Pixel Art Class - Fully Lit Isometric Tiles in Unity!

[@ShiloBuff]

You are seriously underrated. You cater to my experienced game programming side and my amateur pixel art passion. And the way you explain things is the way I think and like to learn. I would totally pay for detailed tutorials or assets from you. Thank you for the lovely content.

[@nikosv7230]

Become a patron!

[@ShiloBuff]

@@nikosv7230 Good idea. Thank you!

[@nikosv7230]

Good call, every dollar helps small creators :^)

[@prototype8137]

How is he underrated? Its a youtuber guy making pixel art tutorials to sell a program called asperite.. i mean nothing new here. Typical. Although he does get into more detail than others. Cool vids but i dont see how its underrated. 40k + views is good.

[@leocalder]

@@prototype8137 he’s most certainly underrated, and he’s not selling aseprite or promoting it.

[@TheZenmaster585]

In case anyone was having the same issue I was trying to get the normal map to work, one crucial step that was omitted in this video was that when you import the normal map png you have to set the Texture Type to Normal Map rather than Sprite 2d. It won't give you any error when you attach it as a normal map when it's just a regular sprite, but it just won't do the normal mapping lighting effect.

[@yvettenaomi3870]

for anyone who needs correct Z values (for 3D A* implementations for example) you can change the "Transparency Sorting Axis" for the 2D Renderer part of URP to "Custom" and change Z to -.26. it does some math and renders tiles at higher Z axes on top of those with lower!

[@yanisgaultier6951]

thank you very much !

[@justinwhite2725]

I've been using unity for years (maybe even a decade now) and I learned 2 things. 1 - 'secondary textures' is huge. I would have had to create a custom shader to use normal maps without that. Fantastic. 2 - you can do math in the inspector!? 3- having the grass sit 'on top of' the base tile is a fantastic idea. I would have been dead set in making these full solid tiles.

[@pi-or-die]

Found your channel recently and just wanted to say that this is really incredible content. You really teach how to *think* about the the problems and find solutions to them rather than just simple how-to tutorials. Good luck with your game!

[@ironbard4901]

Woah! That looks so clean and beautiful! I don't quite know how to describe it, but this is like seeing graphics from an alternate timeline, where 3D accelerated hardware never became a thing, and so 2D graphics progressed two or three decades further than in our own timeline. I want to try my hand at this in the not too distant future.

[@cat-boy1357]

By far the best videos on isometric. All of the channels that cover this topic, just kinda handwave away the textures. "Yeah, just import these textures I found. Mess around with these settings till it looks good." This video thoroughly explains not only the how, but the why as well. Quality work.

[@t3ssel8r]

very cool process. bit scary how unintuitive some of the 2D tools are, but your explanations were clear, the results look great, and the lighting/shadow system works a lot better than I would have expected.

[@AdamCYounis]

The 2D tools are definitely a minefield right now. I was pulling my hair out for 5 hours last monday on stream trying to figure out the right cocktail of settings to get this going. It's got a lot of potential, but the fact that it's such a closed system makes me feel like there's not much room for extensibility on our end. I'd love to have the shadows respect the tile z-axis, for example, but I think that'd require me to roll my own solution rather than expect to mod the shadow caster.

[@clickchapman5240]

Love this new format! Feels much more like a personal connection/teaching lesson rather than watching a Twitch VOD. Will be back for much more!

[@frankeeeej]

Wow thats neat :D You can make it even more fancy by also drawing the lines between the bricks in the normalmap :)

This was brilliant! I just installed Unity and it looks so complicated and technical, tutorials like this help A LOT! Thank you!

[@teggundrut]

This is my first time seeing your channel and omg you are amazing! I have been wanting to make a game for a while and I didn't have any ideas until I saw your isometric tutorial and now im binging you videos. Thank you for your great work! :)

[@GabeWilliams]

I was…amazed when I saw what you could do with those isometric tiles and textures. I’m definitely going to have to try this out

[@faycalbenlarbidelai5586]

DUDE!?? I've always loved isometric games n wanted to make some but they always seemed haarder, but u really explain things way better n simpler making me wanna get on it! thanks man!

[@ahnmichael1484]

I have watched hundredsss of tutorials, and this is probably the best I have ever seen. Incredible structure, flow, demonstration, and execution 😭

[@dotgrid]

I couldn’t agree more. It’s absolutely brilliant. Thank you!

[@vincebilotti8301]

The most helpful video ive seen about isometric game dev i swear.

