Hey guys,
Can someone please tell me, as I don’t see it noted on the website, if the development tools for Unity can run on Windows? I recall reading somewhere that Unity is a Mac only environment, although it will deploy to Windows. Is this true? If it is, will this be changed in the near future? And if not Windows, what about Linux? I run both Linux and Windows, but have never really been a Mac fan. (please don’t flame me 
).
Regards
Nope.
Yep.
Nope. The future, yes (apparently), but not the near future.
Nope.
Try running a Mac from within the last few years, and you’ll come around. 
–Eric
Yep.
FYI, if you look here you’ll see that it lists OS X as a requirement (and it doesn’t offer any Windows OSes thus implying it won’t run on those, you’re required to have OS X).
Otherwise your questions seem to have been answered well enough already…
Oh, yes… 
Rather small text, though.
Oh, well… I have my Torque engine at least.
If you’re really serious about it, I’d check out Unity on a friend’s Mac. Several people on here made the plunge based on Unity alone, and I don’t know of one who regrets it. If not, and you are satisfied with Torque, best wishes to you!
I’m not amazingly satisfied with Torque, no. Not because it isn’t great, but because it’s documentation sucks. It just doesn’t have the ease of being able to get what you want out of it, without tearing the thing apart. However, on the plus side, it is capable of doing what I want it to do. I just need to persevere.
Laz
If you ever get the chance to try the Unity free trial, I suspect you’ll appreciate getting your game DONE without all the persevering Good luck with your game!
Sounds reasonable. I never ventured too far into Torque land but I know some people on here have strong opinions about it. It sounds like the exact opposite reaction I had with Unity, however.
I have no income from games at the moment and no cash to invest either, so I hear you if money is the issue, but if Unity is going to accelerate how fast you get a product to market (and only you can test that out for yourself) then the extra money for an iMac (or whatever) seems pretty paltry.
Any PC people on here want to give some honest comment on their experience with Unity?
Do yourself a favor – and I say this as a contributor to the GG forums and contributor of a code resource to TGE – get a Mac and buy a copy of Unity. Today. Now. Like, stop reading this and go to craigslist and find a Mac, right now.
I’m fond of TGE but with it, so much of everything is a struggle. Every second you waste wrestling with Torque is a second you’re not spending on your game. Unity mostly gets out of the way and lets you do what you want.
GG understands this even if the rabid fans don’t – that’s why they’re now talking about a “Torque 2” that sounds, at the 10k foot level, a lot like Unity: news and if you’re an SDK owner, http://www.garagegames.com/mg/forums/result.thread.php?qt=68136. Which I would guess means TGEA will never get the promised OpenGL/Mac layer.
They’re talking 2008 for Torque 2, with features like polysoup, GLSL shaders, motion blur, a new integrated editor… sound familiar?
I guess I’ll chime in with my two cents…
Having personally reviewed over a dozen open source and commercial game development suites/libraries (from OSG to OGRE/Irrlicht to Torque) before deciding on Unity, I can say with considerable confidence that nothing else matches it in the ease-of-use department, which as all good Indie developers know is worth its weight in gold. Add Unity’s webplayer support into the mix (for no less than all of the major browsers on both the PC and Mac) and its only real competitor is DX Studio, which while being a solid product is unfortunately limited to Internet Explorer and Windows standalone deployment at this time. For standalone-only distribution on the PC side of things, there are a few up-and-coming products (namely Visual3D.NET and Blade3D) that show considerable promise in the aforementioned and all important ease-of-use category, but both of these are still in an early alpha stage and neither will be supporting the Mac anytime soon (as they’re both built on top of XNA).
The moral of all of this is that if you desire both RAD and cross-platform support (including web-browsers ) then Unity is pretty much your only choice at the moment, and $200 (or even $1500) really isn’t that much to ask given the the product’s near monopoly in its field. I mean heck, 3DS Max and Maya share a near monopoly in the high-end modeling and animation industry and they’re both several grand. 
