Timers and countdowns

You should now have a level complete with geometry and coin objects. Thanks to our newly added Coin.cs script, the coins are both countable and collectible. Even so, the level still poses little or no challenge to the player because there's no way the level can be won or lost. Specifically, there's nothing for the player to achieve. This is why a time limit is important for the game: it defines a win and loss condition. Namely, collecting all coins before the timer expires results in a win condition and failing to achieve this results in a loss condition. Let's get started at creating a timer countdown for the level. To do this, create a new and empty game object by selecting GameObject | Create Empty and rename this to LevelTimer. See Figure 2.25:

Figure 2.25: Renaming the timer object

Note

Remember that empty game objects cannot be seen by the player because they have no mesh renderer component. They are especially useful to create functionality and behaviors that don...