[@LootGoblinPenny]

I love watching you work, especially when you're happy with something, your whole face lights up with a smile it's great. Keep up the great work, it helps a lot

[@chimichuflis]

this really helped me a ton, this and the last isometric art video are so good, your explanations are really on point, im working on a simple isometric pixel art game engine on javascript and this videos are gold!

[@JustGabe]

This is GOLD!!! This will seriously help my videogame to get more polished :D THANK YOU!

[@toongloong]

I wonder if you know how good our videos are... bro... these are so well thought and delivered. Masterclass material.

[@Hersatz]

This is exactly what I needed. Thank you very much, good sir. Extremely underrated channel.

[@nilsnoske6460]

Ran into your videos a few days ago. You're honestly inspiring! Love to you! :)

[@meepsterfgsltw5685]

Thank you so much, your videos are easy to understand and are followable if the audience wants to do this themselves, as well as you are doing an amazing job on the textures and your game design!

[@tyreldelaney]

These isometric videos are really great! I would love to see an isometric character video sometime 🙌

[@monarchdrumandbass8700]

So underrated! Incredible content and so well explained! Keep up the good work!

[@bolic-47]

These really cool things, man. It's like a new breath for isometric solutions. Thanks.

[@gutsberserker5476]

loving the slow pace. I was able to follow along and enjoy a cup of tea

[@yasselesca]

If someone has a problem with higher Z position tiles rendered underneath, go to the 2D Renderer Data and set the Transparency Sort Axis in Z smaller to 0, e.g. to "-0.5".

[@giovannicesaramorim9adigan961]

Got the same problem, just want to add that you also need to set the Y sort axis to 0 for some reason

[@ohdahhoart]

Nice video! I have a question; how do you apply that normal map to more complex objects like pixel art trees, bushes, characters, etc? Or it just applies to the tiles? Have a nice day! :3

[@zomk1342]

This looks soo good :)

[@danielwilkins1147]

Holy crap soo good :)

[@Bluequaz]

Subscribed. Don't know how I've never seen you, this was awesome!

[@rxqueenalice]

this video has helped me numerous times in my tilemap journey. thanks so much!

[@nikowolfwood]

I'm designing a tile based game and this video is pure GOLD. Liked and subbed!

[@maximilianomalvido]

Man, this is gold! Thank you so much for sharing 👏

[@Anita028]

this is looking incredible... there's a really easy game to make with this tiles that is awesome, I highly highly recommend to take a look to snes Equinox, it's a puzzle dungeon with some action elements but the game is all about to find tokens inside of isometric dungeons.

[@lordbrenno6354]

Thanks for the tutorial man, I didn't even know Asprite had a normal's color setting. Keep up the good work

[@zeleck3x]

Keep creating mate, you are really good at it, I love all of your materials!

[@danielward9758]

I love this! If you need any ideas for future isometric content, I think character sheets would be a cool focus point. Great content!

[@jeanpablo1031]

this series is incredibly amazing, I hope you continue!

[@pantsurevolution]

Fun fact: secondary texture in sprite editor must be named EXACTLY "_NormalMap", or light will not detect it.

[@tobario]

Just another Unity Quirk

[@valsk01]

@@tobario make your own engine in c than. I do it and im 16 (not even that hard)

[@tobario]

@@valsk01 cool story bro.

[@valsk01]

@@tobario ?

[@リset]

This literally just happened to me and I was stumped. THANK YOU 🙏🏻

[@gsczo]

An isometric game like Bastion is veeeeery good, one of my favorite games.

[@mio-xh1ln]

I wish I could put into words how thankful I am for your video !! keep it up, buddy :)

[@BlaineSirius]

Dude. I love you. Literally answered all my questions in one vid. ✋👏💪

[@el2746]

Holy Fock, it looks super cool !!! Everytime i watch one of your videos i feel the need to draw pixel art too. Damn dude, nice video

[@thigict]

Awesome sensei, you inspired me a lot :D !

[@oscarlundin3842]

One of the best ones yet! Keep up the good work!

[@koalaaberhart7485]

wouldn't it make sense to make the textures unshaded except for stuff like ambient occlusion and subtle details, so that the lighting is solely based on the normal map and thus more accurate?

[@AdamCYounis]

I tried this, but decided that in this case baking some lighting into the texture was better than no lighting, as it's still a flat 2D scene, even with the normals. There's an element of charm you lose when the pixel art doesn't have the benefit of being shaded with detail. I can't explain, but give it a go yourself and let me know what you think :)

[@Grynjolf]

I was curious about this as well, so it would have been cool to have shown the comparison.

