U N I T Y M U LT I P L AT F O R M ⟶ E - B O O K

F I V E F O U N DAT I O N S
F O R S U CCESS F U L
M U LT I P L AT F O R M
GAMES
Learn how to prepare for next steps and
chart a path toward better gameplay
 INTRODUCTION
With unparalleled access to engines, plug-ins, DevOps solutions, and
monetization techniques, there’s never been a better time to pursue
your passion for game development. In the United States alone, nearly
227 million people play video games on a weekly basis.

That’s not a temporary blip: 90% of that audience intends to stay

gaming into the future, emphasizing the growing demand for fun new
interactive experiences.

Gamers love to hear that they can play a title on a system they already
own. Exclusivity is often restrictive, limiting a game’s release due to
third-party proprietary partnerships or other complications.

It doesn’t have to be this way.

If you’re building the Next Big Thing,™ you should consider bringing
your game to a wide range of platforms. This e-book arms you with
insights from industry veterans about the processes you will encounter
along your journey.

Award-winning Unity developers share why it’s best to target

gamers wherever they play with these five foundations for
multiplatform success.

© 2022 Unity Technologies —2

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U N D E R S TA N D T H E
POT E N T I A L COSTS
A N D O B S TAC L E S
© 2022 Unity Technologies —3
 The reason experienced developers bring their games
to multiple systems is simple: They want to expand their
audience. It’s no coincidence that the majority of 2021’s
best-selling console video games in terms of dollar sales
are playable across multiple consoles or desktop systems,
since they often reach larger available user bases.

More than just reaching new players, you’re also allowing

your most dedicated fans to reengage, both at launch and
later down the line as their own hardware preferences
change and grow. As players increasingly own multiple
consoles, there’s a growing demand for engrossing titles.

Deciding to go multiplatform is easy, but it’s even easier

to underestimate the costs of taking your project to new
horizons. Light Brick Studio’s Mobile Game of the Year-
winning LEGO Builder’s Journey was exclusive to Apple
(with iOS, Mac, and TVOS) when it was first released. At
the time, building the title for just the Apple ecosystem
made it easier for the development team to anticipate
budget costs and gear toward the multiple platforms.

Creative director Karsten Lund oversaw production as

the game grew from its December 2019 Apple origins to
branch out on separate launches for PC and Nintendo
Switch™ in June 2021, Xbox One and Series X|S in
November 2021, and finally the PlayStation S4 and PS5 in
April 2022. With over 15 years of history creating games
from past and current generations, he knows that “the
whole logistics around a new platform” can be a potential
obstacle for newcomers.

“You’re going to need to address different kinds

of hardware that can do different things, so you need to
have a broad spectrum of abilities in terms of bringing
the best you can,” Lund said. “From mobile to PC, it’s a
different beast. If that’s what you want, you need that
expertise, that rendering width of knowledge of how to
make things look good at each end of the spectrum,
which is equally hard.”

LEGO Builder’s Journey by Light Brick Studio –

Made with Unity

© 2022 Unity Technologies —4

 -> F I V E F O U N D A T I O N S F O R S U C C E S S F U L M U L T I P L A T F O R M G A M E S
“ I C A N ’ T S AY H O W T H E P R O C E S S
W O U L D H AV E L O O K E D I F W E
H A D N OT H A D T H AT S U P P O RT
I N P L AC E . T H AT ’ S S O M E T H I N G
T H AT H E L P E D U S T RY O U T M O R E
O P T I O N S A N D T A K E M O R E R I S K S .”
— Johan Fröhlander, Thunderful Development (previously Zoink Games)

© 2022 Unity Technologies —5

Launching on one platform before expanding to others post-launch is just one
strategy, and it allows your team to adapt and react to each creative challenge
per platform as they come. Lost in Random, however, took a more comprehensive
approach, launching simultaneously for the PC, Nintendo Switch, PS5, Xbox Series
X|S, PS4, and Xbox One.

The breadth of platforms served wasn’t always set in stone, since the Thunderful
Development team was initially pushing the graphical limits of higher-spec systems
with Unity’s High Definition Render Pipeline (HDRP).

After working with Unity to support their project, the developers eventually chose
the Universal Render Pipeline (URP) to get their game optimized and running as
beautifully as possible. They could efficiently create and scale graphics, gameplay,
and features across a range of platforms.

“We were in a lot of contact with Unity to see, ‘How can we go about doing this? Is it
even possible?,’ and did a lot of experiments and tests with that,” technical director
Johan Fröhlander remembers. “I can’t say how the process would have looked if
we had not had Unity Integrated Success Services in place. That’s something that
Lost in Random by Thunderful Development –
helped us try out more options and take more risks.” Made with Unity

Thunderful Development took the lessons from the transition by randomly testing
screenshots rendered through URP with HDRP, which served as a higher-quality
benchmark with greater graphical realism. Eventually, they refined their precision
with the art style to match their newfound engineering prowess to the point where
the URP version surpassed their benchmark.

