Game Development Reference
In-Depth Information
Summary
In this chapter, you were introduced to Unity GameObjects through the use of several “primitive”
objects. Having something tangible to work with, you experimented with object transforms to
position, rotate, and scale objects in the scene. Making good use of Ctrl+D (Cmd on the mac), you
learned how to align objects with vertex snaps, with grid snaps, and finally, through the use of
“Align to View.”
Parenting, you learned, gave you the
offset
from the parent's transforms in the child object's
Transform component, rather than its actual transform values. Looking closer at the primitive
objects, you discover several of the most common Components. You found that you could hide an
object in the scene by disabling its Mesh Renderer component, or that you could fully deactivate it
through the check box at the top of the Inspector. Although you have not seen them in action yet,
you learned that Colliders are required to keep a player from going through other gameObjects or to
trigger events when another gameObject intersects with them.
With the addition of a Terrain object (a gameObject with a Terrain component), you experimented
with the generation and sculpting of a terrain. Using the Paint Terrain module, you painted textures
onto the terrain and observed the splat map that recorded your endeavors. You made this more
interesting by painting trees, grasses, and detail meshes, learning about some limitations and
peculiarities of each. After a short introduction to wind in Unity, you were alerted in the final section
to a few of the pitfalls encountered when creating terrain assets of your own or using assets not
specifically created for use with Unity terrain.
Finally, you finished off your environment with a skybox, some fog, and a first look at the Beast
Lightmapping system.
