Unity vs. Unreal: Which Game Engine is Best for Your Project?

When developing a game, the choice of a game engine can significantly impact the project’s success. Unity and Unreal Engine are two of the most renowned game engines in the industry. Each has its strengths and is tailored to different types of projects. In this blog, we’ll provide a detailed comparison of Unity and Unreal to help you make an informed decision based on your project’s needs.

1. Ease of Use

Unity is often praised for its intuitive and user-friendly interface, making it a top choice for beginners. The engine is supported by a vast community, offering a wealth of tutorials and resources that ease the learning curve. This accessibility allows new developers to get started quickly and efficiently.

Unreal Engine, in contrast, is recognized for its robust toolset, which can be more challenging for newcomers. However, for developers who aim to create visually stunning games with intricate details, Unreal’s advanced features are unmatched. The learning curve may be steeper, but the potential for creating high-quality games is immense.

2. Graphics Quality

When it comes to graphics quality, Unreal Engine is renowned for its ability to produce photorealistic visuals. This capability makes it the go-to choice for AAA games that require top-tier graphical fidelity. The engine’s powerful rendering tools enable developers to create lifelike environments and characters, pushing the boundaries of what’s possible in gaming.

Unity also offers impressive visuals, though it is often favored for projects where ultra-realism is not the primary focus. Its strength lies in creating visually appealing mobile games, indie projects, and applications where performance on diverse platforms is key.

3. Performance

Performance is a critical factor in game development, and both engines excel in different areas. Unity is optimized for 2D and 3D games, particularly on mobile platforms. It’s lightweight and capable of running smoothly on a wide array of devices, making it ideal for projects with broad hardware requirements.

On the other hand, Unreal Engine is built for power. It is more resource-intensive but shines in developing large, complex games for PC and consoles, where performance, graphical fidelity, and complex mechanics are paramount.

4. Pricing

Pricing models differ between the two engines, catering to various types of developers. Unity offers a free version with essential features, making it accessible for indie developers and hobbyists. For more advanced needs, Unity has several paid tiers that unlock additional capabilities.

Unreal Engine operates on a royalty-based model. Developers can use the engine for free, but once their game generates revenue beyond a certain threshold, a percentage is owed to Epic Games. This model can be advantageous if your project is expected to generate significant revenue.

5. Community and Support

The community and support surrounding a game engine can greatly influence your development experience. Unity boasts one of the largest and most active communities in the industry. This extensive network means there are countless resources, forums, and tutorials available, particularly beneficial for beginners.

Unreal Engine also has a robust community, though smaller than Unity’s. However, it offers high-quality official documentation and support channels, making it easier to tackle complex problems when developing high-end games.

6. Versatility

Versatility is another crucial factor to consider. Unity is known for its ability to develop games for virtually any platform, including mobile, VR, AR, and web-based games. This flexibility allows developers to target multiple markets with a single engine.

Unreal Engine is also versatile but excels in specific areas such as VR and high-end PC/console games. If your project is focused on these platforms, Unreal may offer the specialized tools and performance needed to succeed.

7. Flexibility and Customization

When it comes to flexibility and customization, Unreal Engine provides a range of out-of-the-box features that can save development time. This can be particularly useful for projects with tight deadlines or specific technical requirements.

Unity offers extensive customization options through its asset store, allowing developers to tailor their games to meet specific needs. If your project requires a highly customized approach, Unity’s flexibility might provide the freedom necessary to achieve your vision.

Conclusion: Which One Should You Choose?

Choosing the right game engine ultimately depends on the nature of your project and your development goals. Unity is an excellent choice for those new to game development or working on small to medium-sized projects. Its ease of use, versatility, and extensive community support make it a strong contender for a wide range of applications.

Unreal Engine is ideal for projects that demand high-end graphics, complex mechanics, and scalability. If you’re prepared to invest the time to master its tools, Unreal can deliver exceptional results, particularly for AAA titles and visually intensive games.

About Expedite Studio

At Expedite Studio, we specialize in web3 game development using both Unity and Unreal Engine. Our experienced team is adept at leveraging the strengths of each engine to create outstanding games tailored to your vision. Whether you’re developing a mobile game, a VR experience, or a AAA title, we provide the expertise needed to bring your project to life.

Let’s collaborate to build something extraordinary. Contact Expedite Studio today to discuss how we can help make your game a success.

