take as long as you like. To get the most out of the course use the Learning action plan to realistically plot your course time commitment.

• If you have questions or need advice use the commenting tools to ask questions of your fellow learners. In the next tutorial you will formally be asked to introduce yourself in the group.

3. Self-Assessment Prior to the Learning Experience

Before you get to far into the course there are foundational Unity development skills you will need to successfully create your first games. Some questions to ask as you map out your course approach and duration:

1. Where do you feel your skills are at right now with Unity? Use this to be honest about your skill set, in order to think about the kind of game you can realistically build.

2. What Unity skills do you still need to learn and how will you build time in for that?

3. Who can you connect with to get feedback on your game and learning goals?

The below questions are intended to help you understand the course and evaluate whether it’s right for you.

1. How familiar are you with burndown charts?
a. I have never heard of them or I have heard of them but don't know what they are.
b. I have some idea what they are, but don't know when or how to use them.
c. I have a clear idea what they are, but haven't used them.
d. I can explain what they are and what they do, and I have used them.

2. Do you know what milestones are in game development?
a. I know what a milestone is in general, but I haven’t heard of milestones specific to game making.
b. I can name them but I’m not sure I could define them.
c. I know what they are but I’ve never worked on a project that used them.
d. I can define them and I’ve worked with them in previous game projects.

SELF-ASSESSMENT CHECK: If you haven't worked with or even heard of these things, you're in the right place. Keep going. If you have already worked with game producing tools and the development lifecycle, you may find you already know a lot of the material. You can still benefit from the game design content and the unique insights of our guests.

3. Have you ever participated in a game jam?
a. I have heard of them but don't know what they are.
b. I know what they are but I’ve never been to one.
c. I have attended at least one.

SELF-ASSESSMENT CHECK: We do recommend that you participate in at least one game jam, preferably in person, before taking this course. Once you get a feel for how they work, you'll feel more comfortable with the structure of this course.

4. How familiar are you with Unity (the application)?
a. I’ve opened it but I couldn’t figure out how to do anything.
b. I’ve spent a few hours with it and done parts of some tutorials.
c. I’ve finished at least one tutorial that resulted in a complete game.
d. I’ve done a few tutorials and I’m starting to feel comfortable using it.
e. I’ve made several games with it and feel very comfortable using it.

5. How comfortable are you with using Unity’s collision system in scripts?
a. I know it exists but I haven’t used it.
b. I’ve used it as part of a tutorial, but I didn’t understand what was happening.
c. I can set up the components and write the scripts from scratch, but it takes a while and I never get it right on the first try.
d. I understand them well and I know where they fit in the script lifecycle.

6. How many of the following terms from game scripting could you define without looking them up?

• function

• variable

• class

• conditional

• loop

• array

• reference

• public

• property

• reflection

• dot product

• inheritance

• coroutine

SELF-ASSESSMENT CHECK: If you know five or more, you're in good shape! If you know fewer than six of the scripting terms, or you haven't got a solid grasp of Unity collisions, you may not be ready for this course yet – you'll get more out of it once you've picked up some more scripting. See the below resources for some tutorials and other courses you can use to build your skills.

Are you ready to start the course?

Even if you have seen everything in this survey or have taken this course before, you can repeat it, just like a game jam, and make a different game each time to practice your skills and build your portfolio.

Regardless of how much knowledge you bring to the course, you are welcome!

If you feel you're not quite ready for this course we recommend the following resources to get you started. Once you complete them consider returning and completing this course:

• The Roll-a-Ball tutorial is particularly recommended for a quick overview of Unity’s basic features.

• Creator Kits - Beginner Projects introducing core gaming concepts.

4. Course Toolkit

About the Toolkit

Throughout the Unity + USC Games Unlocked course, we created assignments to simulate real game development practices. This course is all about learning by doing. We created this course toolkit to help you plan your game development and production. The more you continue to practice a game development process, the better you’ll get at bringing your games to life.

Bringing a Game to Life

Lots of people start games, but it’s surprisingly hard to finish one. This course guides you through a process to help you build a game from idea to release. We’ll teach you the same design and production techniques used by professional game makers to develop their ideas, keep their projects on track and deliver a complete, released game. This process will help you choose an idea that’s the right size, refine and test it to “find the fun”, and make a workable plan to finish it.

• Every game starts with a concept. We’ll give you examples, guidelines and a theme to help you come up with an idea that you can implement within weeks rather than years.

• Then you’ll prototype your game – test different parts of your idea and see whether they’re fun and whether you can actually pull them off.

• Once you’ve got an idea that seems workable and fun, we’ll give you tools to plan your code and show you how to avoid common pitfalls, like writing all your code and then realizing you can’t find the right visual assets.

• As you work on your project you’ll check your progress against the specific development milestones used by game professionals. You’ll get weekly feedback from your fellow students to keep on track, and we’ll show you how to playtest your game – observe how your players see the game so you can refine the design.

