Unity Virtual Reality Projects - Second Edition

Description

Unity has become the leading platform for building virtual reality games, applications, and experiences for this new generation of consumer VR devices. Unity Virtual Reality Projects walks you through a series of hands-on tutorials and in-depth discussions on using the Unity game engine. With its practical and project-based approach, this book will get you up to speed with the specifics of Virtual Reality development in Unity. You will learn how to use Unity to develop VR applications that can be experienced with devices such as Oculus, Daydream, and Vive. Among the many topics and projects, you will explore gaze-based versus hand controller input, world space UI canvases, locomotion and teleportation, software design patterns, 360-degree media, timeline animation, and multiplayer networking. You will learn the Unity 3D game engine via the interactive Unity Editor as well as C# programming. By the end of the book, you will be fully equipped to develop rich, interactive virtual reality experiences using Unity. 1: Virtually Everything for Everyone What is virtual reality to you? Types of head-mounted displays The difference between virtual reality and augmented reality Applications versus games How virtual reality really works Types of VR experiences Technical skills that are important to VR What this book covers Summary 2: Content, Objects, and Scale Getting started with Unity Creating a simple diorama Measurement tools Using third-party content Creating 3D content with Blender Creating 3D content in VR Editing Unity in VR with EditorXR Summary 3: VR Build and Run Unity VR Support and Toolkits Enabling Virtual Reality for your platform Building for SteamVR Building for Oculus Rift Building for Windows Immersive MR Setting up for Android devices Building for GearVR and Oculus Go Building for Google VR Setting up for iOS devices Summary 4: Gaze-Based Control Ethan, the walker Go where I'm looking If looks could kill Short intro to Unity C# programming Summary 5: Handy Interactables Setting up the scene Basic button input Polling for clicks Using scriptable objects for input Using Unity events for input Really using your hands Interactable items Summary 6: World Space UI Studying VR design principles A reusable default canvas Visor HUD The reticle cursor The windshield HUD The game element UI Using TextMeshPro Info bubble An in-game dashboard with input events Pointing and clicking with VR components Building a wrist-based menu palette Summary 7: Locomotion and Comfort Understanding Unity characters Using glide locomotion Adding comfort mode locomotion Techniques for teleportation Teleportation toolkits Resetting center and position Managing VR motion sickness Summary 8: Playing with Physics and Fire Unity physics Bouncy balls Managing game objects Headshot game Paddle ball game Shooter ball game Juicing the scene Summary 9: Exploring Interactive Spaces Level design with Blender Assembling the scene in Unity Adding pictures to the gallery Managing art info data Displaying the art info Moving around the gallery Summary 10: Using All 360 Degrees 360-degree media Fun with photo globes Rendering photospheres Using Unity skyboxes Capturing 360-degrees in Unity Summary 11: Animation and VR Storytelling Composing our story Timelines and Audio tracks Using a Timeline to activate objects Recording an Animation Track Using the Animation editor Animating other properties Using Animation clips Using Animator Controllers Making the story interactive Summary 12: Social VR Metaverse Multiplayer networking Setting up a simple scene Adding multiplayer networking Adding a matchmaking lobby Syncing objects and properties Advanced networking topics Options for voice chat Using Oculus platform and avatars Building and sharing custom VRChat rooms Summary 13: Optimizing for Performance and Comfort Using the Unity Profiler and Stats Optimizing your art Optimizing your scene with static objects Optimizing your code Optimizing the rendering Runtime performance and debugging Summary