In the video titled "Enabling user-generated content using Unity UGC | Unity at GDC 2023," published by Unity, Zia Jabali, Product Manager at Unity, discusses how to enable user-generated content (UGC) for game communities and outlines the challenges faced when implementing UGC. The video also provides an overview of Unity's solutions to these challenges and a demonstration of a simple UGC workflow.
The video emphasizes the prevalence and importance of UGC in gaming, citing examples like Skyrim, Roblox, and modded games that have inspired popular titles such as Counter-Strike, League of Legends, and Fortnite. The creator highlights the challenges faced by developers when implementing UGC, including infrastructure, content creation, moderation, content discovery, and monetization.
To address these challenges, Unity has developed a UGC Core and SDK, which simplifies common UGC workflows, such as interacting with content catalogs and setting up CDNs. The UGC Core is engine-agnostic but features easy integration with Unity games. Additionally, the UGC Core includes tags and webhooks to extend functionality and integrate with back-end systems.
Unity also offers an optional plugin that allows creators to use the Unity Editor to create content. The UGC Bridge is extendable and includes functionality for programmatically validating content before adding it to the content catalog.
For content moderation, Unity has developed a fully API-driven moderation system that can be distributed to staff or dedicated community members. The system allows for quick and efficient content review and moderation.
To improve content discovery, Unity has built search capabilities and criteria to display the most relevant content to players. This includes criteria such as most subscribed, most popular, trending, and most engaging.
The Creator Center provides creators with a platform to review, edit, and gain insights into their creations. It also serves as a hub for distributing information and learning resources on content creation for games.
The video then demonstrates a simple UGC workflow using Unity's UGC Core, UGC Bridge, moderation system, and Creator portal. The example showcases a user-generated isometric room creation process, from content creation in the Unity Editor to moderation and content discovery.
In the Q&A session, Jabali confirms that the UGC solution can work with addressables and supports code-based UGC for platforms like Android and PC. However, the speaker is unable to provide a definitive answer regarding memory usage and addressables.
Overall, the video provides a comprehensive overview of Unity's approach to enabling user-generated content and demonstrates how developers can leverage Unity's tools to create engaging and community-driven gaming experiences.
