Proof of Concept. Some Beginners Questions

Hi,
i am quite new to Unity.

But i wanted to make my first own thing.

Up till now, I only did Tutorials.
And No!
I dont want to start my first full Games now, that would be to much, for my skill level.

But a small test sound great.

What am I planning?

In short, a Strategy Game in the 18th Century.
Like this

Really not something high Detail, like Total War (I am not that Insane)
But some low Res. Version of Ultimate General.

Ultimate General

You know a Top Down, Isometric view and some pixels moving around, that with some Imagination are Soldiers.

For this Proof of Concept, I just need a big level Grass Field, and some guys shooting each other.
But here are my Problems.

A. The Style of Warfare means a lot of Guys at one Place! This is very bad for the Performance.

Should I create a lot of Guys and somehow get them to march in some kind of Formation?
Or should I make one Object and use some advanced trickery to make the look like a Formation of many guys?

And how?

B. I dont know if I should make it 2D or 3D.

At first my Plan was to make the hole thing 2D.
I wanted a simple Style, so I can make the Assets myself (I think … I hope)

But than I saw the Tutorial Game “Tanks”

Which is 3D but look quite 2D´ish

Now that look much easier to make than a 2D game that looks like Ultimte General, and it allows some nice touches. But … I know next to nothing about 3D Modelling.

And I would think that a 3D Game would hurt the Performance much more than 2D, or am I wrong?
And what would you think would be easier?

Thanks in Advance

Don’t worry about performance. That’s the last of your worries. You have much bigger problems at this stage. :slight_smile:

It’s no advanced trickery; a formation of guys could literally be just a sprite which you have drawn to look like a formation of guys.

But in this, as in everything else, you should do whichever seems easiest to you.

Which seems easier? Probably 2D.

It doesn’t matter what it looks like, but 2D math is sometimes easier than 3D math. And certainly, given what you’ve said, it will be easier for you to hack out some programmer art in 2D. So you should do that.

You are wrong, and also, performance doesn’t matter. :slight_smile:

What matters is what you think would be easier.

I’m excited for you; this is a fun project you’re starting. Just remember that the greatest risk to it is not that it will perform poorly or be too ugly or be too similar to some existing game. The greatest risk is that you will get bogged down on some problem, and never finish it.

So your first and only criterion for any decision is: which way is easier for you? Then do it that way. Relentlessly dodge, avoid, cut out, and evade any problem that gets in your way. For the problems you can’t avoid, do the absolute simplest solution you can think of.

Good luck, and have fun!

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Is it though?

One major limitation of most tutorials is that they’re focused on beginner topics, but there are advanced topics for this engine that would very much allow for tens of thousands (if not hundreds of thousands) of units in one location without bad performance. The game showcased in the spoiler above is making use of them.

Just keep in mind that when I say “advanced” I mean far beyond a beginner who has just gone through tutorials. Unless you’re coming to Unity as an experienced developer you most likely won’t be able to pick up the advanced features that enable a game of this nature until you’ve gotten experience making games.

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Thanks for the quick answers and words of encouragement