Chapter 1, Overview, starts with a look at what Unity has brought to the table from Version 4.2. In this chapter, we will have a walkthrough of the new 2D system and other new features.

Chapter 2, Character Building, involves rolling up our sleeves as we dig in and start working with 2D assets and sprites, thereby uncovering the sprite editor and a host of other interesting features.

Chapter 3, Getting Animated, introduces that animation is a key in any 2D title; you need more than just a picture to tell a story, so we delve into the new and improved Unity animation system and dope sheet. Beware, curves ahead.

Chapter 4, The Game World, explains that with the basics in hand, we will build our home town and let our character run free within it.

Chapter 5, NPCs and Interactions, explains that an RPG game without people to talk to would be kind of dull. Here, we will build messaging and conversation systems, readying ourselves to leave the nest and venture beyond. Advanced coding, engage.

Chapter 6, The Big Wild World, widens the scope of what we can see, and discusses art and assets, building a map view for the player to navigate in. If you look closely, you can just about see your house from here.

Chapter 7, Encountering Enemies and Running Away, discusses that the world is a big and scary place; you stumble upon a crowd of goblins snacking on their latest meal (who knows what's in that pot), and then get scared and run away. Here, we go through building a battle scene, including setting up Mecanim as a state and AI machine.

Chapter 8, Shopping for Weapons, dives into lots of shiny things! Leveraging our 2D skills, we build a simple shop scene, reusing our messaging system to add interactivity and expand the player's structure adding an inventory. Plus, we look at the other graphical ways of displaying the player's inventory with a cool command bar implementation.

Chapter 9, Getting Ready to Fight, makes us ready to rumble! We have a battle scene but no battle engine yet. Now, it's time to expand on what we have created with a turn-based battle engine, flexing Mecanim's muscles in ways you probably haven't considered.

Chapter 10, The Battle Begins, depicts us opening fire (or at least the axe or sword we came with) on the unsuspecting goblins and shattering their tiny bodies with a gratuitous blood scene (PEGI rating pending). From here, it's up to you how you wish to proceed.

Chapter 11, Onward Wary Traveler, describes that we have a game framework—all it needs is content and some packaging. So, we'll look at what's involved in finishing your game. Not stopping there, we will look at how you can extend the editor to tame this wild beast to work for us and make it build our content for us (or at the very least, make it a whole lot easier).

Chapter 12, Deployment and Beyond, covers the time taken to tackle the last piece of the puzzle, putting your game on a device. We walk through what it means to be multiplatform and build a trustworthy save/load system that will work on multiple platforms, not just one. We finish with a handy marketing section, aimed to arm you and help make your final product successful in the marketplace.

Appendix, Additional Resources, has a heap of assets, links, and information resources to help you with your game building travels.

In order to follow this book, you will need the Unity 3D software available at http://unity3d.com/unity/download.

You can use any version of Unity from Version 4.3, but I recommend the latest 4.x version, which at the time of writing was Version 4.5 (all screenshots have been updated to this version).

You must be familiar with Unity's basic workflow: the words GameObject, components, and Editor/Inspector should be familiar to you.

All the code pertaining to coding skills are available here and explained and commented where appropriate. So, if you are not familiar with them, you will still be able to understand them.

While working with this book, we will be using several freely available assets from the Web, plus a few I cobbled together myself (using my poor programmer art skills). All of these are available as a separate package download along with the book's code downloads mentioned further.

Whether you are a beginner starting to work with Unity 3D, an intermediate, or a professional developer looking to make use of the new 2D features of Unity, this book is for you.

The book also covers some intermediate and advanced coding topics, which are explained for developers of any level such that they are easy to follow.

In this book, you will find a number of styles of text that distinguish between different kinds of information. Here are some examples of these styles, and an explanation of their meaning.

Code words in text, database table names, folder names, filenames, file extensions, pathnames, dummy URLs, user input, and Twitter handles are shown as follows: "Using a path-like name such as playerScene1BounceToWallScript."

A block of code is set as follows:

void OnSceneGUI()
{
  CameraLookAt targetScript = (CameraLookAt)target;
  targetScript.cameraTarget = Handles.PositionHandle(targetScript.cameraTarget, Quaternion.identity);
  if (GUI.changed)
  EditorUtility.SetDirty(target);
}

When we wish to draw your attention to a particular part of a code block, the relevant lines or items are highlighted:

void OnSceneGUI()
{
  CameraLookAt targetScript = (CameraLookAt)target;

  targetScript.cameraTarget = Handles.PositionHandle(targetScript.cameraTarget, Quaternion.identity);
  Handles.SphereCap(0, targetScript.cameraTarget, Quaternion.identity, 2);
  if (GUI.changed)
  EditorUtility.SetDirty(target);
}

New terms and important words are shown in bold. Words that you see on the screen, in menus or dialog boxes for example, appear in the text like this: "You can easily change the profile that the editor is using at any time by navigating to Edit | Project Settings| Editor and changing the Default Behavior Mode option."

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