Learn about unity commands?

News & General Discussion
1

So I’ve been learning C# and it’s pretty basic since I just need to learn the syntax and stuff, however I still got literally no idea how to do stuff on unity because unity has so many “unity unique” commands/functions that I just don’t know they exist or which to use.

What would be a good place to learn about all these unity commands? I can’t even do something as simple as making a crosshair in the middle of the screen without googling. (And I don’t want to be spoonfed, I must learn how to do it myself for a project)

2

The really important ones to learn are Transform, GameObject and MonoBehavior. Learn everything else as you need it.

3

Thing is I need to know all of them to fit what I need to do, if I need to do stuff with “OnGui” for example I wouldn’t ever guess I would need OnGui since I don’t even know it existed in the first place. That’s my biggest problem

4

You’ll find your self using what BoredMormon said over and over and over again until you’re tired of using the same thing over and over again lol.

@sumusiko - You don’t need OnGUI anymore unless you’re doing editor scripts or want to do it the old fashioned way. Look into the new Unity UI.

5

I needed to use OnGui apparently, to make a crosshair show up ingame, not sure about now, but I’ll check it out and try to find a solution

6

No you don’t you can do it with regular UI. Without a line of code.

7

There are several approaches to ‘not knowing what you don’t know’ that I use with Unity.

  • Browse the docs and the manual from time to time. Open up to a random page and start reading.
  • Use google. Someone will have posted a similar problem and a solution. Use that as a spring board to find new sections of the docs or apply them in new ways
  • Help out on answers. Every one struggles to set their own exam. Answering other peoples questions will force you to think about new problems
  • Hang out in the scripting section. Its mostly just noobs wanting to know how to use GetComponent or track down a null reference error. But every few days a thread comes up where some of the more experienced coders share some of their techniques. These are great spring boards to start a google search into new ideas.
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8

All I can think of is making an image and resize it to the size I wish and make it a child of the main camera but if the game was online, wouldn’t other players also be able to see the crosshair of each player this way?

Either way, I’ll look into it.

9

As long as you make sure it’s off for other players then no.

That’s how networking works. everything is on. But if the NetworkView or PhotonView(if using photon) is not yours, don’t exist on the other clients.

E.G. -

if(photonView.isMine){
enable stuff here.
}
else if(!photonView.isMine){
disable everything here.
}

10

Oh thanks!

One more thing:

this is my current stuff, since i’m just trying some stuff still, however when I move the AK & CSS Arms into “FirstPersonCharacter” to make sure that the arms & weapon follow the camera/crosshair & not stay static, the AK & Arms just dissapear for some reason.

Any idea what could possibly be causing this?

11

You probably want to stop now.

Multi player online games are typically not good ideas if you are struggling with figuring out a cross hair. Networking code is perhaps the most difficult type of programming to approach. Start smaller and work your way up to it.

12

Yea I wasn’t planning to do it, just wanted to make sure that other people wouldn’t see it if I ever go for an onine project

13

That’s what Bored is trying to say. You either do it or you don’t, otherwise you’re gonna practically be creating everything you do create all over again.
I’d recommend sticking to single player right now as well.

Seriously we aren’t trying to be mean. I admire the ‘want’ to want to build the game you want, but all good things come in time buddy. I’d try to learn all the basics and master them before moving on to harder things.
Heck I sat in unity for a year just doing basic stuff. Then once I mastered that, I had a firm grip on how everything was done, well - to a point. But I was able to move on to harder and better things.

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14

Its important, especially on your first few games, to clearly limit your scope. Define a bunch of things that your game will not do. And don’t give in to the temptation to change the list, or your game will never be released. For a FPS type game this might include:

  • I will not include multiplayer
  • I will only launch on PC
  • I will not include a custom level editor
  • I will not include crafting
  • I will not include customisable anything
  • I will not do open world
  • I will only include x number of weapons
  • and so forth…

And don’t be afraid of Google. There are far too many techniques to learn all of them and hold them all inside your skull at once. Consider Google and the resources it allows you to access to be an extension of your memory.

There is an anecdotal story that Einstein was once asked for his phone number by a reporter. He promptly opened the phone directory, looked up his number, wrote it down, and passed it to the reporter. The reporter was dumbfounded that the smartest man on the planet* could not remember his own phone number. Einstein responded saying “Why should I memorize something I can so easily get from a book?”

I have no idea if the story is true or not. But it does illustrate an important point. Most intelligent people I work with these days are masters of how to find and use information. Not how to memorise it.

*I was not yet born at the time of this story

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15

The thing with googling is that I’ll be using someone elses code and if I don’t fully understanding, when presenting the project to judges if they ask me what does this particular piece of code does and I don’t know I’m done. I wanted to be the one coding everything from scratch (All the assets that aren’t included right away from unity)

So far for this project I only have a few desires and I’ll end it there.

Make at least 7-8 different weapons. Make the shop, get the guns to shoot, make zombies walk / run towards player with decent AI, make a login screen, store a bunch of different stuff in a database for players to be able to start the game from any computer. (if it was online, I need databases in this project for the judges.)

Also could you maybe take a look at what might be happening?

this is my current stuff, since i’m just trying some stuff still, however when I move the AK & CSS Arms into “FirstPersonCharacter” to make sure that the arms & weapon follow the camera/crosshair & not stay static, the AK & Arms just dissapear for some reason.

Any idea what could possibly be causing this?

16

Simple. You’re trying to run before you’ve even learned how to crawl. If you cannot handle creating a crosshair then you don’t have any chance of succeeding in making a complex game. You need to stop and learn the tools first. Best way to do that is to go through the Unity Learn section.

http://unity3d.com/learn

Once you’ve done that you start making simple games (one gameplay mechanic) until you have a good grasp of the tools.

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17

Any specific tutorial you’d recommend as a must?

18

This one.

19

They’re all useful in some way.

20

I see what you did there :wink:

Honestly, I always recommend the Roll-A-Ball tutorial as your very first intro to Unity. Its older now, but it gives you a very good overview of Unity’s interface and really holds your hand through all of it. Its kinda boring if you know the code, but just kind of seeing where everything is in Unity will make you feel more comfortable with the software :smile:

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