Web3 Mindset For UX Designers

Web3 is a word that is the talk of the town these days. With new technologies and progress, web3 stands out as the next big thing. But how does UX design fit into this equation? What do these two terms mean? And can one exist without the other?
Well, wonder no more! I’ll explain in this article the relationship between web3 and UX and how a designer can start thinking in a web3 way!

Firstly, it’s important to understand what actually is web3, Chris Dixon defined it in really easy words:
“Web3 is the internet that is owned by builders and users, orchestrated with tokens.”

Web3 is the place where users will be incentivized on contributing to the platform, and things will work in a decentralized manner, rather than only big giant companies owning everything.

Now the point is, how UX design will be contributing to the web3 world, and what is the mindset that a UX designer should have in the web3 world, the things that we as designers need to prepare beforehand the world takes the paradigm shift.

1. Don’t let yourself forget the noobs 👶

The newer the technology, the difficult it is for people to adopt it. Most of the users are typically new to this space and being new means less familiarity and understanding of what basically the technology is. This is the part where the crucial role of UX comes in, to literate the user and guide them through their journey of performing any action.

When there’s the case of instructing users there are high chances that you may be overwhelmed with lots of information that results in a poor user experience. The actual art is to convey the right amount of information at the right time! This will help in developing the confidence of people who are trying to adopt this new technology. Since the technology is new and complex and is full of technical jargon that an average user might not be able to understand, there is a dire need to put the creatives’ minds in action to find creative ways of making the technology easier for people. Although the change is huge, with proper UX design you can make it look like nothing really changed. You see, that’s the power of UX Design. And as a web3 designer, you have to keep the noobs in mind.

2. You have to build trust through transparency

When something is new in the market, it’s comparatively difficult for people to trust it, and guess what, if it somehow involves the finances part, then all the best bro cu’s the case is worse now! 🤒 Wait, don’t lose all the hope, UX is still there!

Gone are the days when big giant companies used to show only the data that they wanted to show. The world is going to be more honest and transparent in the upcoming times, it’s time to build relationships based on transparency. To build the trust of the users, it is highly important to be transparent, especially when it comes to DeFi products where people are trusting the application with their assets. UX can definitely help in building trust in products by going with the transparent design approach. By transparent, we mean to show them enough of the details of the transaction, their asset details, clarifying the actions that are not reversible, clarifying actions that involve risk, providing a history of all the transactions, the delay it could take in the completion on any action, or anything that would want to see. The more transparent you are about these things, the better you can build trust with your users. As a user, when you get this feeling that you can access all your information or everything that is going on in front of you, this definitely levels up the trust, all because of the transparency.

You see the depth of details that Uniswap is providing to the user when interacting with the dApp. That’s one way to build the trust of the user!

3. There’s no way going back 🤐

Being immutable means the action once performed can’t be changed, and this tells there is very little tolerance for mistakes, one wrong action can lead to disastrous results. This is the part where UX comes in when technology is so crucial, you must give users enough understanding about the action they are going to take, and give the margin to cross-check the action being performed. Double confirmations, warnings/alerts can help reduce the mistakes. Let’s consider an example of wallet account creation, if you lose the seed phrase, all your money is gone and there are zero chances of recovering your account. Do you see how crucial it can be? A huge amount of losses can be prevented just by putting thoughts while designing the user experience of the product!

Some examples of double confirmations, and warnings even if one has to compromise on the UX because the real assets of people are involved!

4. There’s no such thing as “perfect” processes, don’t be too rigid

Web3 is coming faster than anyanyone of us can think. The transition from web2 to web3 is HUGE, and when the transition is huge, how can we assume to go with the same UX processes assumptions in the world of web3? It’s time to rethink and reconsider everything from scratch and design the processes that are in the best interest of the web3 products.

As Expedite Studio is working on the designs of web3 applications for quite a time now, we realized the need to redefine the processes of design. One of the most important factors in the success of web3 products is the SPEED. The speed of executing your idea and launching it in the market. And if we talk about the most-followed sequence of UX design, it can now be obsolete for web3 products.

What we can do is, design the minimum viable products with basic functionalities after conducting user interviews about their pain products, wants, frustrations, and launch the product in the market. After launching, gather the real data with the help of heatmaps or surveys and then reconsider your UX decisions based on real facts and figures! Iteration is the key. I know it will take time, but eventually, we will be able to achieve the mass adoption of this new technology with the help of UX design.

5. Developers, Product Managers & Designers can do wonders together 🤝

UX design in web3 is beyond just design. In fact, even in web2, UX designers cannot solve the problems of the users alone through design, they need a collaboration of a developer to produce a product that a user loves.

