VR made real in (just) 5 weeks!
What is VR?
Do you know Unity/Unreal?
Do you know C#?
Somewhere in the mid April of 2017 if you had asked me the above questions, here is how my reply would have been
What is VR?
You mean Google Expeditions, right?
Do you know Unity/Unreal?
Are they new upcoming games?
Do you know C#?
I am guessing that it must be a big brother of C,C++
This is definitely not the case now. I am in a much much better position and to boast about it, I MADE MY FIRST VR GAME!
Here is how I did it in just 5 weeks!
It all really started with Google expeditions, I experienced VRwith a bunch of kids and was really excited with this upcoming technology. In few days my imagination was running wild thinking of the endless possibilities that VR holds!!
I really needed to be part of the VR revolution and I definitely want to contribute to it. But I was faced with these obvious questions.
How do I create a VR content?
How much time will it take before I develop something on my own?
Starting from ground ZERO (NIL experience in Unity/C#) I was able to do it 5 weeks. It is time to share the road map that I followed so that it will help someone who is in the same position I was.
Week1
(Read the ‘Long story made short’ alone if you are facing time crunch)
Long story made short — Finished learning basics of Unity, created two games and tried free Udacity VR courses.
By this time I knew Unity is a software that can be used to create VR content. I did not dive into VR yet, but charted a plan to learn Unity. I have to admit that I was surprised that Unity was free software!
On top of that, they have awesome tutorials that can help anyone complete the basics. I created two games in the first week from Unity’s Learn. I covered Unity interface essentials, Lighting and Rendering and 3D physics.
By the weekend, I was then introduced to Udacity by my friend. I was really excited looking at the course content. I decided to go through the free courses that were offered.
It was like magic, all the things were falling into one place. Being a person who is in the workplace for around 10–12 hours a day, it was way more than perfect for me to grab this opportunity.
Week2
Long story made short — Udacity Completed course 1, C# basics, Understanding GVR SDK
I enrolled to Udacity VR Nanodegeree in the beginning of week2. As the course progressed, I tried more of Unity tutorials and realized nothing much runs without C#. I made that my agenda for this week.
Plunged into more videos and tutorials, trying out whatever I can on the way. I also stumbled upon GoogleVR SDK. I understood if I need to start building VR content, I had to learn to use GVR SDK. Google as they are known, have kept it as simple as possible. It took a while to figure it out, Udacity and other Youtubers kept me going. I also completed and submitted Udacity Course 1.
Week3
Long story made short — Correction of Udacity course1, Completion of Course2, C# basics(continued)
By now I was getting the hang of C# and way to get around things in Unity. I started exploring. I also started following various Unity forums. There was too much information to swallow and learn. That kept me excited and engaged all the time.
Course 2 of Udacity was a real hands on for the skills I had learnt so far. I did some scripting too! I submitted Course 2 by the end of that week.
I have to admit I was rushing things up instead of taking slow, and I would recommend doing the course at a slower pace as it would enable you to learn more and explore creative stuff.
Week4
Long story made short — Udacity Course 3 prep work and initial build
I had started Course 3 which required us to build a maze as part of the course project. I really wanted to push my limits and get a real game built. I started preliminary analysis works starting from what made a real maze to building VR UI experience.
I started building prototypes and testing each aspect of the game that I wanted. By the end of this week, all the possibilities that I had explored were put into a single build.
Week5
Long story made short — Completion of course 3 Maze!
I really burnt myself out and was very much excited as the game was taking shape. I was building my dreams and in the tech of the future! My family and friends could not pretty much get what I was building at this point of time. I kept it going continuously. There were numerous fails and some Eureka moments, but ultimately I was in my childhood again!
So without eating up your time further, here is what I built with 3 weeks of study and 2 weeks of practice.