[@Manas-co8wl]

I mean my instinct says the best option is to have the best of both worlds. It really depends on how much we diverge our lighting workload on texture shading and normal maps.

[@gorguliastone]

Adam, you're cool, and everything you do is just great!

[@HawkranGeneral]

Make sure Sprite-Lit-Default is the material being used for your Tilemap Renderer component

[@HawkranGeneral]

Lighting won't appear on your tilemaps otherwise

[@oscarnak4197]

@@HawkranGeneral thx you !

[@arhontcorp.1782]

спасибо

[@Illusionaire1]

I would love to see this kind of technology taken to a more "fitting" aesthetic. Like the lights having only 4-5 shades and dithering. I always find jarring the "ultra smooth gradients" of lighting above the 2-3 color sprite/tilework.

[@WyMustIGo]

I don't think it is possible for Adam to make a bad video. Keep up the excellent work!

[@dafanofftwenty-onepilots4462]

This is exactly the series I need right now (~^-^)~ Just one quick question! I'm seeing in a lot of your videos that when you export your sprites, the change is immediately updated into your unity. Do you just export it directly to the sprites folder in your unity project or what else do you do to achieve this? Thank you so much! Sorry if I don't know whether you have mentioned this somewhere in one of your videos.

[@AdamCYounis]

Yeah! I just keep the aseprite files and the exported pngs in my sprite folder in the Unity Project

[@penwheel6993]

Really love these tutorial videos you've been doing

[@Hersatz]

I've done a few test, and normal mapping is definitely a nightmare to do properly by hand. I understand now why people always says to bake these things through photoshop or freewares. Yet, even then, sprites are kind of sketchy to work with when it comes to normal textures. Normal mapping mostly uses details to make either pop in or out details whenever a light comes into contact with it. Creating shadows and depth in the seems of the sprite. As sprites even from 64x64 starts lacking in details, normal baking might create some artefacts or even create a normal map which isn't that much help at all. That being said, I did see someone uses normal baking for a huge pixel art tree and the final render was impressive soooo... that's that. Definitely something to try mastering out, if you believe your game can be enhanced with dynamic lights. Or just if you want to delve into normal mapping, which is used extensively in 3D modeling.

[@michaeldamon7500]

You are an excellent teacher :) Thank you

[@Sliceoffrontpi3]

Loving these isometric explorations!

[@-geefius-5353]

As I am just watching this video without following along in Unity, I cannot test this, but, I would like to know: Are you able to change the angle at which the camera sees the tiles? If so, would you have to draw the tiles differently? If no, would it just be easier to do it all in 3d, just with a locked camera angle (i.e. still isometric)? To give a visual of the angle I'm thinking of, look up the game "Bleak Sword" or "Bleak Sword DX". I'm new to game dev, and definitely do not want to throw myself off the deep end trying to make complex games off the bat, but I would just like to have an idea of what I'd need to work towards/practice to get a similar angle and functionality to that game.

[@chase.lemons]

How did you get into game development? Is it something you went to school for or just picked up and learned on the go? Love watching your work and I’ve learned a lot in the past week.

[@xelmenguyzxlt5571]

Thank you for listening to my suggestion ! I love isometric and your videos are great help

[@santiagobeitia4473]

I've learn so much and I have so many doubts at the same time, really cool! A recurrent one during de view was: If you can make the lights work dinamically, why shadowing the tiles? Why don't use the same color for all the faces and let unity do the rest? (It's helpful when you draw it, but you can have two textures, one to draw and "see it" and one for the game itself, right?) (sorry if I missed in any word, second language issues)

[@リset]

the music @ 13:40 is 🔥

[@mayo8555]

I looking for that URP in my package manager the whole time but i keep searching on the wrong name "Lightweight" then after I watch your video! OMG ! Thanks you so much !

[@mmfarrell]

Great video, I didn't know Aseprite had normal map capabilities. I was curious what color pallete you are using on the left?

[@kevinhocking3531]

Great tutorial,, even better teaching. Thank you sir!

[@MrHalomaster1000]

I followed your tutorials, but for some reason it shows the tiles with a higher Z value as being below the tiles on Z = 0, and tiles with a lower value appear above 0. This makes placement really confusing. Any idea how I might fix this? Just to clarify, If I did the same thing you did at 15:40 in the video, the tiles show up under the blocks I place them on. - Thanks for the videos!