In web3, the center of attention will be the user, because the user will actually be a part of the product, hence what will matter the most is the actual incentives a platform is providing, for example, Lower gas fees, high transaction speeds, more return on investments, etc. If we actually want to make this technology easier to understand and increase its adoption, then the designers, product managers, and developers must work together so that they can be on the same page if the thing that a designer is designing is technically possible or not, and if it’s not possible then how can we find the middle-ground? In the end, it’s about making combined efforts in one direction.

6. Communities and community members are IMPORTANT:

Communities are the beating heart of the web3 world. They’re what drives and encourages new people to join and participate! Communities aren’t just the force driving growth in web3. They’re what allows it to stand out and become remarkable. Now the point is, as a UX designer how can you get the maximum benefit from these communities? Communities mean like-minded and focused-in-one-direction people on one platform, the people who you are designing for. Involve them in the process, ask for their feedback, look out for their frustrations and try to solve problems through UX design. Feels the communities are GOD SENT for designers, no?

Also, there are now many communities for web3 designers, you can join those and share your experiences, learnings with each other, build relations with designers, help them solve different UX problems, play your part even if you think this won’t create a difference. Believe me, it WILL.

Let’s sum it up
The days are not too far when most of the applications that we use in our daily lives might be shifted to web3. More value will be provided to the users for the contribution. There is so much going on in the world of web3 and people might not be ready to adopt the changes that are on their way. User experience design can play a huge role in making people ready for this change, by not making the changes look so huge through design. We have a good example of Polygon, which launched Finity a user-first interconnected system of design elements that allows teams to quickly prototype, launch and scale their products without compromising on aesthetics and usability. (Read more here) You see, how people have started thinking about the web3 design world? Not too late, it’s a good time to start thinking the web3 way! 😉

We are at the early stages of a truly decentralized internet. There are more and more decentralized services, tools, and technologies that are appearing on the horizon. I believe that UX Design will play a pivotal role in bridging this gap between our centralized internet and new decentralized web3 technologies. Let’s see how the journey goes!

UX Design Meetup 2.0 – In a Nutshell

Expedite Studio came into being on 1st January 2021 with a mission to bring UX Design into the limelight. In the very first month, we discussed the idea of hosting the first UX Design meetup, long story short, the first UX Design Meetup was successfully hosted on 24th January 2021. The energy of all the UXers made us realize that there is a dire need to host more events like this. So yes, here I’m writing the story of UX Design meetup 2.0 that was hosted by Expedite Studio in collaboration with Airlift. The only motive behind such events is to make the UX Design community grow, and I feel super proud to say that the UX Design community in Pakistan is growing stronger each passing day.

I will try to sum up all the important points that were discussed by the great UXers there at the meetup!

UX Myths Busted!

As a UX Designers, you must have heard about some of these UX myths, let’s see what our experienced designer has to say about these myths:

1. All pages should be accessible in 3 clicks

If we try to adjust everything within 3 clicks, it can become overwhelming and frustrating for the user to handle too much information.
As long as a user is getting desired results, and the application is easy-to-use with a good user experience, it’s okay to have more than 3 clicks for making a user complete a particular action.
There is a navigational scheme in Information Architecture which says that try to avoid more than 3 tiers of navigation, this is an actual rule and is mostly used in those platforms that follow 3-tier rule.

2. Users don’t scroll

This generation is used to scrolling 24/7 on their mobile screens. (Aren’t you? ) The most consumed content these days is on mobile devices, and if we talk about the UX of mobile phones, scrolling is much more convenient than actually clicking on to the CTAs.
For continuous and lengthy content, scrolling provides a much better user experience.
The scrolling thing can totally vary depending on the platforms. For example, there is a higher rate of scrolling on mobile devices than on the web. So, it totally depends on which platform you’re designing for.
The design and content must be pleasing and engaging enough that makes a user scroll more.

3. Users can tell you what they want

User can tell you the symptom of his pain points and frustrations, but not the root cause behind those symptoms. As a UX designer, it’s your role to identify the root cause of the problems.
You don’t have to follow everything that a user is telling you, sometimes even the user is not right.
There was research conducted for a new Coke mint flavor, according to the research reports, most people were sure that this new flavor will be a hit, but the launch of the real product proved the research to be wrong.
Netflix conducted A/B testing for the research on its sign-up process, users predicted that they are most likely to sign up if they can see whether the show they want to watch is there or not, but it eventually resulted in fewer sign-ups.
Try to identify where your user is coming from.
Observe more about how the user acts or behaves, rather than just what he says.
Sometimes you have to convince the user to give a chance to a new design, for the cause of a better UX.

