Unity* Unite events continue to grow in popularity, drawing developers from around the globe in increasing numbers. Having already visited Seoul and Tokyo this year, the event moved to Beijing in May, settling at the China National Convention Center. Top technology experts and industry talents from across the world provided the audience with over 80 multi-themed technical courses and activities, including keynote presentations focusing on Unity's next-generation technology developments. Intel was there as well, presenting a technical keynote that demonstrated Intel technology in four new games.
Optimizing with Intel® Graphics Performance Analyzers
Peng Tao, senior software engineer at Intel China, gave a presentation with the title of "Increasing Gaming Audience: Intel® HD Graphics Can Also Run MR Games." He outlined how Intel® Graphics Performance Analyzers (Intel® GPA) can be used for game performance optimization during development. This helps achieve the goal of running mixed reality (MR) games smoothly on integrated graphics from Intel, and helps gamers run virtual reality (VR) games on a wider range of hardware platforms, expanding the target market for VR games.
Using the MR game Space Pirate Trainer* as an example, before the use of Intel GPA, the frame-rate on a certain platform (Intel® Core™ i5 processors, Intel HD Graphics 620, Intel® NUC) was only 12 frames per second (fps), which was far from a smooth gaming experience. That low performance resulted in lagging and dizziness in players. Even when some of the special effects were removed, a frame rate of only 30 fps was achieved, still far from optimal.
After game performance optimization using the Intel GPA toolkit, some image quality was compromised, but Space Pirate Trainer achieved a rate of 60 fps on this configuration, which met the Windows* MR application requirements.
Intel GPA is a free graphics performance analysis tool that enables game developers to optimize the performance potential of their gaming platforms. The toolkit includes GPA Monitor, which connects Intel GPA with applications; System Analyzer HUD, which displays application performance indicators in real time; Graphics Frame Analyzer, which enables the captured frame files to be viewed in detail; and GPA Platform Analyzer, which enables detailed analysis of the running source code on all threads.
Intel GPA helps developers perform detailed analysis without changing the game's source code. Intel recommends the use of this tool for game performance optimization by all developers.
Intel showed how to analyze intricate game scenarios using Intel GPA during the performance optimization of Space Pirate Trainer. The demands for hardware performance were reduced by approaching the optimization from the aspects of the shader, materials processing, lighting, post-processing, CPU performance, power consumption, and other areas.
Visionary Games and Evolutionary Gaming Experience
The four games that were demonstrated at the Intel booth for Unite Beijing 2018—Seeking Dawn*, TEOT: The End of Tomorrow*, Candleman: The Complete Journey*, and Enlightenment*—were recommended by Intel China team. Intel showed how its graphical support, architecture, and other technologies were used to improve overall game performance, and how Intel can assist game developers to optimize their gaming experience and satisfy the high demands of the gaming market.
Seeking Dawn combines elements of science fiction, survival, and exploration with different visual performances on different hardware platforms. On a gaming platform equipped with an Intel® Core™ i7 processor, physical effects and other aspects of Seeking Dawn showed considerable improvement when compared to a platform powered by an Intel Core i5 processor.
Figure 2. Freeman, founder and CEO of Multiverse, introduced Seeking Dawn*.
Candle man is a uniquely creative, highly original game about the dreams of ordinary people. It has received positive reviews for its use of dynamic lighting, linear color space, and other visual techniques. Candle man was successfully migrated to Intel HD Graphics, resulting in smoother gameplay and more enabled visual effects than before optimization started.
Figure 3. Gao Ming, game producer and co-founder of Spotlightor Interactive, introduced Candleman*.
The game TEOT: The End of Tomorrow offers realistic 3D scenes and an attractive storyline with interesting gameplay. Collaboration with Intel helped developers improve game performance, accurately detect bottlenecks, and provide more gaming solutions. Thanks to performance optimization, TEOT can now run smoothly on Intel HD Graphics, potentially offering more sales.
