Unity is getting some exciting new graphics features in 2023, including improved lighting, water effects, faces, and more. And what is the most interesting? All this is planned to be done in 2023.
This was announced during a keynote at GDC today called "Unity's Roadmap for Gaming in 2023." The talk talked about the near future of the engine that powers a huge portion of video games today, and featured graphics product manager Mathieu Muller, who talked about the plans.
Right before entering the hall, the crowd was informed that Directx 12 was leaving the preview stage with a 2022 LTS release in the spring (LTS is, in fact, a major update). Later, ray tracing, a long-awaited rendering effect, will also be released from preview in version 23.1 LTS. There is no specific release date for both LTS releases yet, but they are coming soon.
Unity is also working on a new rendering system that will obviously improve the performance of Unity games, but it's still in testing.
In terms of VFX, future LTS releases will improve the visual fidelity of smoke effects with a six-way lighting system, so fog, explosions, etc. will look much more realistic. The 23.1 LTS release also introduces the screen space lens flares feature, which automatically generates lens flares on shiny objects and surfaces.
There are also adaptive probe volumes - which colloquially means Unity can automatically place lights in scenes in 2023. This not only speeds up the process of adding beautiful lighting, but should also result in more beautiful lighting in Unity games that use this tool.
That's all well and good, but what about the really cool stuff that you, the players, should be excited about? Well, first of all, we are waiting for a seriously improved water simulation in Unity games. Waves, ripples and foam are coming soon to create amazing looking oceans and rivers in future games.
Vegetation should look better too, with the 2021 acquisition of vegetation modeling company Speedtree starting to pay off. This means more realistic looking (and acting) trees and other shrubs, which should make worlds in future games more realistic.
And finally, the best faces. Nobody likes characters with inappropriate, bad facial animations, and Unity games will be able to avoid this problem thanks to ZIVA VFX and their facial technologies, which will come under the Unity umbrella and fall into the hands of developers at the end of 2023.
The conversation was very insider and aimed at developers, which, in general, is understandable, but even if you are just a consumer of Unity games, the meaning is clear. Unity games could very well start looking impressive in the coming months.
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