AR/VR

Unity has expanded beyond gaming into various fields, such as simulations, training, and app development. In its latest versions, notable improvements in augmented reality (AR) technologies have been introduced. In the latest versions of Unity, we have seen lots of improvements in the field of augmented reality, which allows us to add a layer of virtuality on top of our reality, thereby augmenting what our device can perceive to create games that rely on real-world data, such as the camera’s image, our real-world position, and the current weather. This can also be applied to work environments, such as when viewing the building map or checking the electrical ducts inside a wall. Welcome to the extra section of this book, where we are going to discuss how to create Augmented Reality (AR) applications using Unity’s AR Foundation package.

In this chapter, we will examine the following AR Foundation concepts:

• Using AR Foundation
• Building for mobile...

Using AR Foundation

In this section, we will examine the following AR Foundation concepts:

• Creating an AR Foundation project
• Using tracking features

Let’s start by discussing how to prepare our project so that it can run AR Foundation apps.

Creating an AR Foundation project

Transitioning to AR development not only changes coding practices but also the game design approach. For instance, in AR, user interaction and camera control are significantly different.

Something to consider when creating AR projects is that we will change not only the way we code our game but also the game design aspect. AR apps have differences, especially in the way the user interacts, and also limitations, such as the user being in control of the camera all the time. We cannot simply port an existing game to AR without changing the very core experience of the game. That’s why, in this chapter, we are going to work on a brand-new project; it would be too difficult...

Building for mobile devices

Unity is a very powerful tool that solves the most common problems in game development very easily, and one of them is building the game for several target platforms. Now, the Unity part of building our project for such devices is easy to do, but each device has its non-Unity-related nuances when installing development builds. In order to test our AR app, we need to test it directly on the device. So, let’s explore how we can make our app run on Android and iOS, the most common mobile platforms.

Before diving into this topic, it is worth mentioning that the following procedures change a lot over time, so you will need to find the latest instructions on the internet. The Unity Learn portal site (https://learn.unity.com/tutorial/how-to-publish-to-android-2) may be a good alternative in case the instructions in this book fail, but try the steps here first.

In this section, we will examine the following mobile building concepts:

...

Creating a simple AR game

As we discussed previously, the idea is to create a simple game where we can move our player while moving a real-life image and also put in some enemy spawners by just tapping where we want them to be, such as a wall, the floor, a table, and so on. Our player will automatically shoot at the nearest enemy, and the enemies will shoot directly at the player, so our only task will be to move the player so that they avoid bullets. We are going to implement these game mechanics using scripts very similar to the ones we used in this book’s main project.

In this section, we will develop the following AR game features:

• Spawning the player and enemies
• Coding the player and enemy behavior

First, we are going to discuss how to make our players and enemies appear in the app, specifically in real-world positions, and then we will make them move and shoot each other to create the specified gameplay mechanics. Let’s start with...

Summary

In this chapter, we introduced the AR Foundation Unity framework, explored how to set it up, and how to implement several tracking features so that we can position virtual objects on top of real-life objects. We also discussed how to build our project so that it can run on both iOS and Android platforms, which is the only way we can test our AR apps at the time of writing. Finally, we created a simple AR game based on the game we created in the main project but modified it so that it’s suitable for use in AR scenarios.

With this new knowledge, you will be able to start your path as an AR app developer, creating apps that augment real objects with virtual objects by detecting the positions of the real objects. This can be applied to games, training apps, and simulations. You may even be able to find new fields of usage, so take advantage of this new technology and its new possibilities!

Well, this is the end of this journey through Unity 2023. We are really glad...