Securing the Best Indie Game award for Lost in Random at gamescom confirmed
the idea that adaptability and quality can happen together. It’s a much more cost-
effective lesson to learn before starting from scratch mid-development.

© 2022 Unity Technologies —6

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—7
DEVELOPMENT
ROADBLOCKS
PREEMPT
F O U N DAT I O N N O. 2

© 2022 Unity Technologies

 It’s impossible to predict everything that can trip you and your team
up throughout the production stages of your game, especially if you’re
looking to target multiple platforms for the first time. You should
know that stumbles will occur and prepare yourself for unforeseen
challenges. Implementing systems to codify checks and balances
allows you to be flexible and reactive on the road ahead.

Mimimi Games had a firm idea of which systems to target when

conceptualizing Desperados III, the studio’s most recent (and long-
awaited) entry in the Desperados stealth strategy franchise. They
kicked off development as a lean group of six, starting with a prototype
running on targeted systems early to find any issues they didn’t have
the resources to handle.

“When we start a project, we usually have in mind which platforms we

are going to be targeting,” says head of development Frieder Mielke.
“We then try to get the game running on those platforms as soon as
possible so that we can actually see if we will have any problems that
we didn’t encounter before or didn’t think of. It’s probably the best thing
to do: Assess potential risks and unknown factors early on and work on
minimizing them as soon as possible.”

It may seem like a simple idea, but you can never truly predict the
tiny wrinkles that arise when working on each platform, some of
which might change during production. Control schemes are common
sources of release platform complications since these are unique to
each platform. Even on PC, you could find yourself stripping out code
allocated for achievements depending on whether the storefronts
you’re targeting support them.

When digging in to identify production stages, documentation will be

more important than you could possibly imagine. It’s easy to keep a
handful of people on the same page for the needs of multiple consoles
when you can talk it over in a matter of seconds; it becomes much
harder as you scale up development and add more friendly faces to
your project.

Desperados III by Mimimi Games –

Made with Unity

© 2022 Unity Technologies —8

 “ T H E G A M E YO U WA N T TO M A K E
W H E N YO U S TA RT I S N ’ T G O I N G TO
B E W H A T C O M E S O U T T H E D O O R ;
T H E GA M E CO M I N G O U T T H E D O O R
I S N ’ T E V E N W H AT I T WA S T H R E E
M O N T H S A G O .”
— Bruce Slater, Radical Forge

Bright Paw by Radical Forge –

Made with Unity

When the team at Radical Forge began work on Bright Paw, they were a
tight-knit group of four juggling work on external projects alongside a game
to call their own. With a laidback, collaborative approach to the creative
process, they could stay up to date with their tasks simply by using sticky
notes on a gigantic wall in their offices to monitor progress.

However, as the project gathered acclaim with a second-place finish at

Pocket Gamer’s “Very Big Indie Pitch,” their team started to grow larger
and larger. Radical Forge found that a sense of oversight and balanced
development progress was significant, noting that maintaining good
standards across all of the platforms you’re targeting will be better than
approaching different platforms unevenly.

To track progress on a game headed to multiple platforms with a much larger

workforce, the team beefed up their documentation with spreadsheets that
kept everyone informed of the criteria needed for project progress.

“If most of the game is at 100% quality, but there’s a bit that’s at 60%, it
doesn’t even out nicely to a clean 80% — it lowers the whole game down to
60%,” creative director Bruce Slater explains.

Perfect is the enemy of good. Their team found that it was better to operate
and standardize at an equal measure across platforms, roll with the punches,
and move on to the following stages. That way, they could prioritize
efficiency and productivity across the board and avoid stalling out on one of
their platforms.

© 2022 Unity Technologies —9

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PRIORITIZE THE
S K I L L S YO U R T E A M
N E E DS TO S U CCE E D
© 2022 Unity Technologies — 10
As you plot out the launch of a multiplatform game, one word should come to
mind: versatility. Early on, when your game is being developed by a smaller core
group, you will notice that people who can touch upon multiple aspects of the
creative process in a collaborative fashion will become the rockstars of your
team. Once you have those key roles in place, knowing how to scale up the
game’s scope and balancing team resources for pre- and post-launch will be
easier to process.

“The main thing you’ll need is a C# coder that can take care of all the technical
requirements for the different platforms, like integration into the store APIs and
achievements,” Mimimi’s Mielke says. “Often this includes working with first- or
third-party plug-ins, especially for more complex operations like saving storage
and user handling.”

Those are just some of the troubleshooting pain points these coders should be
prepared to encounter, and their foundational knowledge will help serve as a
guiding voice that can speak to various focuses.

