Building an Environment in Unity
I found this project to be a lot of fun. I got more bogged down deciding what I wanted to create than actually building in Unity which was a nice change of pace.
In the end, I couldn’t decide on what to build so I ended up mixing and matching assets that I found interesting. I used a few different low poly asset packs I found in the Unity Asset store. There are so many amazing things, I can see the fun in designing and building an environment.
I began working with a LowPoly Environment Pack — that had desert and forest elements that I played with. I decided to build ‘two’ different types of environments, one mountain region, and a forest area. This is where I started but they ended up becoming more of a scene and working together.
I was able to add in a water effect using a LowPoly Water Asset. This element was really neat and seems to shimmer and move in play mode. However, when I go into game mode the water seems to have a tide/wave effect and comes above the player object. I’m not sure if this is part of the asset or there is a miscue somewhere in my build.
One of the things I wasn’t sure about was how to have the ground elements blend into each other. Because the desert floor is not level the water seemed to come in and out at different places. I actually like the effect as it feels more realistic but I wasn’t sure if there was something I needed to do in order to join the ‘floor’ layers. As you can see in the image below the ground plains are layered on top of one another.
I really enjoyed playing with the natural assets, but wanted to toy around with adding in a few ‘manmade’ objects. I found a LowPoly Brick Houses Asset which also had a boat and lighthouse. I thought those would be interesting elements to add to the water area.
I added in a few buildings and trees as well.
Here is a short video in the simulated environment. You can see the tide moving and the game player has the ability to walk up. They are not ‘tethered’ to the ground plane. I’d like to continue working on this experience.