That said, when you throw the price of a new Mac into the equation the deal does start to lose some of its luster, especially if you’re not overly fond of Mac OS X and have no intention of using the thing outside of Unity development (guilty! :twisted:). But fear not, as there is a cheaper, if not entirely legal, alternative. I won’t go into too many details, but suffice it to say that with a copy of Mac OS X Tiger in hand, a fair amount of experience with computers under your belt, the proper web resources located and a lot of time on your hands, it is entirely possible (though in blatant violation of Apple’s EULA) to turn a modern PC into a part-time Mac. For instance, say, an Athlon X2 3800+ rig with an Epox AF550G Pro motherboard and an EVGA GeForce 7800GT, which turns out to be a darn sight cheaper than an iMac. But you didn’t hear it from me.
I applaud macs tenacity and the OS its very nice. Simple figures though mac equate to 4% (and climbing) Windows 78% of the total global OS usage. I just can’t understand why unity is on the mac? Im sorry I like macs, though i am a windows user primarily. Literally all dev houses use a windows environment? I guess if it s a revolutionary thing then Keep on the good fight. Its a shame though as Id like to get my mits on Unity. it looks truly excellent. Just not going to purchase a mac to do it. I guarantee if it was Dual OS the windows uptake would be Maaahoosive! I applaud vision though
Must say it again Awesome looking engine and tools well done!
Waiting patiently for the windows version!
See, if it was a revolution thing, I would have thought the main contender to back would be Linux. It’s open source (well, not all, but most), works on non-proprietary machines, and is by far the easiest machine to develop for, due to its highly modular makeup. The only downfull, in terms of games development, is it’s lack of native drivers for most graphics cards. Still, it’s getting there, and looks to be the likely winner of the OS race, as it’s free. That usually wins out.
I think the Mac is a very natural place for the Unity project to have started. The designers are not only skilled developers, but have a keen eye for aesthetics, simplicity, and innovation. It’s no wonder Unity attracts such loyalty, really, since it “feels right,” in just the same way that a Mac is supposed to.
Unity seems to developed with clear but not financial gains in mind. I talk about macs and not linux as Macs are seen as ‘creative tools’ but its just branding as most creative tools exist on both mac and Pc (windows) platforms. its like if someone made an coconut OS and developed a super engine / dev environment for that and it was amazing but only %1 of the populating used it, just doesn’t make economical sense?
Heck id be Loyal to unity if I could try it but I can’t and dont have any spare ££££ to get a machine to do so. The tools do not make anybody any more or less creative (hate that word) I’ve used both MAC OSX and PC (XP + Vista) in working environments and my preference is Ole Microsoft. Just plain preference. Im also a keen games player and Macs just dont have the library of software I like to play. All Im saying is its a shame its not windows viable yet. Im against pigeon holing to OS specifics ie we will release for this OS and not that one (just like consols Halo3 only being ON Xbox etc) It’s a shame more dev stuff isn’t available on the mac as it is on the PC, healthy competition but I don’t want to be forced to purchase something just to get something else.
They have a small talented team and Im sure the windows version will come out soon till then ttfn.
Well, that’s where the major fallacy lies…just because there are 10X as many Windows machines doesn’t automatically translate to 10X as many sales. Far from it…you can find some cases where Mac versions sell as much as Windows versions (and occasionally outsell, actually). Some research suggests Mac owners are a little more likely to actually buy software, but probably the main reason is less “noise” in the Mac market and therefore you get noticed more easily, and your marketing dollars go a lot further. I mean, 20% of Microsoft Office sales this past year were the Mac version…
–Eric
He used the T-word
Torque is quite capable but its not such a creative workflow, like it is with unity. I prefer drag and drop (without lacking ability code or adjust anything you like, yourself).
Unity has a nice GUI, lots of features and is extremly easy to use…
When staying very basic, you can have a 3D shootem-up playable within a day. Just try it!
Are there any decent Unity examples for windows? That I could check out?
Also, could you name a good web based example?
Cheers
were shipping a few…
Go to gallery->live demos and download the standalone Avert Fate demo.
in the same sections, there are also the terrain and shadows webplayer demos
I’m amazed at how Mac users are portrayed as zealots, while on this forum there are an endless stream of potential Unity users who absolutely refuse, for all sorts of zealot-like reasons, to touch a Mac.