Convergence of the Latest Gaming Technology Trends
The interactive activities set up at the Intel booth attracted both game developers and game players. Intel showcased products and emerging technologies for upgrading visual experiences and improving performance. The Intel booth attracted over 1,000 registrations from developers. Intel conducted live interviews in every booth, and developers learned how to optimize gaming experiences via cooperation with Intel.
Figure 4. Standing room only: The crowd at the Unite Beijing 2018 presentations.
Many leading gaming technology trends affected by Unity were also showcased at Unite Beijing 2018. The core topics of the event included:
- Fully upgraded Unity 2018 release. Unity presented its latest 2018 version, which features improvements to the two core concepts of low-level rendering and default performance. Other improvements are in the areas of GPU Instancing support for GI (global illumination, or bounced lighting); presets for settings import and component editor; an all-new particle system upgrade; the new scriptable render pipeline (SRP) real-time rendering architecture option; and more. The new functions can turn the Unity engine into a high-end studio.
- Unity 2018 feature analysis. Unity summarized the pioneering technologies available on its 2018 version, and provided suggestions to developers on how to utilize these new technologies. These new technologies include next-generation rendering features such as the SRP, Post-processing Stack v2, the Unity Shader Graph, and more. These technologies can help developers efficiently compile high-performance code for the C# Job System and the new generation Entity Component System. Unity also explained the new generation Unity particle system and the custom rendering texture feature, and discussed optimization tips.
- Application of AI and machine learning in game development. Unity showcased their progress with artificial intelligence (AI) and machine learning, explaining how to use the revolutionary AI and machine learning tool Machine Learning Agents (Unity ML-Agents). Better AI features promise to bring new possibilities to game development and content creation, and help developers create smarter games and systems.
- Efficient creations with real-time image rendering. Unity demonstrated its high quality, real-time rendering functions along with the Timeline, Cinemachine, Post-processing Stack, and other additional film production modules. Developers and artists can use Unity 2018 to create animations, add movie effects, edit scenes, and include other content while greatly reducing development and production time.
Unity* Experts Take the Stage
During the keynote presentations on May 11, several guests from Unity shared their views surrounding Unity's content creation engine, Unity's market strategy, and other topics.
Chief marketing officer Clive Downie shared some of Unity's market penetration data. He said that Unity is seeing success in VR titles across all major platforms—69 percent of VR content on the Oculus Rift* platform, 74 percent of VR content on the HTC Vive* platform, 87 percent of VR content on the Samsung* Gear VR platform, and 91 percent of content on the Microsoft HoloLens* platform—all developed using Unity.
Figure 5. Chief marketing officer Clive Downie discussed Unity's impressive market penetration statistics.
Carl Callewaert, the global director of evangelism at Unity, did a deep technology dive by introducing a series of new features in Unity, such as the all-new art tool, next-generation rendering pipeline, real-time ray tracing, GPU lightmapper, and Nested Prefabs.
Figure 6. Unity's Carl Callewaert, global director of evangelism, discussed the new rendering pipeline.
Andy Touch, Unity's global content evangelist, presented function highlights of Unity since 2015 by comparing the contents of a Unity demo in different stages, and introduced the feature of a High Definition Render Pipeline (HDRP) through Unity's latest real-time rendering film, Book of the Dead*.
Figure 7. Unity's Andy Touch introduced the High Definition Render Pipeline.
Unity Evangelist Mark Schoennagel presented the lightweight version of Unity, long-awaited by developers. As a web-based application, the file size of the new Unity core is a mere 72 KB. At the same time, Unity also performed optimization on the asset pipeline, reducing file sizes further, and implemented optimizations on the lightweight project more efficiently.
Figure 8. Unity Evangelist Mark Schoennagel discussed the new, smaller footprint for the Unity* core.
Danny Lange, Vice President of Unity AI and Machine Learning, shared new developments in the field of machine learning. Unity strives to reduce the entrance threshold for machine learning and help developers apply this technology to their games. Unity's open-source AI toolkit, Unity ML-Agents, can help developers and researchers train machine agents in real and complex environments, and help developers enter the age of smart development.
