Anyone into Android programming?

[emjay]

Hi, emjay.

1)  I don't know much about using Unity in Linux, and I didn't see a Linux version.  Unity is not very demanding on CPU/GPU, so if you have Windows running on Wine, I'm pretty sure it will work well.
2)  Shaders are scripts which describe how a graphics card should process 3D graphical information: color, gloss, reflections etc.  Custom shaders are an advanced subject, but almost completely unneeded to do things in Unity, with the exception of animating color-- and THAT shader is trivially easy to write. . . you could even just copy mine.  For the most part, Unity will do all the graphical stuff-- you basically just have to import the images you want to use for tiles etc.
3)  When you start a new project in Unity, it asks whether you are making a 3D or 2D project, and sets the basic scene up for you.  Unity is a boss at doing tile games, card games, and things like that.  Unity also has a complete 2D physics system: collision, hinges, springs, collision detection, etc. etc. built in.

Here's a little overview of 2D design:

Woh, seeing that I'm sold! I really wanna do this now. And since it's free that's even better! I'll see if I can get it to work in Wine, though I don't hold out much hope because only a small percentage of Windows programs do, but if I can't I think I'm prepared to buy a Windows laptop just for it. To be honest I do miss Windows a bit because I can hardly get any of my old games working on Linux. Anyway the closest I've ever got to game development was using Amos and Blitz Basic on an Amiga when I was a teenager. They were both designed to make game development easier as well. I made a 2D platform game of Dr. Who, with Daleks because they were easy to animate. Seriously, I can't wait to do this - thanks to both of you for the info Now you guys just carry on chatting and I'll dip in again when I've got something to show

[Rhizomorph13]

Bennyboy,

I checked out marble runner; I liked the control scheme. It was easy to make quick adjustments to force and also fine adjustments that felt natural.

[bennyboy]

Bennyboy,

   I checked out marble runner; I liked the control scheme. It was easy to make quick adjustments to force and also fine adjustments that felt natural.

Thanks, but tell that to my wife. She just can't get it. . . she's like swiping all over the place and tilting the phone upside down and stomping her feet, no matter how many times I tried to explain it.

Could you finish all the levels? So far only about 4 people have done them all, especially the last one.

[bennyboy]

Woh, seeing that I'm sold! I really wanna do this now. And since it's free that's even better! I'll see if I can get it to work in Wine, though I don't hold out much hope because only a small percentage of Windows programs do, but if I can't I think I'm prepared to buy a Windows laptop just for it. To be honest I do miss Windows a bit because I can hardly get any of my old games working on Linux. Anyway the closest I've ever got to game development was using Amos and Blitz Basic on an Amiga when I was a teenager. They were both designed to make game development easier as well. I made a 2D platform game of Dr. Who, with Daleks because they were easy to animate. Seriously, I can't wait to do this - thanks to both of you for the info   Now you guys just carry on chatting and I'll dip in again when I've got something to show  

That's great! Note that I really do have shite laptops at work (like about $500 or less), and Unity really does work fine on them. Not sure, but think they are i3 or even Core Duo computers.

[emjay]

Woh, seeing that I'm sold! I really wanna do this now. And since it's free that's even better! I'll see if I can get it to work in Wine, though I don't hold out much hope because only a small percentage of Windows programs do, but if I can't I think I'm prepared to buy a Windows laptop just for it. To be honest I do miss Windows a bit because I can hardly get any of my old games working on Linux. Anyway the closest I've ever got to game development was using Amos and Blitz Basic on an Amiga when I was a teenager. They were both designed to make game development easier as well. I made a 2D platform game of Dr. Who, with Daleks because they were easy to animate. Seriously, I can't wait to do this - thanks to both of you for the info   Now you guys just carry on chatting and I'll dip in again when I've got something to show  

That's great!  Note that I really do have shite laptops at work (like about $500 or less), and Unity really does work fine on them.  Not sure, but think they are i3 or even Core Duo computers.

Just to let you know I got my new laptop, have Unity installed, and have started on the first tutorial. The whole thing looks incredible - I'm so glad you put me onto it because I think it will become an obsession I think it's really gonna work for me because it looks like you can build up your projects iteratively and see the results as you go - much more so than you can with traditional programming - so less discouragement and more opportunity to use your imagination because it's almost like working backwards from the graphics to the code... almost like Minecraft for programmers.

[bennyboy]

That's great!  Note that I really do have shite laptops at work (like about $500 or less), and Unity really does work fine on them.  Not sure, but think they are i3 or even Core Duo computers.