From there, you might be surprised to hear about how critical a good UI
designer can be to your team’s success. “Press Square to attack” will look
out of place if you’re not
playing on a PlayStation 5, let
alone playing with a French
localization option.

“Consoles have pretty strict

regulations on what you can
show and how you have
to handle communication
of information to the
player,” Mielke continues.
“You probably have to
do lots of tweaks to the
UI to accommodate that.
Localization is usually a big
part of that, which in turn is
pretty tied into the UI.”

Desperados III by Mimimi Games –

Made with Unity

© 2022 Unity Technologies — 11

“ T H E R E N E E D S TO B E AT L E A S T

-> F I V E F O U N D A T I O N S F O R S U C C E S S F U L M U L T I P L A T F O R M G A M E S
O N E P E R S O N P E R P L AT F O R M T H AT
U N D E R S TA N D S T H AT P L AT F O R M
AND HOW THEIR PIPELINE WORKS,
I N O R D E R TO U N D E R S TA N D I F
A PROBLEM ARISES, WHY IT
A P P E A R S O N O N E P L AT F O R M
A N D N O T T H E O T H E R S .”
— Johan Fröhlander, Thunderful Development

© 2022 Unity Technologies — 12

 Of course, you can’t have a video game without artists’
work to provide a visual representation of your ideals. Lost
in Random technical director Johan Fröhlander makes the
case that technical artists with proficiency across multiple
media are required to operate as a throughline between
those who only create art and others who specialize in
engineering prowess.

“An important part is that on the tech side, there needs to

be someone to understand, ‘Okay, so if we want to support
different versions with different visual fidelities for the
different platforms, if they’re not equally strong, then what
would that mean for the product?’” Fröhlander explains.
“‘What kind of tools do we need? And what pipelines do we
need in order to adhere to that?’”

He says, “There needs to be at least one person per

platform that understands that platform and how their
pipeline works, in order to understand if a problem arises,
why it appears on one platform and not the others.”

It’s important to
prioritize the right type of
experience that can not
only manage tasks, but
also lead into the future.
As Radical Forge continues
to staff up into their future
work, they focus on looking
for senior members who
can manage team units
working in tandem within
their larger group.

With newly joining staffers

placed in a position to add
their input within their team
units and collaborate on
their tasks, Radical Forge
is able to maintain the
collaborative spirit of the
studio from the pre-launch
era well beyond their post-
launch phase.

Lost in Random by Thunderful Development –

Made with Unity

© 2022 Unity Technologies — 13

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OPTIMIZE
T H E P L AY E R
EXPERIENCE ON
E AC H P L AT F O R M
© 2022 Unity Technologies — 14
There’s nothing more disappointing for a single-platform gamer than to read a review about
an exciting new game – only to be warned against playing it on the only platform they own.
When building a multiplatform title, many factors such as design, optimization, and testing
are essential to maintain a base level of standards, no matter where people play.

The process begins as early as the design stages. Bright Paw design director Red Freeman
knew that the level design format could be flexible for players on mobile and elsewhere. “A
lot of the levels were short and sweet, and we kind of maintained that throughout because
we were thinking of it as a mobile game,” he explains.

“The kind of long-term

energy comes from “ T H E CO M M O N M Y T H O F ‘J UST
the fact that it’s got a
consistent narrative PRESS THE BUT TON AND EXPORT
throughout. If I’m on
mobile on the train, I TO P L AT F O R M X ’ I S N OT T R U E ,
can play through three
levels, or if I’m playing O B V I O U S L Y.”
on a console, I can play
through an act.” — Frieder Mielke, Mimimi Games

That mobile-first mentality is pivotal for games aiming to reach

smartphones as well as other platforms. When it comes to
hardware specifications, Slater advises, “Go to the lowest
common denominator and scale up from that. Make sure if
you’re scaling up, you’ve got separate branches per console or
platform you’re going on.”

Backup branches will save you more times than you can
count, on both the front and back ends. You might already
know the differences in lead time for separate storefronts,
with console certification more stringent than on mobile.
However, it’s those last-second surprises (like manual
achievement uploading versus a batch process or
sudden feature conflicts) that might see you reverting
to a previous build version to ensure consistency
across all platforms.

Bright Paw by Radical Forge –

Made with Unity

© 2022 Unity Technologies — 15

Desperados III by Mimimi Games – With Desperados III, testing visual fidelity on desktop platforms alongside consoles and
Made with Unity
without mobile support, Mielke’s team aims to go with the greatest common factor instead.

“Get your game running on desktop or your main target platform first,” he suggests. “Then,
as soon as you have that, test it on your other platforms. That’s probably the best first step
you can do.”

Once those things are established, the focus on gameplay optimization reverts to the
biggest feature needs for your core loop. For example, with Mimimi developing stealth
strategy games, prototyping how the player, characters, and enemy AI interact at scale
becomes top priority.