Figure 9. Unity's Danny Lange, VP of AI and Machine Learning, discussed Unity ML-Agents, an open-source toolkit to help developers boost immersion and realism.
Hu Min, Customer Management Director of Unity Ads for the Greater China Region, announced the official Unity Ads direct advertising solution for China's Android market. This is an easy-to-deploy and extremely secure solution that can help Chinese developers generate revenue through advertising.
Figure 10. Unity's Hu Min, Customer Management Director of Unity Ads for the Greater China Region, introduced the official Unity Ads direct advertising solution.
Anuja Dharkar, head of Learning, Global Education at Unity, introduced Unity's global education certification system. Developers can utilize a variety of official channels, such as online interactive tutorials and official offline training, to fully master Unity skills and obtain official certification. Unity's Senior Operations Director of the Greater China Region, Beeling Chua, introduced Unity's education strategy in the Greater China Region.
Figure 11. Unity's Anuja Dharkar, head of learning, introduced Unity's global education certification system.
Zhang Zhunbo, General Manager of the Greater China Region and Global Vice President at Unity, introduced Unity's service system in China, which includes technical support, technology presentations, education, the Unity Asset Store*, industry solutions, advertising services, strategic platform cooperation, and more. He also introduced products and services that were developed locally.
Figure 12. Unity's Zhang Zhunbo, GM of GC and VP of Unity, introduced Unity's service system in China.
Abundance of Demos in the Exhibition Area
Multiple gaming hardware manufacturers, game developers, game development tool providers, and other vendors set up shop in the exhibition area.
Figure 13. Conference attendees had an opportunity to try out the latest gear and demos.
HTC Vive*, Windows Mixed Reality, 3Glasses*, Pico Interactive, HoloLens, Lenovo Mirage* AR, and others presented VR head-mounted displays to the public. Demo games attracted enthusiastic players and were very popular, with shooting games making up the bulk of the VR titles at the show.
With augmented reality (AR) development tools becoming widely available, plenty of AR content also appeared at the event. Automotive AR applications such as YuME and Meow!* have caught the attention of many players. Google demonstrated its ARCore* software, which has three main functions to help create realistic AR experiences: plane recognition, motion tracking, and light estimation.
Different types of games that were developed using the Unity engine were presented at the event, and many of those games were developed by independent developer teams in China. Horizontal games, puzzle solving games, martial arts role-playing games , action role-playing games, and others were represented, all showcasing the effectiveness of the Unity engine across gaming genres.
Besides VR gaming, the introduction of VR into education and other industries was also a major focus in the exhibition area. The VR product developed by Unity Education and its application in the Ruiyu Imagination Classes at Sichuan Normal University was showcased. Developed using the Unity engine, this experimental K12 product utilizes VR technology and includes all physics, chemistry, biology, and scientific experiments from elementary school through high school (sourced from Chinese textbooks). Experiencing laboratories and experiments through VR allows students to safely walk through methodology and application; errors can be corrected immediately, and processes repeated, in order to better remember and learn.
Interesting Technical Topics
More than 80 courses and activities ran at Unite Beijing 2018, focusing on Unity's next-generation technology developments, hopefully spurring game developers to envision greater possibilities.
Figure 14. Demo shown at Unite Beijing 2018.
- High-end real-time rendering. Unity highlighted its creative experience in film and animation and introduced how to use the new generation Unity HDRP to develop film clips with realistic qualities.
- Quality real-time rendering animation function. Jiang Yibing, Global Technical Art Supervisor at Unity showcased the process of creating her upcoming animated short Windup*, and took the audience through the process from initial concept, to writing a captivating script, time-lining, camera setup, role creation, scene building, lighting control, and all the way to the final animation production.
