Unity Technologies has revealed a beta version Unity 2018.1, the first update of this year.
New rendering architecture: Scriptable Render Pipeline (aka SRP)
As part of the Unity 2018.1 release, we will introduce a new real-time rendering architecture option known as Scriptable Render Pipeline (SRP). We will roll out SRP iteratively adding new functions and improvements with each new release. SRP places the power of modern hardware and GPUs directly into the hands of developers and technical artists, without having to digest millions of lines of C++ engine code. SRP is an extensible and powerful option that makes it easy to customize the rendering pipeline via C# code and material shaders.
We will provide out-of-the-box templates that take advantage of SRP and are optimized for different scenarios, starting with Lightweight and High-Definition pipelines. The Lightweight one targets general cross-platform scenarios, and the High-Definition one is for a scenario with ambitious graphical goals aimed at the most powerful platforms like high-end PC/consoles.
SRP is in the experimental stage, and you can, of course, continue to use the built-in rendering pipeline and its various configuration options.
New Shader Graph tool for artists: visual shader creation
The new Shader Graph, which is designed to work with the SRP, enables you to build shaders visually. Instead of hand-writing code, you can create and connect nodes in a graph network with previews at every step to help you design and debug your shaders.
How to get your hands on SRP and the Shader Graph
In the next iterations of the beta, we will integrate these elements in a friendly user workflow for creating and using projects. But if you can’t wait to try them out, we made a simple sample that uses SRP, built on the Lightweight pipeline, and also includes the Shader Graph tool.
To get started, download the sample project, open it with Unity 2018.1 beta, and start exploring!
We have a forum post with basic instructions, share your feedback there.
Coming soon: the C# Job System
During the beta 2018.1 cycle, we will also make the C# Job System & the experimental Entity Component System available. These will make it easier to write safe, multithreaded code and increase performance.
Unity Technologies
You can find more details on the newest version here.