[@kassarin]

Experiencing this issue as well... Higher Z values would elevate the tile BUT render the tile at the back. Edit: I have found a working solution. Under the 2D Render asset > General > Transparency Sort Mode > Set to 'Custom Axis' > Set the values to (0, 1, -0.26). It's kinda arbitrary and looks like a magic number, but it was what was suggested on the Unity manual (here: docs.unity3d.com/Manual/Tilemap-Isometric-CreateIso.html)

[@kyonru]

@@kassarin is there any explaination for this?

[@bigcaka7725]

@@kassarin its just not working with 2d renderer. it works with no urp. idk what to do.

[@christopherkarlsson4919]

"This is the really cool thing" But everything before that was really cool!

[@Aviiven]

awesome, only thing missing is normal maps on those tiles so they would pop out more with the lighting.

[@hiiambarney4489]

This may just get me interested in making an isometric game haha. Love it but I feel a bit restricted making isometric pixel art games... I feel like one can only aim to recreate Final Fantasy Tactics Advance as that is hands down the best isometric game in pixel art known to man!!!11!one!!eleven!

[@tavisbragg3616]

You are amazing. Great tutorials all around!

[@geshtu1760]

I had a lot of trouble getting shadow occluders working with Unity's URP and using a composite tilemap collider. I couldn't really see evidence of shadow occlusion in your example either. Did you happen to implement that and get it working? I'd be very interested to know if this is possible to do in Unity. Those shadows look really nice btw.

[@Slu2112]

im making a game like what u showed at the end, thanks alot for this videos they keepme going

[@rikman81]

Great video with loads of useful info - thanks!

[@apollo933412]

Make sure to name your secondary texture "_NormalMap", otherwise it wont work. For whatever reason in my version of unity (2021.3.15) there was no dropdown with suggestions for the name-field of the secondary texture... :(

[@raimanchannel3376]

It's a very informative lesson!!! Thanks

[@esoretal]

this is amazing!! thank you so much!

[@GeorgeKarala]

This Guy Is Pixelart GEM

[@weckar]

Crazy question, perhaps: Once you use a normal map for your lighting, shouldn't you remove the drawn shading you already did?

[@ErwanLeCun]

Awesome tutorial! Is there a way to set this up so that the tiles also cast shadows? It would make sense for the walls to cast shadows onto the floors behind them, etc. Thanks!

[@dotgrid]

I have the same question. I’d love to see how the walls could also cast shadows.

[@blades575]

Neat. Any info on how it works to transition players between the tile map Z height?

[@fyofyoriosity2350]

super helpful, well explained, and really pretty~

[@MichaelZesty]

THIS IS SO AWESOME I cant wait for more :3

[@kopoflakes6009]

Really cool and useful!

[@voracdesign]

This looks great!!!

[@Gmaaa]

Best Tutorial 3d pixel

[@Tacopool]

I know this Tutorial is a year old but just in case anyone is following along now and gets stuck on the .png bit where you import your tiles from Aseperite you need to make sure that Filter mode is on Point (No Filter), otherwise your pixel sprites will be blurry.

[@gnipaheler]

absolute legend

[@jjhu7916]

this is wonderful

[@02HERO17]

this was great and incredibly useful thanks!

[@alecsciandra705]

just found this channel. I love u

[@abdulkadirdursun6072]

Another great video. Thank you.

[@faus585]

Thank you so much for these videos!

[@SpyteDesigns]

Thank you for the tutorial. Extremely helpful.

[@aceoptixx]

Thanks for this amazing tutorial

[@rohitpardhi3924]

It's very helpful, thank you.

[@MilanJ]

Just a purist nitpick but now the lighting is higher resolution than your pixel art textures. I wonder what it would look like if they render at the same scale and afterwards you scale the image up to get the blocky pixel art look.

[@ElDonitazz]

will you make a tutorial on elevation collisions? ewe

[@mystupidtheories6554]

Hi im a new viewer and really appreciating what you are doing I am curious when you edited the textures it seemed as if you changed the texture on your tiles without having to rebuild your whole level, HOW thanks

[@SirShrimpey]

Great vid, really informative. However, I've got one question. You are using Z offset for differentiating tile height on the same tilemap (tilemap set to individual mode instead of chunk), but why don't we achieve this via different tilemaps for different height levels? (this way you can set mode to chunk instead). It should be better for performance, potentially easier for setting up colliders and distinguishing between different layers in code.

[@AdamCYounis]

It's been a while since I was working in an isometric project, but from memory I think this approach was less effective when creating levels with an arbitrary number of layers. If you keep it to 2-3, it should be fine.

[@marc13bautista]

This looks cool as hell!

[@lucasborges6447]

this guy is lovely thanks for exist!