4. Aesthetics are not important if you have good usability

The first and the most important thing is the usability/functionality of the product. The product must fulfill its purpose.
With functionality, if you add a touch of aesthetics then it can definitely level-up the standard of your product.
In those products where users have other choices as well, then he will prefer the one that is aesthetically pleasing as well as usable.
Chances are high that a user might not even go through the whole website/application if the User Interface is not pleasing enough.

5. If you’re an expert , you don’t need to test your design

Designers usually become obsessed with their own designs and eventually become defensive for their designs, which is definitely not a good thing. As a designer, you should be open to suggestions and improvements.
Even if you are an expert, or a user yourself, you still need to test your designs to get different perspectives from different people.
The expert opinions also matter a lot. The things that you can’t see, others can identify those issues.
Sometimes the user’s expectations are different from what we are thinking, so it’s very important to let the user test the product.

6. You don’t need content to design your website

If we design just with the dummy content (Lorem ipsum blah blah.. :p), it results in aesthetically pleasing but unrealistic designs.
Content is by far the most important element of UI Design.
The layout problems can occur if we are totally designing with the dummy content, chances are high that you might have to change the whole design after putting real content.
In a case where a product is in the brain-storming phase and the content writer does not have any idea about the content direction and all, we can go with the low fidelity wireframes/sketches, instead of directly moving towards UI.

Some open discussion topics

All about Usability Testing:

Usability testing is about evaluating your designs by testing it with representative users.
You must have a basic prototype ready for the usability testing.
Usertesting.com, maze.co are great platforms where you can test your products.
We can use Data Analytics for the products, the data can help us know where the real user is getting stuck, and what actions the user is performing.
Hotjar, Mixpanel are great tools for website heatmaps and behaviour analytics.
The methods of Usability Testing vary from company to company, and environment to environment.
When you are conducting usability testing with the user, make sure to make him easy and comfortable first.
Try to engage with the user instead of just silently observing.
It’s a good practice if you prepare a list of questions beforehand, but try not to use it as a script, and just go with the flow of the conversation.

Generalist VS Specialist:

There’s this misconception that you cannot be a master of more than one thing at once, the truth is that you can be a master of more than one things if you focus closely and keep on trying.
Specialist is someone who focuses on one thing while a generalist is looking after many domains.
The specialized fields in the UI/UX Design: Visual Designer, UX Researcher, UX Writer, Product Designer, Motion Designer, Interactions Designer, and Service Designer, etc.
It’s not bad to be a generalist, but if the domain and scope is of large scale, then we definitely need specialists there!
Most people at leadership positions are the generalists, as they are the one’s keeping a bird’s eye view on so many things at once.

Noob Clients and UX processes

Try to identify the needs and requirements of the client and pitch them the solutions of his pain points.
Make them understand the value of UX processes by showing the “with” or “without” examples and result-driven solutions.
Evaluate the business matrices of the product and then try to explain to the client about ROI based UX.
If you are telling that the actual cost of a bad design is huge, then you must also tell the benefits of the good design.

(It’s totally okay if nothing works, and the client just wants a quick UI (sigh), we all are in this together! )

Future of UI/UX Design in Pakistan:

The design industry in Pakistan has been evolving since the last 5 years. The UI/UX design has started getting attention, and this is something we are super proud of!
The processes are becoming more formal, people are willing to learn more about UX, we just need the right processes and then we will definitely see a huge boom in the UX design world.
Currently, we lack in the educational programs of UX/Human computer interaction. Some UX relevant programs should be introduced by different universities in Pakistan.

So these were some of the insights from the great UXers from different firms which include Airlift, Bazaar, Bykea, Careem, Ibex, Securiti.ai, Systems, and many more! The whole idea behind this initiative is to bring the UXers on one platform where they can meet and know each other and share their experiences with each other. Expedite Studio will be hosting more events like this, just to empower the UX DESIGN community in Pakistan!

See the recorded UX Design Meetup 2.0 here
Wanna read insights from the first UX Design meetup? Read here

Join the UX Hub by Expedite Studio here
Expedite’s Socials: Facebook | Behance | LinkedIn | Instagram | Twitter

UX Design Meetup – in a nutshell

The UX Design Meetup took place on 24th January 2021 at the Xord Basecamp, Expedite Studio and Sheikh Izhan took an initiative and conducted a UX Design Meetup for all the amazing UX people in the town in which designers got a chance to know each other better and learned from the experiences of each other.

