Game Design in Unity Course Updates
Full-year and One-semester Versions, Updated Scaffolding, New Lessons, and More!
We are excited to announce the release of revised full-year and one-semester versions of our Game Design in Unity course. This revision brings the previously released Semester One and Semester Two courses into an updated full-year course and implements feedback from our teachers. Additionally, a one-semester version of the course has been developed, featuring the foundational Unity lessons from the full-year course.
These updated courses have been released and are now available for teachers to use:
Note that these revised versions have been launched as new courses. The previously released Semester One and Semester Two versions of our Game Design in Unity course are still available for teachers, but we encourage you to consider using the updated full-year course as it includes new scaffolding and instructional enhancements.
Here’s an overview of the changes you can leverage in the revised versions of our Game Design in Unity course.
Updated Scaffolding
Based on teacher feedback and a review of the current courses, some of the new full-year course’s lessons are reorganized to better support students as they first dive into using the Unity game engine. Lessons that provide students with a strong foundation in creating and manipulating GameObjects in the Unity editor can be found in the first module focused on Unity skills.
These foundational Unity lessons are now located in their own module, Create Interactive Game Worlds, instead of within the Unity setup module. Lessons specific to installing, setting up Unity, and sharing Unity projects are now contained in a newly titled Getting Started with Unity module.
The first game project in the course includes more student guidance around the type of games they might create. Examples of game genres and mechanics students may consider using in the first course project are more tailored to the Unity skills students learned earlier in the course.
New Lessons
Gameplay Trailers
One aspect of publishing or releasing a new game is to promote it. Many indie (independent) game developers and studios create their own short videos to highlight the awesomeness of their games. In a new lesson, students create a gameplay trailer video to showcase their end-of-course game design project. Students learn about different styles of gameplay trailers and choose one that best fits their game’s mechanics, genre, or aesthetics.
Game Jams!
A new module for supplemental lessons includes a couple additional Unity tutorials and a new lesson for running or hosting game jams. In this optional lesson, students learn how to host or join a game jam and why participating in game jams is important for continuing to learn about game design and development. Resources are provided to help students join existing online game jams. Teachers may also choose to let students host a game jam in their class or school. Resources for hosting a game jam are also included along with a Game Jam Idea Generator for a fun way to select a random topic for each jam.
As you and your students collect your own game jam ideas, instructions for easily adding them to the generator program are provided. Encourage your students to come up with their own ideas from year-to-year!
Unity Tutorial Enhancements
The updated Game Design in Unity courses puts Unity tutorials in the CodeHS platform. Previously, students followed Unity tutorials within the game engine software. Based on teacher and student feedback, the Unity in-editor tutorials have been removed from Unity project files and reformatted as CodeHS notes within the appropriate course lessons.
Moving Unity tutorials to the CodeHS platform allows students to easily return and review previous lessons and tutorials. CodeHS notes also allow the tutorial contents to be more clearly formatted, making it easier for students to follow tutorial steps and view instructional images. Lastly, removing in-editor tutorials from CodeHS Unity starter projects lets students and teachers download course Unity project files with a significantly reduced file size.
General Improvements and Updates
We’ve also made general improvements and updates to the course, again many coming from teachers’ comments over the past year. These include things like: clearer assignment instructions, more defined module and lesson titles, supplemental content, lesson resources, and more.
Are there any updates that you’d like to see to our curriculum? We would love to hear your feedback: https://codehs.hellonext.co/b/Curriculum
