Intel, Unity Team Up to Optimize The Unity Engine for Android
Intel and Unity Technologies announced that the Unity Engine, which is used for creating games and other 2D/3D applications, will be optimized for Android devices using Intel hardware such as the Intel Core and Intel Atom series of processors. What that means for the consumer is a better experience on each and every Intel-based Android mobile device.
"Given our publicly stated goal to ship 40 million tablets this year and the fact that we will have more than 100 Android tablet designs in the market by the end of this year, it's important for us to offer great experiences on Intel platforms running Android," said Christos Georgiopoulos, Vice President, Software and Services Group and General Manager, Developer Relations Division, Intel Corp.
According to Intel, there are nearly 3 million registered Unity developers who can now write native apps on Android devices such as tablets, phones, desktops and laptops. Georgiopoulos said that by writing native apps on an Android device driven by Intel hardware, end users will see better application startup times, better performance and a great user experience on the whole.
Given that there are two sets of architectures (ARM and Intel) running the Android platform, one might be concerned that developers will need to write two separate versions of the same game or application, but that won't be the case; Unity will create a single "fat" binary that supports both Intel and ARM hardware, which can be uploaded to Google Play.
However, developers can choose to develop separate binaries if they so choose. Both choices will involve a minimal amount of work, Georgiopoulos told Tom's Hardware.
When asked what Intel is doing to convince developers to use this optimized engine, Georgiopoulos said that Intel is working closely with all of its developers worldwide. However, by default, all registered Unity developers will receive the Intel-optimized engine automatically and can start using it at no extra cost.
So what led to this agreement between Unity and Intel? "Intel's growing relevance in the mobility segment coupled with developers' demand for increased support for Intel based Android devices," Georgiopoulos said.
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Unity Technologies offers two versions of the Unity engine, a free model and Unity Pro. Developers using the free edition can create games and applications without having to pay royalties. The catch is that it can be used for commercial use only if the developer's annual turnover does not exceed $100,000. The Pro version doesn't have that limitation and comes with the full toolset. This Pro edition costs $1,500 outright, or $75 per month for 12 months.
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Kevin Parrish has over a decade of experience as a writer, editor, and product tester. His work focused on computer hardware, networking equipment, smartphones, tablets, gaming consoles, and other internet-connected devices. His work has appeared in Tom's Hardware, Tom's Guide, Maximum PC, Digital Trends, Android Authority, How-To Geek, Lifewire, and others.
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dovah-chan Thank god. Unity is just terrible on android due to the divided architectures. In my opinion its especially horrid on the desktop segment since a lot of developers use it only for mobile games and the desktop version doesn't give much support. There are no major 'indie' titles (aka independently created and published) games that utilize Unity on the desktop platform which are commercially successful. In my opinion Unity is trying to become the next Unreal Engine. (jsome properties shared between it and UE are; easy to develop with, large set of tools, multiplatform support)Reply
Always good to have other options though. Happy that the master of optimization and efficiency is helping them out now. -
fkr i think "the golf club" uses the unity engine on pc and it is a fun good looking realistic golf game. i could be wrong about that unity engine.Reply -
ZolaIII Hopefully they will try to optimize it toward GS GPUs & not for Intel graphics.Reply
Some Android (free) games based on Unity (wort of playing) are even getting a PC version. Like Dead Effect.
http://deadeffect.com/ -
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Not yet but that is going to be moot in two to three years when all new PCs will only support DDR4 anyway.14001162 said:is ddr4 worth for gaming / programming normal pcs??? -
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There are a few dozens but none of them specially popular so Intel tends to get forgotten on the smartphone/tablet side.14001415 said:there are Android devices with Intel chips in them in the wild? by Whom?
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somebodyspecial Unity is pricing themselves out of this market. Not many will attempt a game with unity if not a larger dev. You can TEST your gaming prowess on unreal4 for $20 a month. A far cry from $1500+900 up front. It's much cheaper to try your luck on unreal for $240 for a year. If you suck you're not out a lot of cash. With unity that's a huge pill to swallow if things don't work out (and not everyone works out...LOL).Reply
Also this is just Intel catching the rest. NV already optimized for unity5 and Unreal4 (pretty much a well duh, as they'll both run fine on desktops). -
koolkei ReplyThank god. Unity is just terrible on android due to the divided architectures. In my opinion its especially horrid on the desktop segment since a lot of developers use it only for mobile games and the desktop version doesn't give much support. There are no major 'indie' titles (aka independently created and published) games that utilize Unity on the desktop platform which are commercially successful. In my opinion Unity is trying to become the next Unreal Engine. (jsome properties shared between it and UE are; easy to develop with, large set of tools, multiplatform support)
Always good to have other options though. Happy that the master of optimization and efficiency is helping them out now.
cough cough cough Squad cough cough cough KSP cough cough cough