This Starter Kit is a set of procedural game art tools that can be used in the Unity game editors. This starter kit provides a variety of bread and butter tools that you can use right away to enhance your game environments. These tools can be used inside these host applications using the Houdini Engine plug-ins which you can install at the same time you install Houdini. Below are tutorials for getting started with Houdini Engine and for each of the tools in the collection. 

DOWNLOAD HOUDINI ENGINE STARTER KIT


NOTE: These lessons use the SideFX Labs tools. Make sure the latest release (non production build) is installed when doing this lesson.

OVERVIEW

A quick introduction to the various tools that are available in this starter kit. You will explore them within the Unity game editor. Individual tutorials for each tool can be found below.

Length: 06:23

GETTING STARTED WITH HOUDINI ENGINE

Learn how to set up the Houdini Engine in Unity then how to import assets and use them in the editor. Learn how to bake assets into either meshes or prefabs to prepare them for use in game.

Length: 03:30

 BOOLEAN EDGE DAMAGE

This tool lets you select multiple pieces of geometry from your game engine that will then be turned into a single mesh using Booleans then set up edge damage to make the resulting mesh look aged.

Length: 02:48

 TREE

With this tree tool, you can set up different kinds of simple trees for use in your game. You control the tree's shape using a curve and can set up a simple canopy or instanced leaves.

Length: 02:29

ROCK

This tool lets you create rock formations to use in your game level.  You can take geometry from your editor and use that to drive the shape of the rocks and you can add smaller rocks where the formations touch the ground.

Length: 01:57

FOLIAGE

Foliage can be added to your game level as plants on the ground or attached to geometry to create vines. You have control over the shape of the leaves, how many are there and how they interact with other objects.

Length: 03:21

PIPE

Quickly create pipes or cables for your level using a control curve to drive the shape. You can have a single pipe or multiple pipes drawn along the curve depending on the look you want for your level.

Length: 01:59

PLACEMENT

This tool lets you place multiple objects along a curve or scattered onto an object. You can control the orientation and scaling of the objects to insert some randomness into your design.

Length: 02:51

PLATFORM

Create platforms for your game using this versatile tool. You can use shapes in your game to drive the placement of the platform or use a curve. You can add an edge to the platform and scatter some debris on its surface.

Length: 02:16

Unity

MODULAR WALL

This tool creates walls with windows and doors. You have control over the size of the wall and the placements of the elements. You can also bend the wall and change its look using a border which you can shape using a ramp.

Length: 03:27

WFC LEVEL

Using the WaveFunctionCollapse algorithm, this tool lets you generate game levels using an outside image as a driver.  You can also use shapes in your game editor to influence the results and can automatically scatter elements throughout the spaces generated by the tool.

Length: 03:16

LEVEL FROM PSD

This tool lets you generate a level using a Photoshop PSD file. This creates spaces that can be populated with objects and the walls that divide the spaces can be set up with geometry to create buildings.

Length: 03:40

 ROAD TOOL [NEW]

This tool lets you generate a road system using shapes in Unity to define the placement of the roads. You can then control the curbs, roads lines and platform size. You can also set up UVS and inputs for adding materials to the system.

Length: 08:59

TERRAIN TOOL [NEW]

This tool lets you create different kinds of terrain using parameters such as terrain type, size and resolution. You can then input shapes to add or subtract from the terrain to sculpt the look of your landscape. You can then add noise, slump and simulate erosion to add realism to your terrain. You can then save out textures to be used to build a material for the terrain.

Length: 12:30

TRIM TOOL [NEW]

This tool lets you set up trim textures on geometry from your game. This includes tools for unwrapping the UVS and aligning them with regions on the texture. There are options for bevelling the geometry then you can add custom trim sheets that match texture you have already prepared.

Length: 08:59

CREATED BY

Simon_V
SIMON VERSTRAETE

Simon is a tech Artist that loves building procedural tools and assets. By adding more and more procedural approaches to his workflow, he is able to build 3D models with speed and flexibility. During his studies at Digital Arts and Entertainment, he taught himself how to work with Houdini. After his studies, he started working on Ary and the Secret of Seasons at eXiin. Currently he is a Houdini freelancer and focuses on creating procedural content.