One of the benefits of building Lost in Random in the Unity engine was that the flexibility
of tools like the Unity Profiler helped the Thunderful Development team monitor and
investigate issues shared across all platforms more easily. This meant that in-depth
knowledge of corresponding platform-specific tools were not necessary, especially in the
early stages.

© 2022 Unity Technologies — 16

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MAXIMIZE MARKET
POTENTIAL ACROSS
A L L AVA I L A B L E
P L AT F O R M S
© 2022 Unity Technologies — 17
 It’s not enough these days to create an excellent video game.
Building excitement for the game is just as important.

With a 64% increase in the number of games released in 2021 over

2020, there’s never been more competition in the marketplace.
In addition to broadening your release platforms, you need to create a
marketing strategy that provides a multifaceted showcase for the game
on each system.

Even if it feels too presumptuous, it’s crucial in the early game

design stages to think about how your project will fit into the bigger
picture of the industry at large. “Try to have an awareness of what your
market space is and where you think you’ll fit in,” Radical Forge’s Red
Freeman explains.

“You don’t necessarily need to enter into it with a full marketing plan,
because that’s asking a lot for a small indie studio that’s just getting off
the ground. But it’s worth thinking about because if you don’t, you’re
gonna get caught short when people start asking you those questions.”

Being able to describe your game in under 60 seconds is one simple

way to identify the highlights that make your game stand out from
the crowd. That succinct summary will be important for promotional
purposes, whether it’s to pitch yourself to a publisher or to market
yourself as a fully independent studio.

Each platform has a distinctive draw to what it offers players.

A player swiping across their smartphone’s screen a few feet away
from their face to navigate down a foreboding hallway will experience
something different than the same person pushing on an analog stick
with a controller.

© 2022 Unity Technologies — 18

 “GO FOR TH E U N IQU E ANGLE ;
M A K E S O M E T H I N G YO U
C A N ’ T G E T A N Y W H E R E E L S E .”
— Karsten Lund, Light Brick Studio

Thankfully, those differences can turn into marketing opportunities, as the team
behind LEGO Builder’s Journey found in their later launches. The tactile feel of
moving LEGO blocks to build structures and solve clever stage puzzles was a huge
selling point on iOS, enough to draw attention on its own.

Ahead of the PC launch 18 months later, the influx of ray tracing in video games
gave Light Brick another opportunity to attract more eyeballs. The team worked with
the LEGO group to collaborate with hardware partners such as NVIDIA in order to
implement this super-innovative technology and add hyperrealism to their lifelike
LEGO bricks, to great success.

“We created a lot of buzz around our ray tracing version on Steam that sort of drove
a lot of attention to the game in general,” Lund recalls. “It really gave a good push
with a lot of impressions. People really wanted to see what that was all about. That
was a good angle that enhanced the quality of the game, as well as generated a
little bit of buzz around it.”

Sometimes, all it takes to get a good marketing campaign going is to find a unique
aspect of gaming and illustrate it to the industry with your project. At other times,
the stars align and allow you to become an early face of a burgeoning new trend.

© 2022 Unity Technologies — 19

 TAKE THE GUIDED PATH
TO MULTIPL ATFORM
SUCCESS
The principles above will help you lay the groundwork to mitigate common
gamedev challenges and are fundamental for multiplatform success.

Thunderful Development navigated roadblocks by migrating from Unity’s

powerful HDRP to URP, which better supported their production needs. This
allowed them to easily create, scale and optimize graphics and features
across multiple platforms. Leo Brynielsson, an environmental artist at
Thunderful Development, says, “Unity is very extendable and adjustable, so
it was fairly easy for us to quickly adapt some of our original HDRP work for
the URP.”

Radical Forge’s CTO Freddie Babord says that the team was able to preempt
development missteps by “having an open mind about what might happen.”
They used constant systems checks, oversight, upgraded documentation,
and close teamwork to target being good, rather than obsessively perfect.

With small- and medium-sized teams needing to develop for multiple

platforms, “making sure everyone has the capacity to be a bit self-directed”
became a priority for Radical Forge’s Bruce Slater as they built out a team
with the skills necessary to cover as many bases on technical, creative, and
management sides.

Light Brick maximized their multiple launch cycles by working with third-
party partners to highlight different features in marketing campaigns. As
Lund notes, “It helps to make something that stands out,” even when you’re
releasing an existing game to a new audience.

In addition to these fundamentals, the keys to multiplatform success are

having the right partner and the optimal tools.

While the decision to take your next game to multiple platforms might
seem daunting, Unity can help guide you through the process with a
multitude of solutions.

With Unity, you can build once, reach billions. Access a wider audience and
feel confident that your IP is ready for the future, no matter how the industry
evolves or where your imagination takes you. Build your content once and
deploy across more than 20 platforms to captivate players across formats.

© 2022 Unity Technologies — 20