• At the end of the course, you’ll release a small but finished game, and you’ll have the skills to bring your other game ideas to life.

Setting yourself up for success
We know time can be precious and work, life, school, and so on can be hard to balance with an online course. Ideally you will fly through this and get it done in 8 weeks. Then again it may take you much longer - you can take all the time you need. Using the above sample timeline think about how you will structure your time to complete the course and your game. To help you structure your time further you can also use our Learning Action Plan.

5. Unity Learning Action Plan

Create a Course Action Plan

Use the Unity Learning Action Plan to help you set your goals and figure out how you can best achieve them. Map out the amount of time you will take for each course project and assess if, in addition to what you learn in the course about the game development process, if you need to build your Unity skills to help you reach your goals.

Create your Action Plan

Now that you've assessed your current skills, download the Learning Action Plan template, a PDF file is also provided in the tutorial materials tab and create your course plan of action so you can create your game!

6. Course Structure

Assessments

To get the most out of this course, it is highly encouraged that you engage with and provide feedback to your fellow learners. This course relies on you self evaluating your work along the way. Use the guiding questions provided with each assignment to get the most out of these assessments.

Project 1: Goal Setting and Community Building

Learning Goals

• Confirm readiness for course

• Define personal goals

• Identify Unity skills and knowledge areas for review

• Understand course structure and resources

Assignments

• Assignment #1: Introduction and Course Planning

Project 2: Design and Planning

Learning Goals

• Understand role of constraints in design process

• Understand your own skills and resources as constraints

• Understand the concept of scope

• Assess your own skills and resources (including time) as part of scope

• Use a given constraint to develop an original game concept

Assignments:

• Assignment #1: Review examples of concept documents

• Milestone Assignment: Concept Document

• Step 1: Fill in the Concept and Scope Check template with information about your game concept.

• Step 2: Take screenshots of your document and upload it to the gallery.

• Step 3: Provide peer feedback in the gallery to at least 2 other learners.

Project 3: Prototyping

Learning Goals

• Understand the purpose of prototyping and the practice of divergent prototyping

• Create prototypes with Unity

Assignments:

• Assignment #1: Make an Asset Inventory

• Assignment #2: Prototype your game

Project 4: Milestones & Agile Development

Learning Goals

• Determine design priorities, identify features that can be cut

• Understand the importance of creating and testing asset plans

• Create a production plan for a small game project

Assignments

• Assignment #1: Backlog

• Assignment #2: Class-Responsibility-Collaboration (CRC) Cards

• Milestone Assignment: Build your Vertical Slice

• Step 1: Identify the core of your game and make a list of the features and assets you will need and prioritize them

• Step 2: Use CRC cards and a digital prototype to build your first vertical slide of your game

• Step 3: Get started building in Unity

• Step 4: Turn in your build

• Step 5: Provide peer assessment for at least one fellow learner

Project 5: Agile Development

Learning Goals

• Understand and apply Agile methodology to a game project

• Understand Agile terms and artifacts: backlog, sprint plan, burndown chart

• Create a sprint plan for this week’s iteration

Assignments

• Assignment #1: Sprint Plan for Vertical Slice Part 2

• Milestone Assignment: Vertical Slide Part 2

• Step 1: Get started building in Unity

• Step 2: Turn in your build

• Step 3: Browse the gallery and provide feedback to your fellow learners

Project 6: Writing Better Code

Learning Goals

• Understand the concept of code architecture

• Understand the concrete consequences of good or poor architecture

• Describe qualities of good architecture

• Understand the relationship between game design and code architecture

• Use tools (CRC cards and class diagrams) to develop a class diagram for a small game

Assignments

• Assignment #1: Refactoring Plan

• Assignment #2: Sprint Plan for Playtest Build

• Milestone Assignment: Game Build 1 for Playtesting

• Step 1: Get started building in Unity

• Step 2: Upload your project.

• Step 3: Use peer feedback instructions, and provide peer review for someone else's game

Project 7: Playtesting

Learning Goals

• Determine the best method for playtesting a game

• Plan and run a playtest for a game

• Implement Unity Analytics to measure key game metrics (optional)

• Generate action items from playtest and (optionally) Unity Analytics reports

Assignments

• Assignment #1: Playtest

• Assignment #2: Sprint Plan after Playtest

• Milestone Assignment: Game Build 2 after Playtesting

• Step 1: Get started building in Unity

• Step 2: Upload your project.

• Step 3: Browse the gallery and provide feedback to your fellow learners

Project 8: Release your game

Learning Goals

• Understand the pros and cons of developing custom tools for production

• Identify and describe professional tools, such as version control and project management/Agile software, that support a structured production process

Assignments

• Milestone Assignment: Release your Game

• Fix any bugs

• Make, test and save your final build

• Upload your game and submit the link in the gallery

• Reward yourself by playing your classmates' games

• Assignment 2: Make a Trailer (Optional)

• Assignment 3: Postmortem