Unity opens up early access to Windows 8 and Windows RT

Ahead of its full release, Unity has opened up its early access process for the Windows Store, allowing "intermediate or advanced" Unity users to port titles to Windows 8 and Windows RT.

Detailed in a blog post, the company said Windows support is still in beta mode, but adding Microsoft's marketplace to its roster long term will open up "a new global platform for you to reach even more people eager to play great Unity-authored games and interactive content."

Early movers

"If you feel brave enough to be an early adopter and play with technology still in development, then enroll in our Windows Store apps early access program," detailed Unity development manager Vilmantas Balasevicius.

"As a participant of our beta, you get to test our new platform, report bugs and provide relevant feedback that will help Unity create a great product and jump start your Windows Store plans.

"We do ask for your patience though; depending on the number of people who register for the program it could take time for us to process the requests and send you the link to the beta site."

Game on

Unity claims several games powered by Unity 4 have already made the leap to Windows 8 and Windows RT, including Siegecraft by Blowfish Studios, Drift Mania Championship 2 from Ratrod Studio and Coding Jar Studios' Fling Theory.

Drift Mania Championship 2

"With Unity 4.2 you will be able to publish games as Windows Store apps targeting x86 and ARM systems," concluded Balasevicius.

"The minimum DirectX version supported is DirectX 11 Feature level 9.1, so your games will run on almost any PC and tablet that is running on Windows 8 or Windows RT.

"You will be able to port your existing games to the Windows Store apps platform using the Unity 4.2 alpha/beta builds."

[source: Unity]