Issue #230 - Keep It Simple

This article was originally published on GameDevDigest.com

Here is another week of tips, including some on keeping your scope achievable. Enjoy!

Nathan Tolbert pushes the limitations of new games on old consoles - Nathan Tolbert is a lead research software engineer at the National Center for Supercomputing Applications (NCSA) at the University of Illinois, and for the past 15 years he has also been developing indie games in his spare time for his company Bite the Chili Productions. These aren’t just any games, but new games for the original Nintendo Entertainment System (NES).
smilepolitely.com

Spirit City: Lofi Sessions. How Shrinking Down Lead To Huge Success - This game is an amazing success and in a genre that many indies probably haven’t even heard of: productivity idle game / room decorator / creature collector. In today’s post I am going to break down how this game came to be and the signs of success along the way.
howtomarketagame.com

Made With Unity DOTS | Let’s Move A Cube - I will REALLY TRY to explain the basic stuff on Unity DOTS with a small example of moving a cube. Yes, it’s very baby steps, but learning little by little is the best way I know.
rehtse-studio.medium.com

Solo-Devs and Risk-Takers (An Artistic Exploration of Experimental Tools) - Tools outside of the mainstream, made by just one person, a group of friends, or a small team… all asking “what if”, and then exploring how their tool can empower creation in an idealistically creative way.
gamedeveloper.com

Unity Asset Bundles tips and pitfalls - While there are a lot of guides on how Asset Bundles work, I’d like to cover some lesser-known aspects of the system, with a focus on game performance, memory runtime usage, and general compatibility.
Unity

See the Unity 2022 LTS updates to two of our biggest e-books: URP and HDRP for advanced users - With the HDRP guide weighing in at 186 pages and the URP one at 166 pages, these are two comprehensive resources you can reference throughout the planning and development of your Unity 2022 LTS-based projects. Let’s look at what’s in each of the guides.
Unity

Videos

Coding Adventure: Rendering Text - This... is text! Let's figure out how to draw it.
Sebastian Lague

I Optimised Volumetric Lighting Up To 11,764 FPS - I've compared 2 sunlight rendering methods and created a 3rd method that runs 70x faster.
Vercidium

Learn C# Intermediate FREE Tutorial Course! - Here is a FREE video with all the Video Lectures for the Intermediate section of my complete C# course!
Code Monkey

2 Overrides every Unity Dev should Use #unitytips - hey everybody in this video I want to show you two really cool Unity features that are built in that'll save you a ton of time if you know they exist
Jason Weimann

Developing 'Terra Nil': A Strategy Game About Nature, Not Expansion - Terra Nil is a strategy game that eschews many of the mainstays of its genre. Lead designer Sam Alfred offers a look at how the team drew inspiration from the natural world to make a strategy game that's not about the exploitation of natural resources, but about balance. This talk on the design of Terra Nil illustrates how, by looking outside established boundaries, old genres can be reinvigorated.
GDC

Happy Harvest URP 2D sample game customization tutorial | Unity - In this video, we add some customizations to the URP 2D Happy Harvest sample.
Unity

EASY Stats and Modifiers in Unity | Broker Chain Pattern - Dive into Player Stats and Modifiers using the Broker Chain pattern! Uncover how this powerful design pattern can streamline your coding process and enhance game mechanics. Get ready to supercharge your programming skills and bring your game ideas to life like never before!
git-amend

Assets

Spring Sale – 50% off - Feed your creativity with 50% off 300+ of top assets, including tools, 3D animations, audio, and more.
__

Blender Core Skills - The Ultimate Blender Basics Bundle - Level up your Blender skills. It’s time to begin the next step in your Blender journey with this bundle of video courses from CG Cookie, designed to get you up and running a number of essential skills and disciplines in the realm of 3D art. If you’re just starting to get your bearings, kick things off with a full course on 3D mesh modeling with Blender, then learn to create lifelike organic shapes with a course on sculpting. Bring your creations to life with thorough courses on rigging and animation. Master skills like these and many more, and help support One Tree Planted with your purchase!
Paulsams Affiliate

MateAnimator - Adding more features to the open sourced Animator from Unity.
ddionisio Open Source

AnimatorCoder - Trigger Unity animations entirely through script - Complete Edition
SmallHedge Open Source

save-async - Save Async is BUCK's Unity package designed for asynchronous saving and loading of game data.
buck-co Open Source

hack-and-slash-framework - HnSF is a Unity framework for developing Hack-and-Slash/Character Action games.
christides11 Open Source