More from Simon Verstraete

COMMENTS

  • ThomasSpaceflower 3 years, 9 months ago  | 

    This asset would have helped me so much learning Houdini back in 2017.
    Glad you made them as a starter pack to help ppl get into the procedural magic!

  • bnidz 3 years, 9 months ago  | 

    Excellent material! Just what I was hoping for :)

  • Kvale 3 years, 9 months ago  | 

    Very good!

  • smoluck 3 years, 9 months ago  | 

    Thanks a lot for sharing those.
    This is a friendly introduction to the HDA Pipeline.

    Good job Simon.

  • Andrew Robyn 3 years, 9 months ago  | 

    Where can I find tutorials on using a pyro/other particle simulations in unity?

  • mihai 3 years, 9 months ago  | 

    If I install the package for unity contained in "engine", it doesn't work when I drop the HDA tree inside the scene. The materials assets missing. And the same happens with the plugin taken from the Unity Assets store. What might be the problem?

    • Simon_V 3 years, 9 months ago  | 

      Some tools will not auto assign materials, because it will look into a specific place for a material like "Assets/My_Material/Mat1" . The other thing with Unity is the different pipelines uses other materials. So often you will have to add the material or go in Houdini and change the default values of the tools

  • dewelly28 3 years, 9 months ago  | 

    Am I right to assume the parameters shown in the video only work with HDA's that are already set up in Houdini, is then any support for beginners to make these themselves, for unity?

    • Simon_V 3 years, 9 months ago  | 

      If you are a bit familiar with Houdini, you can open the tools in Houdini and make any changes to the tools that you want like adding or removing parameters.

  • yuri24 3 years, 9 months ago  | 

    Simon, this is really very cool work! Can you tell me how you can connect multiple curves to the Placement tool or pipe tool?

    • Simon_V 3 years, 9 months ago  | 

      Thanks! The tools by default only support one curve. You can add more curve by opening the tools in Houdini and more changes there, like adding curve nodes.

      • yuri24 3 years, 9 months ago  | 

        Yes, that's a good solution! But tell me if it is possible to generate editable curves dynamically from the HDA?

  • keshaw-singh 3 years, 9 months ago  | 

    terrain tool was not working for me :(

  • keshaw-singh 3 years, 9 months ago  | 

    it says assets missing sub-asset definitions

  • keshaw-singh 3 years, 9 months ago  | 

    ops but still after installing these I count do that , is that because of my Houdini apprenticeship version ?

    when I dragged your terrain tool its empty :(

  • mathieu8be20f74977a49a4 3 years, 7 months ago  | 

    For people who do have prb with the terrain tool.
    Make sure you select a terrain shader in the material tab.

  • glyons06306ce14362409e 3 years, 7 months ago  | 

    This asset says download latest production build but it's broke in the latest production build. Says API "need Houdini engine api version built 3.5.1" but the latest is 3.5.2.

  • shondiaz 3 years, 3 months ago  | 

    Thank you for running through these tools! This is a good overview of some of the possibilities. These tools are mega timesavers :)

    I had to update the python in the wfc creator, so heads up for anyone with houdini with python3.
    Additionally, I had to recreate most of the existing hdas in the scene in order to follow along with the tutorial. If you try to just click on the existing objects in the scene and mess with the settings, you'll get all kinds of null reference errors. If you drag n drop new instances in from the hda folder, then you'll find that those actually work as expected.

  • mtr 3 years ago  | 

    When using the Starterkit in Unity 2020.3.19f1 in an HDR Scene, I get a lot of errors. Some are can't bake, some are missing Mats, and some are list errors. Someone else having those Problems?

  • Anonymous 2 years, 4 months ago  | 

    I have no idea why the script is missing...

    • Anonymous 2 years, 4 months ago  | 

      Found my problem... did not install the engine :) Thank you

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