Unity Helper Methods #4: InvokeInSeconds

/// <summary>
/// Invokes an action after waiting for a specified number of seconds
/// </summary>
/// <param name="waitSeconds">The number of seconds to wait before invoking</param>
/// <param name="invoke">The action to invoke after the time has passed</param>
public static IEnumerator InvokeInSeconds(float waitSeconds, Action invoke)
{
    yield return new WaitForSeconds(waitSeconds);
    invoke();
}

Typical Usage

Now I know that Unity already has its own Invoke method but Unity's method only accepts a string specifying the method name.

I wrote this method to be able to specify an anonymous lambda instead of the string.

Note that the method's return type is IEnumerator since it yields, therefore we must invoke it with StartCoroutine.

StartCoroutine(InvokeInSeconds(0.5f, () => Destroy(gameObject))); // Destroy the gameObject in 0.5 seconds

Unity Helper Methods #3: GetRandomEnum

/// <summary>
/// Returns a random enum from the specified enum type
/// </summary>
/// <typeparam name="T">The enum</typeparam>
public static T GetRandomEnum<T>()
{
    Array values = Enum.GetValues(typeof(T));
    return  (T)values.GetValue(UnityEngine.Random.Range(0, values.Length));
}

Typical Usage

Fairly simple; returns a random enum value from an enum type.

enum EnemyModels
{
    Knight,
    FrailOldLady,
    Copernicus,
    BrianMay,
    MalboroGuy
}

void SpawnEnemy() 
{
    EnemyModels modelType = GetRandomEnum<EnemyModels>();
    // Now we have a random enemy model type.
}

Unity Helper Methods #2: BoxCollider.GetPointInCollider

/// <summary>
/// Returns a random world point inside the given BoxCollider
/// </summary>
public static Vector3 GetPointInCollider(this BoxCollider area)
{
    var bounds = area.bounds;
    var center = bounds.center;

    var x = UnityEngine.Random.Range(center.x - bounds.extents.x, center.x + bounds.extents.x);
    var z = UnityEngine.Random.Range(center.z - bounds.extents.z, center.z + bounds.extents.z);

    return new Vector3(x, 0, z);
}

I normally use this method to get a random spawnpoint within my spawn area represented with a BoxCollider (set to a trigger of course).

Notice how I hardcode Y to 0 because the Y position is irrelevant to me since that is set by code outside of this method.

public BoxCollider spawnArea;

void SpawnWhatever() 
{
    Vector3 spawnPoint = spawnArea.GetPointInCollider();
    // Spawn something at the random spawnpoint we got
    // ...
}

Unity Helper Methods #1: Animator.SetLayerWeights

/// <summary>
/// Sets the weight of all the layers in the specified Animator
/// </summary>
/// <param name="animator">The animator</param>
/// <param name="totalLayers">The number of layers this animator contains</param>
/// <param name="weight">The value of the weight</param>
public static void SetLayerWeights(this Animator animator, int totalLayers, float weight)
{
    for (int i = 0; i < totalLayers; i++)
    {
        animator.SetLayerWeight(i + 1, weight);
    }
}

Description

Starting with a fairly trivial method; setting the weight of 'all' the layers of an Animator. When a game starts, Unity by default sets all the layers of the Animators' Controllers to 0.

Unfortunately, the method needs to be supplied with the number of layers that the Animator contains because I haven't yet found a way how to get the number of layers programmatically.

Typical Usage

I use this method at the start of a game to set the weight of all the layers to 1.

So, if I know that I have 4 layers for a particular Animator:

animator.SetLayerWeights(4, 1); // Sets the weight of all (4) the layers of my animator