Stride for Unity® developers

Stride and Unity® both use C# and share many concepts, with a few major differences.

Editor

The Stride editor is Game Studio. This is the equivalent of the Unity® Editor.

You can customize the Game Studio layout by dragging tabs, similar to Visual Studio.

For more information about Game Studio, see the Game Studio page.

Terminology

Unity® and Stride use mostly common terms, with a few differences:

Unity®	Stride
Hierarchy Window	Entity Tree
Inspector Window	Property Grid
Project Window	Asset View
Scene View	Scene Editor
GameObject	Entity
MonoBehaviour	SyncScript, AsyncScript, StartupScript

Folders and files

Like Unity®, Stride projects are stored in a directory that contains:

• The project .sln solution file, which you can open with Game Studio or any IDE such as Visual Studio

• A MyGame.Game folder with project source files, dependencies, resources, configurations, and binaries

  

• Assets contains asset configuration files.

• Bin contains the compiled binaries and data. Stride creates the folder when you build the project, with a subdirectory for each platform.

• MyPackage.Game contains your source code.

  • MyPackage.Platform contains additional code for the platforms your project supports. Game Studio creates folders for each platform (e.g. MyPackage.Windows, MyPackage.Linux, etc.). These folders are usually small and only contain the entry point of the program.

• obj contains cached files. Game Studio creates this folder when you build your project. To force a complete asset and code rebuild, delete this folder and build the project again.

• Resources is the recommended location for storing source files for your project, such as textures, models, and audio files.

Stride and Unity® differ in the following ways:

• Stride doesn't automatically copy resource files to your project folder when you import them into assets. You have to do this yourself. We recommend you save them in the Resources folder.

• Stride doesn't require resource files and asset files to be in the same folder. You can save resource files in the Assets folder if you want, but instead, we recommend you save them in the Resources folder. This makes sharing your project via version control easier.

For more information about project structure in Stride, including advice about how to organize and share your files, see the Project structure page.

Open the project directory from Game Studio

You can open the project directory from Project > Show in explorer in Game Studio.

Game settings

Unity® saves global settings in separate assets (i.e. Graphics Settings, Quality Settings, Audio Manager, and so on).

Stride saves global settings in a single asset, the Game Settings asset. You can configure:

• The default scene
• Rendering settings
• Editor settings
• Texture settings
• Physics settings
• Overrides

To use the Game Settings asset, in the Asset View, select GameSettings and view its properties in the Property Grid.

Scenes

Like Unity®, in Stride, you place all objects in a scene. Game Studio stores scenes as separate .sdscene assets in your project directory.

Set the default scene

You can have multiple scenes in your project. The scene that loads up as soon as your game starts is called the Default Scene.

To set the default scene:

1. In the GameSettings properties, next to Default Scene, click (Select an asset).

   

   The Select an asset window opens.

2. Select the default scene and click OK.

For more information about scenes, see Scenes.

Entities vs GameObjects

In Unity®, objects in the scene are called GameObjects. In Stride, they're called entities.

Like GameObjects, entities are carriers for components such as transform components, model components, audio components, and so on. If you're used to working with GameObjects in Unity®, you should have no problem using entities in Game Studio.

Entity components

In Stride, you add components to entities just like you add components to GameObjects in Unity®.

To add a component to an entity in Game Studio:

1. Select the entity you want to add the component to.

2. In the Property Grid (on the right by default), click Add component and select the component from the drop-down list.

   

Transform component

Like GameObjects in Unity®, each entity in Stride has a Transform component which sets its position, rotation, and scale in the world.

All entities are created with a Transform component by default.

In Stride, Transform components contain a LocalMatrix and a WorldMatrix that are updated in every Update frame. If you need to force an update sooner than that you can use TranformComponent.UpdateLocalMatrix(), Transform.UpdateWorldMatrix(), or Transform.UpdateLocalFromWorld() to do so, depending on how you need to update the matrix.

Local Position/Rotation/Scale

Stride uses position, rotation, and scale to refer to the local position, rotation, and scale.

Unity®	Stride
transform.localPosition	Transform.Position
transform.localRotation	Transform.Rotation
transform.localScale	Transform.Scale
transform.localEulerAngles	Transform.RotationEulerXYZ

World Position/Rotation/Scale

In comparison to Unity, many of the Transform component's properties related to its location in the world have been moved to the WorldMatrix.

