Setting up Unity platform to build android games

Background

This tutorial assumes you have already installed Unity.
You can download Unity from their official site - https://unity3d.com/
In this post we will see how to setup Unity to test android games that you develop.

For details you can visit their site - https://unity3d.com/

and you can also see list of games that are already created with Unity. So lets get started -

Setting up android build setup in Unity

Fire up your Unity. Once it is opened you can create a new project and add a new scene to it. It's like creating project in any IDE. Once Unity is up and running go to 

• File -> Build Settings

 Then

1. Select android as the platform
2. Click Switch platform
3. Click Add Open scenes - this should add all open scenes in build setting
4. Finally click on build (This step will generate your android apk file. Skip this step if you are doing 1st time well come to this in a moment. Before this we need to have some more configurations.)

 Also you can see Player setting right besides switch platforms. Click this to open a new section of player settings. Here you will see settings that are specific to your android app. If you are developed android apps before then you would know it requires app/bundle id, app icon of different resolutions, app name, api version to build your app, certificate to sign your app for production build etc. all of this you can configure in this section.

 Next you need to tell Unity location of your Android SDK and JDK.  For this go to

• Unity -> preferences.

This path will be different based on your operating System. For me it's Mac so preferences are in Unity -> Preferences. If you have windows it can be in File -> Preferences.

Once preferences window is opened go to External tools and provide path of your Android SDK and JDK as shown in screenshot below -

 After this your unity is all setup to create and run your android app. Lets see how we can test this setup.

Testing remote android apps

For testing Unity has provided an android app that you need to install on your android device. Before that make sure -

• Your device has developer mode enabled and have enabled USB debugging
• It is connected to your machine running Unity with USb cable.

Then you can install unity remote on your device -

• https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.unity3d.genericremote

Latest one when I am writing this post is unity remote 5. Check accordingly.

Once you have installed it go to Unity on your machine . Now go to

• Edit -> Project Settings -> Editor

and select Any android device as device.

 That's it. You can just play and you can see your scene running in android unity remote app.

Following are screenshots in playmode from my laptop and android device running unity remote -

Enjoy :)

Related Links

• Unity Roll-a-ball tutorial