Just to let you know I got my new laptop, have Unity installed, and have started on the first tutorial. The whole thing looks incredible - I'm so glad you put me onto it because I think it will become an obsession I think it's really gonna work for me because it looks like you can build up your projects iteratively and see the results as you go - much more so than you can with traditional programming - so less discouragement and more opportunity to use your imagination because it's almost like working backwards from the graphics to the code... almost like Minecraft for programmers.  

I'm glad you like it.

Yeah, you could complete an entire game with nothing but one-liner code bits (move here, change that text, go to the next level, etc.): pretty much you just have to tell your game what to do when colliders crash: play a sound, increase a counter, restart the level, whatever.

If you look at my little mini-game there, it was about 10% C# scripting and 90% learning how the "Animation" control works.

[emjay]

Just to let you know I got my new laptop, have Unity installed, and have started on the first tutorial. The whole thing looks incredible - I'm so glad you put me onto it because I think it will become an obsession I think it's really gonna work for me because it looks like you can build up your projects iteratively and see the results as you go - much more so than you can with traditional programming - so less discouragement and more opportunity to use your imagination because it's almost like working backwards from the graphics to the code... almost like Minecraft for programmers.  

I'm glad you like it.

Yeah, you could complete an entire game with nothing but one-liner code bits (move here, change that text, go to the next level, etc.): pretty much you just have to tell your game what to do when colliders crash: play a sound, increase a counter, restart the level, whatever.

If you look at my little mini-game there, it was about 10% C# scripting and 90% learning how the "Animation" control works.

I'm quite looking forward to it for another reason as well... there's only two languages available for writing the scripts, C# and JavaScript, and I don't have much experience with either, so now's a chance to learn I can't foresee much problem though in that department because, as you say, there's not much code, and the editor provided with Unity is very helpful.

I've got as far as moving the ball in the Roll a Ball project but I can already think of loads of games I could make based on balls, Snooker being the most obvious one and one that might even be possible based solely on whatever I learn in the rest of this project. Can't wait

Your little mini-game was really cool I have to say. It reminded me of Super Monkey Ball but with the innovation of these pipes that the ball could go through... that was pretty cool too, reminded me of Sonic. What was that face that it showed between every level, was that you?

Anyway I'm really happy with the new laptop I got for this. I specifically looked for one with Windows 7 rather than 8 and was lucky to find one brand new with Windows 7 Pro, a full copy of MS Office, 4gb of RAM, and a quad-core AMD processor, all for £330. Runs like a dream and I'm very happy with it

[bennyboy]

C# is most commonly used for Windows programming. You can download free versions of Visual Studio from Microsoft and there are a million tutorials on C# online. Same with Java.

Yeah, that face was me. I just put it in there to prove to my students that I really made the game-- otherwise they would have thought I was just pulling their legs.

I'm glad about your laptop. Sounds like a great deal.

[emjay]

C# is most commonly used for Windows programming.  You can download free versions of Visual Studio from Microsoft and there are a million tutorials on C# online.  Same with Java.

Yeah, that face was me.  I just put it in there to prove to my students that I really made the game-- otherwise they would have thought I was just pulling their legs.

I'm glad about your laptop.  Sounds like a great deal.

That's okay Benny, I've got the gist of C#, just missing a few syntax elements I had Visual Studio before when I had Windows before, and had a play around with C# then but mainly used VB. I might get Visual Studio again at some point but I don't think there is any desperate need.

I've finished the Roll a Ball project now and built it for Windows. I tried building it for Android just to see the process but it needs the Android SDK installed, which I wasn't sure I'd need, but glad I know. I know it probably wouldn't work as a game because the control method is different on a phone than a PC, but I did want to see how easy it was just to create an installable apk. It raises the the question of how they manage to keep the two in sync - I mean Android changes roughly every six months with new features added so I haven't got a clue how unity can implement the game in android and take advantage of all the latest features, if it does?

So is Unity widely taught in schools/colleges these days? I didn't quite realise until I saw the software and its site how professional and well supported it was. It's site says it's partners include Microsoft, Sony, Samsung, and Nintendo; I never realised it had such strong backing. But as usual I guess I'm jumping on the bandwagon very late and it's probably been around for years and built up a solid following?

[bennyboy]

I don't know about a solid following, but I know that Microsoft had XNA, which worked for Windows and XBOX, but they just couldn't keep up with support for it, so they discontinued support and supported Unity instead.

I don't think Unity DOES really support all new phone features, but I'm not complaining-- in a couple days, I can put together a little game, port it to my phone, and it works. That's better than anything else I've found.

Roll a Ball totally works on phone-- in fact the Marble game I showed IS Roll-A-Ball, basically with a couple animated tiles and added a touch control. If you ever want help with that, let me know.