Unity®	Stride
transform.position	Transform.WorldMatrix.TranslationVector
transform.rotation	N/A
transform.scale	N/A
transform.eulerAngles	Transform.WorldMatrix.DecomposeXYZ(out Vector3 rotation)
transform.scale and transform.position	Transform.WorldMatrix.Decompose(out Vector3 scale, out Vector3 translation)
transform.scale, transform.rotation, and transform.position	Transform.WorldMatrix.Decompose(out Vector3 scale, out Quaternion rotation, out Vector3 translation)

Note

WorldMatrix is only updated after the entire Update loop runs, which means that you may be reading outdated data if that object's or its parent's position changed between the previous frame and now. To ensure you're reading the latest position and rotation, you should force the matrix to update by calling Transform.UpdateWorldMatrix() before reading from it.

Transform Directions

Unlike Unity, Stride provides a Backward, Left, and Down property. Note that those are matrix properties, so setting one of those is not enough to properly rotate the matrix.

Unity®	Stride
transform.forward	Transform.WorldMatrix.Forward
transform.forward * -1	Transform.WorldMatrix.Backward
transform.right	Transform.WorldMatrix.Right
transform.right * -1	Transform.WorldMatrix.Left
transform.up	Transform.WorldMatrix.Up
transform.up * -1	Transform.WorldMatrix.Down

Note

See note in World Position/Rotation/Scale

Assets

In Unity®, you select an asset in the project browser and edit its properties in the Inspector tab.

Stride is similar. You select an asset in the Asset View and edit its properties in the Property Grid.

For certain types of assets, Game Studio also has dedicated editors:

• prefabs
• scenes
• sprite sheets
• UI pages
• UI libraries
• scripts

To open the dedicated editor for these types of assets:

• double-click the asset, or
• right-click the asset and select Edit asset, or
• select the asset and type Ctrl + Enter

The editor opens in a new tab. You can arrange the tabs how you like, or float them as separate windows, just like tabs in web browsers.

Note

When you modify resource files outside Game Studio, the corresponding assets update automatically in Game Studio.

Scriptable Objects

See the Custom Assets page.

Import assets

To import an asset, drag it from Explorer to the Asset View. You can also click an Add asset button, navigate to the desired file, and specify the type of asset you want to import.

As soon as you add an asset to your project, you can edit its properties in the Property Grid.

Note

Unlike Unity®, Stride doesn't automatically copy resource files to the project directory when you import them to projects.

Supported file formats

Like Unity®, Stride supports file formats including:

Asset type	Supported formats
Models, animations, skeletons	.fbx, .dae, .3ds, .obj, .blend, .x, .md2, .md3, .dxf
Sprites, textures, skyboxes	.dds, .jpg, .jpeg, .png, .gif, .bmp, .tga, .psd, .tif, .tiff
Audio	.wav, .mp3, .ogg, .aac, .aiff, .flac, .m4a, .wma, .mpc
Fonts	.ttf, .otf
Video	.mp4

For more information about assets, see Assets.

Prefabs

Like Unity®, Stride uses prefabs. Prefabs are "master" versions of objects that you can reuse wherever you need. When you change a prefab, every instance of the prefab changes too.

Just like with Unity®, in Stride, you can add prefabs to other prefabs. These are called nested prefabs. If you modify a nested prefab, all the dependent prefabs inherit the change automatically.

For example, imagine you create a Vehicle prefab with acceleration, braking, steering, and so on. Then you nest the Vehicle prefab inside prefabs of different types of vehicles: a taxi, bus, truck, etc. If you adjust a property in the Vehicle prefab, the changes are inherited by all other prefabs. For example, if you increase the Acceleration property in the Vehicle prefab, the acceleration property in the taxi, bus, and truck prefabs also increase.

For more information about using prefabs in Stride, see Prefabs.

Archetypes

Archetypes are master assets that control the properties of assets you derive from them. Derived assets are useful when you want to create a "remixed" version of an asset. This is similar to prefabs.

For example, imagine we have three sphere entities that share a material asset named Metal. Now imagine we want to change the color of only one sphere, but keep its other properties the same. We could duplicate the material asset, change its color, and then apply the new asset to only one sphere. But if we later want to change a different property across all the spheres, we have to modify both assets. This is time-consuming and leaves room for mistakes.

The better approach is to derive a new asset from the archetype. The derived asset inherits properties from the archetype and lets you override individual properties where you need them. For example, we can derive the sphere's material asset and override its color. Then, if we change the gloss of the archetype, the gloss of all three spheres changes.