Descent3 - Descent 3 by Outrage Entertainment. This is the latest version of the Descent 3 source code. This includes the '1.5' patch that Jeff Slutter and Kevin Bentley wrote several years ago. At the time, it worked for Windows, Linux, and Mac. [Hacker News post]
kevinbentley Open Source

Krotos SFX & Plugins for Sound Design Bundle - All-in-one audio workshop. The Krotos SFX & Plugins for Sound Design Bundle offers you a broad collection of high-quality sound effects spanning across classic categories of sound design like Foley, Surfaces, Magic, Weapons, Combats and many more, as well as two modern synths and 3 months of the flagship plugin Krotos Studio. Krotos Studio is a groundbreaking software designed to revolutionize the way people work with sound effects by offering a seamless blend of speed, quality, and creative freedom, allowing users to produce high-quality, unique, and royalty-free sound effects swiftly.
Humble Bundle Affiliate

MercuryMessaging - A framework and encompassing toolkit to facilitate nonspatial communication in the Unity game engine.
ColumbiaCGUI Open Source

SlnMerge - SlnMerge merges the solution files when generating solution file by Unity Editor.
Cysharp Open Source

coreutils - Structural systems and tools that make using Unity easier and more productive.
fantabulous-tech Open Source

UnityTools - A set of useful code stuff for Unity
oleghcp Open Source

CustomRayTracing - Path Tracing with Unity RayTracing Shader
Andyfanshen Open Source

BrgContainer - Batch Renderer Group is an API for high-performance custom rendering in projects that use a Scriptable Render Pipeline (SRP) and the SRP Batcher.
LizzyFox-code Open Source

unity-editor-icons - List of Unity Editor icons.
jasursadikov Open Source

Learn To Make Games in Godot 4 Bundle - Godot 4 Mastery Awaits. Been sitting on your game dev ambitions? Jump on this bundle of online courses from GameDev.tv, packed with expert instruction on the skills you need to develop both 2D and 3D games using Godot 4. Learn the fundamentals of game mechanics, animation, scripting, and more with courses dedicated to both 2D and 3D game development. Spread your wings with specialized courses covering topics like C#, multiplayer and mobile game development, and more. Also included are a host of premium asset packs to help your creations stand out. Kick off your game project today and help support Kiss the Ground with your purchase!
Humble Bundle Affiliate

50% off OccaSoftware - OccaSoftware makes easy-to-use tools and assets that help you make stunning games - even if this is your first time. PLUS, get Super Simple Skybox for FREE with code OCCASOFTWARE
Unity Affiliate

An Upcoming Open-source Framework For Layer-Based Infinite Procgen - LayerProcGen is a framework for Unity and any C#-compatible engines for implementing layer-based procedural generation facilitating a structured way to organize generation processes and how they depend on each other.
80.lv

Master of C# and .NET Book Bundle - Mastery of C# and .NET awaits. Upgrade your approach to software development with this meticulously curated bundle of books from Packt, covering C# and a host of related topics. Kickstart your journey with C# Data Structures and Algorithms, written to help you understand these crucial concepts in computing. .NET MAUI Cross-Platform Application Development provides a comprehensive guide to building versatile applications across multiple platforms. A Developer's Guide to .NET Azure will empower you to harness the cloud, opening doors to scalable, high-performance applications with global reach. Pay what you want for all these and more—over 20 books in all!—and help support Trees, Water & People with your purchase!
IvanMurzak Affiliate

Creator Boombox - Loopable Royalty Free Songs For An Upgraded Experience - A library of loopable royalty-free tunes. Does your project need a soundtrack? Jump on this bundle of royalty-free music and get 20 track packs representing a spectrum of genres, ready to add a new dimension to your creation! Whether you’re looking for chill coffee shop vibes, ambient lo-fi beats, hard-driving EDM, or anything in between, you’ll find the sound that your project needs. A total of 12 hours worth of songs. Pay what you want for a music library that will keep you stocked with tunes for years to come and help support Alzheimer’s Research UK with your purchase!
Humble Bundle Affiliate

Spotlight

Vasilisa and Baba Yaga - An adventure game based on the Russian folktale "Vasilisa the Beautiful". A scary story about the journey to the mistress of the forbidden forest for magical powers.

[You can get the demo on Steam and follow them on Twitter]
Baba Yaga Games

My game, Call Of Dookie. Demo available on Steam

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