Issue #280 - Shaders, Graphics, Steam, and more
This article was originally published on GameDevDigest.com
Enjoy!
New: Showing Accessibility support for your games on Steam - Steam will soon start making it easier for players to search for games based on accessibility features
Steam
A Guide to Conquering Asia - This is a market that should not be overlooked. I believe many of you are also interested in learning how to promote your games in Chinese-speaking regions. As an Asian developer myself, I would like to share with you some Chinese communities and platforms that can help you quickly gain exposure in the Asian Chinese market and improve your game’s statistics.
medium.com
Pattern Matching in C#: A Simple Guide with Real-World Examples - C# has evolved significantly over the years, and one of its most powerful features is pattern matching.
arungudelli.com
How a 20 year old bug in GTA San Andreas surfaced in Windows 11 24H2 - I knew it was a real bug and I needed to figure out the root cause.
cookieplmonster.github.io
How An Itch.io Game Became A Million-dollar Hit: The Roottrees Are Dead - The Roottrees are Dead is an amazing case study of how a narrative puzzle game emerged from a polished game jam game that was published to itch.io for free, then found some early interest by fans, then over the course of a year remade as a $19.99 Steam game and went on to earn over a million dollars.
howtomarketagame.com
Creating Constant Content with Minimal Pain - It’s difficult to list out my complete process when it comes to content creation, especially when inspiration can be on the fly. However I know some sort of starting point helps! So whether you’re new to this or a seasoned expert, I hope you find it useful.
victoriatran.com
Half Past Yellow on the gentle art of making enemies for Tempest Tower - The element of our game Tempest Tower that we get asked about the most on social media is the art style. Specifically, the visual style of our enemies. There just seems to be something in how they look, fans repeatedly asked how we are achieving such a “crisp” and sometimes “clayish” look. Today we are diving into exactly that.
unity.com
Videos
I Tried Recreating PowerWash Simulator - In this video we'll explore how you could recreate the effect of painting (or cleaning) a 3D environment, as found in games like PowerWash Simulator, Splatoon, Mario Sunshine, and more, in Unity. We'll write some C# and Shader code to accomplish the effect and build our a basic PowerWash Simulator clone inside Unity. We'll use techniques like Triplanar Mapping, Parallel Reduction, Raycasts, Spherecasts and more to implement the effect.
Kyle Banks
Why Did PS1 Games Look Like That? - The indie game space has seen a rapid rise in games emulating the style of the ps1 era. So, how did the ps1 work? Why did ps1 games look like that? How can we recreate these effects?
Acerola
Template Method: The Pattern That Saves You from Inheritance Headaches - Dive deep into the Template Method pattern and learn how it can solve common inheritance problems in Unity, like forgetting to call base methods or silently breaking game logic. We'll start by clearly showing how explicit base calls lead to fragile, error-prone code, then introduce the Template Method as a clean, structured solution using practical Enemy AI examples. We'll also explore how careless subclassing can violate the Liskov Substitution Principle without throwing exceptions, why that's dangerous, and how you can program defensively to avoid it. Whether you're building AI, abilities, or gameplay systems, this is essential knowledge for writing safer, smarter Unity code.
git-amend
The SECRET to Clean Unity GameObject Communication - One of the easiest things to get wrong in Unity is interobject communication
Jason Weimann (GameDev)
Independent Games Summit: Marketing Your Game Under the New Steam Rules - 2024 was the year Valve made major changes on how games and their demos gain visibility. In this talk, game marketing researcher Chris Zukowski will list the changes and show you how successful developers have adapted to them.
Chris Zukowski
Rigging Isn't Scary - Free Course - If you want to learn the Fundamentals of Manual Rigging in Blender, this is course is designed to be the only one you'll need: from Absolutely Beginner, all the way to Intermediate Level.
CGDive (Blender Rigging Tuts)
Assets
Asset Store Spring Sale - Feed your creativity with 50% off 300+ of our top assets, including tools, 3D animations, audio, and more.