You can derive an asset from an archetype, then in turn derive another asset from that derived asset. This way you can create different layers of assets to keep your project organized:

Archetype
    Derived asset
        Derived asset

For more information about archetypes, see Archetypes.

Object Life Time

Entities and components are not destroyed in Stride, they are removed from the scene they exist in and then freed by the Garbage Collector.

This seemingly small difference significantly changes how objects are managed within the engine. For example, entities can be removed from a scene, kept as a reference in a component, and added back into another scene later on. Components can be removed from an entity and added onto another without losing its internal state.

Input

Stride supports a variety of inputs. The code samples below demonstrate the difference in input code between Stride and Unity®.

For more information about Input in Stride, see Input.

Unity®

void Update()
{
    // true for one frame in which the space bar was pressed
    if (Input.GetKeyDown(KeyCode.Space))
    {
        // Do something.
    }

    // true while this joystick button is down
    if (Input.GetButton("joystick button 0"))
    {
        // Do something.
    }

    float horiz = Input.GetAxis("Horizontal");
    float vert = Input.GetAxis("Vertical");
    // Do something else.
}

Stride

public override void Update()
{
    // true for one frame in which the space bar was pressed
    if (Input.IsKeyDown(Keys.Space))
    {
        // Do something.
    }

    // true while this joystick button is down
    if (Input.GameControllers[0].IsButtonDown(0))
    {
        // Do something.
    }

    float horiz = (Input.IsKeyDown(Keys.Left) ? -1f : 0) + (Input.IsKeyDown(Keys.Right) ? 1f : 0);
    float vert = (Input.IsKeyDown(Keys.Down) ? -1f : 0) + (Input.IsKeyDown(Keys.Up) ? 1f : 0);
    // Do something else.
}

Time

Unity®	Stride
Time.deltaTime	Game.UpdateTime.WarpElapsed.TotalSeconds
Time.unscaledDeltaTime	Game.UpdateTime.Elapsed.TotalSeconds
Time.realtimeSinceStartup	Game.UpdateTime.Total.TotalSeconds
Time.timeScale	Game.UpdateTime.Factor
Time.fixedDeltaTime	myRigidbodyComponent.Simulation.FixedTimeStep

Physics

Just like Unity®, Stride has three types of colliders:

• static colliders
• rigidbodies
• characters

They're controlled by scripts in slightly different ways.

Kinematic rigidbodies

Unity®

public class KinematicX : MonoBehaviour
{
    public Rigidbody rigidBody;

    void Start()
    {
        // Initialization of the component.
        rigidBody = GetComponent<Rigidbody>();
    }

    void EnableRagdoll()
    {
        rigidBody.isKinematic = false;
        rigidBody.detectCollisions = true;
    }

    void DisableRagdoll()
    {
        rigidBody.isKinematic = true;
        rigidBody.detectCollisions = false;
    }
}

Stride

public class KinematicX : SyncScript
{
    public RigidbodyComponent rigidBody;

    public override void Start()
    {
        // Initialization of the component.
        rigidBody = Entity.Get<RigidbodyComponent>();
    }

    public override void Update()
    {
        // Perform an update every frame.
    }

    void EnableRagdoll()
    {
        rigidBody.IsKinematic = false;
        rigidBody.ProcessCollisions = true;
    }

    void DisableRagdoll()
    {
        rigidBody.IsKinematic = true;
        rigidBody.ProcessCollisions = false;
    }
}

For more information about rigidbodies in Stride, see Rigidbodies.

Triggers

Unity®

// Occurs when game objects go through this trigger.
void OnTriggerEnter(Collider Other)
{
    Other.transform.localScale = new Vector3(2.0f, 2.0f, 2.0f);
}

// Occurs when game objects move out of this trigger.
void OnTriggerExit(Collider Other)
{
    Other.transform.localScale = new Vector3(1.0f, 1.0f, 1.0f);
}

Stride

var trigger = Entity.Get<PhysicsComponent>();
trigger.ProcessCollisions = true;

// Start state machine.
while (Game.IsRunning)
{
    // 1. Wait for an entity to collide with the trigger.
    Collision firstCollision = await trigger.NewCollision();

    PhysicsComponent otherCollider = trigger == firstCollision.ColliderA
        ? firstCollision.ColliderB
        : firstCollision.ColliderA;
    otherCollider.Entity.Transform.Scale = new Vector3(2.0f, 2.0f, 2.0f);