It’s always a great idea to learn from each other, we don’t want anyone to miss out on the knowledge, hence writing this blog post so that everyone can take benefit from what the amazing designers discussed in the meetup.

The key takeaways

A number of topics were discussed in the meetup on which designers shared their valuable knowledge and thoughts. I tried to extract outcomes from those discussions, hoping that it will benefit you in some way!

UX processes in a company:

This topic was about the UX processes that a company follows.

The standard UX phases (Understand, Research, Sketch, Prototype, Evaluate) are being followed by most of the companies in one form or another.
The design process is all about how YOU shape it. You can always mould your processes according to the project and business requirements.
Google design sprint is a five-day process that is being implemented in some companies that are designing products. It is helpful in knowing whether the product is sustainable or not.
It is noticed that the Product and Service design phases are mostly not the same.

UX beginners , where to start?

Most of the newbies in this field have no idea about where to start learnings from, here are some tips for the newbies who want to start their career in UX design.

To start off your career in the field of UI/UX, first, identify your goal, start your journey if you think you are really passionate about the field, and then follow these steps:

Plan your 5-year goal.
Find a mentor.
Become social with the people in your field.
Learn how to market yourself.
Learn about the UX framework and UX cycle.
Read books related to the UI/UX.
Get yourself enrolled in different online courses.
You are an influencer, start creating content. Share with your audience whatever you create and get feedback from the experts.

Designer and developer, an unmatched love story

Ah, this was one of those topics that put a smile (the smile with hidden pain ) on every designer’s face, because this topic was something that most designers could relate to.

Some outcomes from the discussion are:

The designer should have empathy for the developer but not to the extent that it compromises the usability of the design.
It’s good if a designer has basic know-how of development, especially of the styling languages so that they can tell about the libraries that will be used by the developer so as to make the developer’s life easy.
It’s a better approach to let the designer and developer sit in different workspaces so that the developer cannot influence the design decisions, which in turn compromises the design.
Don’t expect the developer that he will take care of the minor details like margins, paddings, font sizes, and font-weight, etc. Provide him all these details in a design-release document or with some handoff tools like Zeplin. Style guides can become really handy in such a case.

UX Testing

The most important pillar of UX is usability testing, it helps you in knowing where your product stands and how a user will perceive it.
Your design is nothing without user testing.
Design QA is a step to review the coded version of the design to make sure that it is developed according to the provided design specifications.
The Design QA is a crucial step and it should not be skipped. There can be many ways of doing the design QA, you can either document all the inconsistencies or conduct a meeting with the developer.

Dribbblable Trends

Dribbble trends like Neumorphism, Glassmorphism, Skeuomorphism are not development friendly in most cases.
The overly used animations that we mostly see on portfolio sites are not feasible in real-world applications, they are just eye-candies that are usually far away from solving real-world problems.

Personal projects

We all know the importance of unsolicited projects and how important a role they play while you are trying to land in a company.

Some key points regarding the personal projects are:

For personal projects, you can pick out any real-world application and perform its UI/UX audit and publish your case study on it.
Use real-world applications as much as you can and ask people about the problems that they face and try to solve those problems through your design solutions and research.
Most designers don’t get enough time to do personal projects in order to maintain their portfolio, but if you manage to take out 1-2 hours per 2 days a week, make one schedule and stick to it, you can surely manage to do it! Note that, setting a deadline for personal projects is equally important.

UI/UX interviews

If you aspire to join a certain company, the best way to prepare before appearing in their hiring interviews is to learn the UX processes that they follow in their company. Also, customizing your profile and portfolio and making it as relevant as the company’s requirements will be highly effective.

Long story short

So these were some of the highlights from the meetup. It won’t be wrong to say that this meetup was a success, designers from different firms (VentureDive, Folio3, Airlift, 10pearls, Two Dots, and many more) joined and shared their valuable thoughts and knowledge with each other.

It’s always a great idea to network with the people in your field, you get to learn a lot of things.
Looking forward to more meetups like this, it will surely help in building a stronger UX community.

Special thanks to Arif Samad, Arif Kamal, Umair Ali Khatri, Tabish Rafiq, Adnan Khan, and Sohaib Khan for providing their valuable insights to all the community members!

Join Expedite’s UX community here.