I have stumbled upon Unity, and it seems like an awesome game engine for my projects!
I was wondering what the support was for the XBOX 360 and the PS3. Also, does Unity support Windows and Mac OS X development?
I apologize for the possible duplicate question, I couldn’t find any reliable or current information about this topic.
Also, in effect, with clean source code, one may develop a simple game (e.g. Pong), in C#, and deploy it to Windows PC’s, Mac OS X Macs, XBOX 360’s and PS3’s?
X360 and PS3 are expected to be like the Wii license and as such not available nor affordable for home brew devs likely (as nobody else would go for a pong at the license fees we talk about here). you will need to be a registered console developer with the manufacturer to even have a chance to invest into the 5 figure per title license for it (see Unity Wii to get an idea on licensing and fees)
OK, but Windows and Mac OS X are supported, correct?
Thanks for the information though.
Now, Nintendo is relatively strict about the requirements of handing out the Wii SDK to developers, correct?
I’m assuming you need to become a registered and licensed developer with Nintendo before being able to use Unity to develop Wii Games. If so, perhaps it’s a good idea to gain a track record as a startup dev company with Unity on Windows and Mac OS X, to “show your stuff” in essence.
Windows and Mac OSX are present in the regular versions right (free - pro)
Android and iPhone are available as “normal addons” on the store without any further requirement (aside of being on mac osx 10.6.x to do iphone dev at all)
As for Wii: right, you need to be a licensed dev with nintendo before you can buy Unity Wii to start developing a wii title (console licenses are per title)
Correct PS3 and XBox 360 support is not available yet.
As for Wii Games: Depends on the license you buy / can buy. Wii Ware previously used to be $15’000 per title, disk distribution used to be $30’000 per title, ontop of team wide U3 Pro licenses I assume (no fees mentioned on the Wii Publishing page anymore at http://unity3d.com/unity/publishing/wii )
Best drop the support / sales questions in relation to this if something isn’t obvious from the page (where you can find the information on wii)
Wii and Wii-Ware are nothing to do with legit or not. Both are exactly the same, just one is retail boxed and one is digital download. Unity Wii supports making Wii boxed titles as well as Wii-Ware.
Unity Xbox and Unity PS3 are not shipping products yet but IF you are an existing Microsoft 360 developer AND/OR Sony PS3 developer, you can contact Unity Sales about POSSIBLY getting your hands on a Beta copy of Unity for those platforms.
My understanding is that these are closed betas at the moment.
Its a good idea yes, otherwise you can basically save the time on contacting them without a very wii focused innovative concept.
also doing a game etc that way makes sense cause part of the requirements to get console dev licenses is dedicated office space, stable financial situation to drive the project and comply to the nda (and indemnifications if you don’t) and naturally experience as they won’t let beginners on there.
nintendo require you be a full company with more than one employee and quite a few games under your belt. Even then it could cost you 20k before your game sees the light of day on the wii. Thats old stuff I know from the DS days. I don’t know about wii…
Normally the best path for a startup these days is to make an awesome game any platform you can, then shop it around to publishers. A publisher can get you a deal to convert a game to Wii, XBox360 or PS3 with out you needing to qualify for a developer license from Nintendo, MS or Sony, as they (the publishers) generally have licenses if they publish games on those platforms.
It is getting increasingly harder and harder for Indies and startups, even with a good title to showcase, to get developer status on consoles without a long track record and financial stability.
For now, I would concentrate on making an awesome game. Get that far and then see what options you have available then.
Fully agree with Seon, having something you can get through a Publisher is the by far most solid path to consoles nowadays. Also it solves the problem of moneytrees for engine licenses and alike
Well, I’m bet that the costs won’t quite be that bad. I mean, if the 360 license costs too much, they’re just forcing independents to use XNA, not really a good path to wide engine adoption. Software is priced according to what people are willing to pay, and I’d imagine/hope that they’d have pricing that’d scale well enough (but admittedly a 15K Wii-ware price is a bad sign).
If you are interested in a cheaper way to create X360 games (Xbox Live Community games + Windows PC and Windows phone).
Check this out: http://www.synapsegaming.com/products/sunburn/engine/
Their 2D engine is top-not, featuring realtime lighting and shadows!
It also support cool Xbox Live features, like Xlive customizable avatars, ladderboards, trophies, etc.
This is provably the most advanced and featured (and fully working) XNA engine i ever saw!
I contacted them a while ago, and I believe the starting prices for those licenses was above $80K. I was hopeful too. I was, at minimum hoping for a less expensive version to release games for Xbox live.
Xbox Live dunno, i know that you can now send your community game for an Xbox Live review but regarding the synapse license (Community XLive ones) they are quite cheap:
150$(Xbox360, PC and Windows Phone) Indie,
300$(Xbox360, PC and Windows Phone) Pro.
1000$ (Xbox360, PC and Windows Phone) Studio.
For more info: http://www.synapsegaming.com/products/sunburn/engine/editions.aspx
Are there actually any Xbox or PS3 games using Unity in development? We’ll want to make sure that Warsoup runs on every platform, but we’re very scared about performance issues on x360 and ps3, since if Unity isn’t optimized on consoles, there won’t be much that we can do about that - and for Warsoup we definitely want a 60fps experience.
I’d love to hear some reports on that - how well do Unity games run on those machines and which optimizations have to be done to make things run really well?