    // 2. Wait for the entity to exit the trigger.
    Collision collision;

    do
    {
        collision = await trigger.CollisionEnded();
    }
    while (collision != firstCollision);

    otherCollider.Entity.Transform.Scale = new Vector3(1.0f, 1.0f, 1.0f);
}

For more information about triggers in Stride, see Triggers

Raycasting

Unity®

public static Collider FindGOCameraIsLookingAt()
{
    int distance = 50;

    // Cast a ray and set it to the mouse cursor position in the game
    Ray ray = Camera.main.ScreenPointToRay(Input.mousePosition);
    RaycastHit hit;
    if (Physics.Raycast(ray, out hit, distance))
    {
        // Draw invisible ray cast/vector
        Debug.DrawLine(ray.origin, hit.point);
        // Log hit area to the console
        Debug.Log(hit.point);
        return hit.collider;
    }
    return null;
}

Stride

public static bool ScreenPositionToWorldPositionRaycast(Vector2 screenPos, CameraComponent camera, Simulation simulation)
{
    Matrix invViewProj = Matrix.Invert(camera.ViewProjectionMatrix);

    Vector3 sPos;
    sPos.X = screenPos.X * 2f - 1f;
    sPos.Y = 1f - screenPos.Y * 2f;

    sPos.Z = 0f;
    Vector4 vectorNear = Vector3.Transform(sPos, invViewProj);
    vectorNear /= vectorNear.W;

    sPos.Z = 1f;
    Vector4 vectorFar = Vector3.Transform(sPos, invViewProj);
    vectorFar /= vectorFar.W;

    HitResult result = simulation.Raycast(vectorNear.XYZ(), vectorFar.XYZ());
    return result.Succeeded;
}

For more information about Raycasting in Stride, see Raycasting.

Scripts

Stride saves scripts in a subfolder in the MyGame.Game folder in the project directory.

To open a script in the Game Studio script editor, double-click it in the Asset View. The script editor has syntax highlighting, auto-completion, and live diagnostics.

You can also edit scripts in other IDEs, such as Visual Studio. When you edit a script in an external IDE, Stride reloads it automatically.

If you install the Visual Studio plug-in during the Stride installation, you can open your project in Visual Studio from Game Studio. To do this, in the Game Studio toolbar, click Open in IDE.

Alternatively, right-click the script in the Asset View and click Open asset file:

Event functions (Start, Update, Execute, etc)

In Unity®, you work with MonoBehaviours with Start(), Update(), and other methods.

Instead of MonoBehaviours, Stride has three types of scripts: SyncScript, AsyncScript, and StartupScript. For more information, see Types of script.

Unity® MonoBehaviour

public class BasicMethods : MonoBehaviour
{
    void Start() { }
    void OnDestroy() { }
    void Update() { }
}

Stride SyncScript

public class BasicMethods : SyncScript
{
    public override void Start() { }
    public override void Cancel() { }        
    public override void Update() { }
}

Stride AsyncScript

public class BasicMethods : AsyncScript
{
    // Declared public member fields and properties that will appear in the game studio
    public override async Task Execute()
    {
        while (Game.IsRunning)
        {
            // Do stuff every new frame
            await Script.NextFrame();
        }
    }

    public override void Cancel()
    {
        // Cleanup of the script
    }     
}

Stride StartupScript

public class BasicMethods : StartupScript
{
    // Declared public member fields and properties that will appear in the game studio
    public override void Start()
    {
        // Initialization of the script
    }

    public override void Cancel()
    {
        // Cleanup of the script
    }     
}

Script components

Like Unity®, in Stride, you attach scripts to entities by adding them as script components.

Create a script

To create a script, click the Add asset button and select Scripts.

In Unity®, when you create a MonoBehaviour script, it has two base functions: MonoBehaviour.Start() and MonoBehaviour.Update(). Stride has a SyncScript that works similarly. Like MonoBehaviour, SyncScript has two methods:

• SyncScript.Start() is called when it the script is loaded.

• SyncScript.Update() is called every update.

Unlike MonoBehaviour, implementating the SyncScript.Update() method is not optional, and as such, must be implemented in every SyncScript.

If you want your script to be a startup or asynchronous, use the corresponding script types:

• StartupScript: this script has a single StartupScript.Start() method. It initializes the scene and its content at startup.