- Game production process based on image reconstruction. Zhang Liming, Technical Director of the Greater China Region at Unity, revealed the creation process of the Book of the Dead and introduced how the newly added rendering features in Unity 2018 were used to bring the real-time rendering quality to unprecedented heights.
- Quickly creating virtual worlds in Unity. Yang Dong, Technical Director of the Unity Platform Department of the Greater China Region, explained the various function models of ProBuilder*, and how to use its features for level development.
- Machine learning in Unity. The machine learning framework published by Unity allows developers to use the Python* API to apply machine learning capabilities to game production and various VR simulations within the Unity environment. Sun Zhipeng from Unity introduced Unity's machine learning framework and its tuning to the audience, and shared some practical cases.
- Analysis of underlying memory usage in iOS*. Detailed analysis of underlying memory use in iOS was presented and the use of Unity Profiler, Xcode*, and an instrument to compile data was introduced. This allows for the discovery of where memory consumption is highest within the game and its corresponding optimization method.
- Geometry and compute shaders in Unity. The familiar rendering pipeline was reviewed as a way to introduce the application of the geometry shader, which is used in Unity to implement more realistic grass renderings.
- Best practices for baked lightmaps. This presentation focused on baked lightmap effects, baking time, and lightmap memory usage. Some best practices for baking system tuning and optimization were discussed so that developers could obtain the optimal baking effects in the shortest amount of time while optimizing lightmap memory usage.
Emerging Technologies Introduce New Innovations into Traditional Industries
Aside from having a wide range of applications in the world of gaming, VR/AR/MR, other new and emerging technologies can also be applied to manufacturing, automotive, construction, animation, design, and education.
Figure 15. Unity technology is now being applied to traditional industries such as construction, architecture, and design.
The application of Unity's technology in traditional industries was introduced under the broad subject of industrial applications. Speakers touched on the following areas:
- Quickly generate VR/AR workflows for industrial engineering design. Zhong Wu, Global Development Consultant at Autodesk, showed how to utilize the seamless interconnection between industry-leading cloud services technology and Unity's workflow. The goal is to quickly and efficiently solve the challenges of the engineering design industry and to create an all-new, highly efficient design data presentation in VR/AR.
- Upgrade project management communication. Using building information model (BIM) with VR, users can upgrade their project management communication scenarios and bring forth a more intuitive project management mode to overhaul the traditional project management communication model.
- Apply interactive MR in broadcasting. DataMesh CTO Wu Hao shared how to use Unity to create interactive MR experiences and implement broadcasting-grade live mixed-reality content.
- Apply MR in industrial IoT. Liu Hongyu, co-founder and architect of Holoview Lab (Shanghai) Co. Ltd., shared how to apply Unity to development for industrial Internet of Things (IoT), and used it with the HoloLens mixed-reality device, Microsoft Azure*, GE Predix*, and other platforms to share the development experience with mixed-reality IoT applications.
- Transform video technology. High-dimension video digital assets based on the Unity engine will become core elements in the various layers of video content in the future, and the use of Unity within the video industry will probably also increase.
- Create industrial AR/VR applications. Zhou Guichun, Research Engineer at United Technologies Corporations, shared how to obtain data from BIMs, and how to analyze data from 3D models developed using Unity. He also described his experience with developing Unity animations, and explained how to design UI/UX for AR/VR applications and Unity's AR/VR development framework.
The Future is Here
Over three days, Unity demonstrated the tremendous energy and enthusiasm in the growing Unity ecosystem with cutting-edge technology and the spirit of community at its core. Speaker after speaker presented Unity's most advanced technical features, while challenging developers to realize their potential to bring revolutionary changes to various industries.
As a major collaborator with Unity, Intel demonstrated how game developers can take full advantage of multicore technology to improve their game development capabilities. Intel showcased a full line of optimization tools that work with the Unity engine, and clearly established that they will continue to help drive gaming technology and concept innovation. If you want to get in on the action at an upcoming Unite conference, check out their upcoming schedule and make your plans to attend.