Flash sale⚡ 🔥 Act Fast! Enjoy up to 70% off Flash Deals, with fresh assets dropping daily. Don't miss out—once they're gone, they're gone! ⏳🎯 Get great deals on assets like Universal Vehicle Controller (Plus), Dreamscape Village - Stylized Fantasy Open World, Character Editor [Megapack], Single-Player CCG Kit, KWS Water System (Standard Rendering), Voxel Play 2, plus more!
Unity Affiliate
The Supreme Unity & Unreal Game Dev Bundle - Unrivaled assets for Unity & Unreal
Dive into an asset collection that offers the widest range of stylized towns, buildings, and more with The Supreme Unreal & Unity Game Dev Bundle! Save time and money by accessing this library of 50+ asset sets, ranging from medieval Viking villages to deserted military outposts—specific standouts include Whispering Grove Environment and Asian Dynasty Environment. Get the assets you need to help bring your game to life, and help support the charity of your choice with your purchase!
Humble Bundle Affiliate
StateGraphTool - State Machine Tool using UI Toolkit & GraphView / Unity Editor Scripting
darkrainbowsprinkles Open Source
Graphlit - Custom node shader editor for Unity
z3y Open Source
Versionator - Unity editor plugin for a git integration with Unity projects
meaf75 Open Source
YetAnotherHttpHandler - YetAnotherHttpHandler brings the power of HTTP/2 (and gRPC) to Unity and .NET Standard.
Cysharp Open Source
UnityPlayableGraphMonitorTool - A tool for monitoring the PlayableGraph in real-time within the Unity Editor.
SolarianZ Open Source
unity-texture-toolkit - Texture2D exporter, and other Unity3D bundle toolbox, in PHP
esterTion Open Source
univoice - Voice chat/VoIP solution for unity.
adrenak Open Source
UnityUtil - A set of utility classes and components useful to any Unity project, 2D or 3D.
DerploidEntertainment Open Source
SofaUnity - SOFA-Renderer asset for Unity
InfinyTech3D Open Source
unity-fsharp - F# scripting in Unity with automatic compilation
gilzoide Open Source
Free outline shaders for Unity 6+ from my project It's All Over - It's all made in shader graph in Unity 6000.0.42f1, but I assume any version 6 or above should work. [Dropbox download]
PartTimeMonkey
SRPDetectionConditionalCompiling - detect URP or HDRP with assembly definitions, to use #URP_INSTALLED or #HDRP_INSTALLED compiler conditionals
unitycoder Open Source
Complete 2D Game Assets Bundle - Retro inspired assets for a new age. Add retro vibes to your next game project with our all-new 2D game asset bundle by ElvGames! Choose from 75+ collections of unique and exciting game assets for use in Unity, Unreal, and other popular development engines. This high-quality collection features environments, characters, meshes, models, animations, and more in a variety of styles ranging from cute to horrific. Get the assets you need to help bring your game to life, and help support the Prevent Cancer Foundation with your purchase!
Humble Bundle Affiliate
Shop up to 50% off CraftPix - Publisher Sale - Craftpix is a game asset studio creating high-quality 2D graphics for indie developers. PLUS get 4416 RPG Icons Pixel Art for FREE with code CRAFTPIX2025
Unity Affiliate
Stylized Cartoon Assets Bundle - Stylized—eye-catching—assets that pop Make games—but make them with style using our latest asset bundle by Hayq Art. The Stylized Cartoon Assets Bundle offers 40+ beautiful and unique asset packs for new and professional game devs. Add life and color to your next project with great packs like Sci-Fi Environment Pack, Stone Age Characters Pack, Medieval Castle City, and more. Get the assets you need to help bring your game to life—and help support Save the Children with your purchase!
Humble Bundle Affiliate
Spotlight
Office After Hours - Spot anomalies and uncover hidden clues to escape an office where overwork turns strange and experiments happen more often than coffee breaks.
[You can get it now on Steam and visit their website]
gameandcode
My game, Call Of Dookie. Demo available on Steam
You can subscribe to the free weekly newsletter on GameDevDigest.com
This post includes affiliate links; I may receive compensation if you purchase products or services from the different links provided in this article.