• AsyncScript: an asynchronous script with a single method AsyncScript.Execute() and you can use async/await inside that method. Asynchronous scripts aren't loaded one by one like synchronous scripts. Instead, they're all loaded in parallel.

Reload assemblies

After you create a script, you may have to reload the assemblies manually. To do this, click Reload assemblies in the Game Studio toolbar.

Add scripts to entities

1. In the Entity Tree (on the left by default), or in the scene, select the entity you want to add the script to.

   

2. In the Property Grid (on the right by default), click Add component and select the script you want to add.

In Unity®, script components are grouped under Components > Scripts. In Stride, scripts are not grouped. Instead, Game Studio lists them alphabetically with other components.

For more information about adding scripts in Stride, see Use a script.

Scripting gameplay

Unity® and Stride both use C#. However, scripting gameplay in Stride is a little different from Unity®.

Instantiate Entity / GameObject

In Unity®, you use Instantiate to create new object instances. This function makes a copy of UnityEngine.Object and spawns it to the scene.

Unity®

public GameObject CarPrefab;
public Vector3 SpawnPosition;
public Quaternion SpawnRotation;

void Start()
{
    GameObject newGameObject = (GameObject)Instantiate(CarPrefab, SpawnPosition, SpawnRotation);
    newGameObject.name = "NewGameObject1";
}

Stride

In Stride, you can instantiate Entities similarly to Unity® GameObjects:

// Declared public member fields and properties displayed in the Game Studio Property Grid.
public Prefab CarPrefab;
public Vector3 SpawnPosition;
public Quaternion SpawnRotation;

public override void Start()
{
    // Initialization of the script.
    List<Entity> car = CarPrefab.Instantiate();
    SceneSystem.SceneInstance.RootScene.Entities.AddRange(car);
    car[0].Transform.Position = SpawnPosition;
    car[0].Transform.Rotation = SpawnRotation;
    car[0].Name = "MyNewEntity";
}

Use default values

Each class in Unity® has certain default values. If you don't override these properties in the script, the default values will be used. This works the same in Stride:

Unity®

public int NewProp = 30;
public Light MyLightComponent = null;

void Start()
{
    // Create the light component if we don't already have one.
    if (MyLightComponent == null)
    {
        MyLightComponent = gameObject.AddComponent<Light>();
        MyLightComponent.intensity = 3;
    }
}

Stride

// Declared public member fields and properties displayed in the Game Studio Property Grid.
public int NewProp = 30;
public LightComponent MyLightComponent = null;

public override void Start()
{
    // Create the light component if we don't already have one.
    if (MyLightComponent == null)
    {
        MyLightComponent = new LightComponent();
        MyLightComponent.Intensity = 3;
        Entity.Add(MyLightComponent);
    }
}

Disable GameObject/entity

Unity®

MyGameObject.SetActive(false);

Stride

Entity.EnableAll(false, true);

Access component from GameObject/entity

Unity®

Light lightComponent = GetComponent<Light>();

Stride

LightComponent lightComponent = Entity.Get<LightComponent>();

Access GameObject/entity from component

Unity®

GameObject componentGameObject = lightComponent.gameObject;

Stride

Entity componentEntity = lightComponent.Entity;

Log output

To see the output, in the Game Studio toolbar, under View, enable Output.

Game Studio displays in the Output tab (at the bottom of Game Studio by default).

Print debug messages

Logging from a ScriptComponent:

public override void Start()
{
    // Enables logging. It will also spawn a console window if no debuggers are attached.
    // The argument dictates the kinds of message that will be filtered out, in this case, anything with less priority than warning won't show up
    Log.ActivateLog(LogMessageType.Warning);
    // Log this message to your console or IDE output window
    Log.Warning("hello");
}

System.Diagnostics.Debug.WriteLine("hello");

Note

To print debug messages, you have to run the game from your IDE, not Game Studio. Running games cannot print to the Game Studio output window.

Attributes

Unity®	Stride
[Serializable]	[DataContract]
[SerializeField]	[DataMember]
[HideInInspector]	[DataMemberIgnore]
[Range]	[DataMemberRange]
[Header("My Header")]	[Display(category: "My Header")]
[Tooltip("My tooltip")]	/// <userdoc>My tooltip</userdoc>

Note

You cannot serialize private fields in Stride, if you want to set a field in editor but prevent other scripts from writing to that field, you should use a init property

public float MyProperty { get; init; }

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Unity® is a trademark of Unity Technologies.