The rise of content creation has made game development more accessible than ever before. Social media these days is filled with content teaching aspiring game developers, but YouTube arguably stands out as the best platform for learning how to make games.

This article focuses on the Unity Game Engine, but the content in some of these YouTube channels applies to other engines, such as Godot or Unreal Engine. Whether you're a hobbyist game developer or a student intent on working in a AAA studio, these channels should be useful at some point or another.

The channels are broken down into the following categories:

• Art
• Shaders
• C# & Scripting
• Animation
• Video Game Artificial Intelligence (AI)
• Visual Effects (VFX)
• All-in-one
• Game Design
• Mobile Game Development
• Publishing/Industry Knowledge
• Game Development Challenges

Art

Saultoons

Saultoons teaches pixel art, from setting up Aseprite, a popular pixel art tool, to pixel art animation. The channel's owner, commonly referred to as Saul, also specializes in hand-drawn art and has attended art school.

Saultoons' content is beginner-friendly with a touch of comedy while covering topics such as hue-shifting, the twelve principles of animation, and color palettes. The community is active and participates in the annual Septembit Challenge, where aspiring game artists and developers create pixel art from 30 prompts in 30 days.

Blender Guru

Blender Guru specializes in making 3D content using Blender, a popular, free, and open-source tool widely used in the video game industry. This channel is responsible for the well-known donut tutorial on YouTube, which you may have heard about.

If you're interested in creating 3D environments or characters, knowing how to use a 3D tool like Blender is crucial. Blender Guru is a YouTube channel that can help.

Brandon James Greer

Brandon James Greer's channel focuses on making and animating pixel art. The content also focuses on pixel art challenges, such as using obscure color palettes on different sprites to see how far they can be pushed.

If you're interested in learning pixel art while diving deeper into the design choices behind popular video game characters, Brandon James Greer is the channel for you.

Honorable Mentions

MortMort, regarded highly in the pixel art world, is one of the first YouTube channels dedicated to pixel art. It covers everything from pixel art techniques to advanced brushes in Aseprite.

Pixel Pete is another popular pixel art YouTube channel known for its "Pixelart 101" series exploring various aspects of pixel art, including grass, furniture, and trees.

Shaders

Ben Cloward

Ben Cloward is an industry veteran specializing in shader creation using Unity's shader graph and code. His deep knowledge of shader creation spans almost two decades and is a rich source of information for any aspiring game developer interested in shaders.

The channel covers shaders in both the Unity Game Engine and Unreal Engine. Ben's content ranges from beginner to advanced, so there's something for game developers of all skill levels.

Dan Moran

Dan Moran's channel is a treasure trove of shader case studies of popular video games like Overwatch, Dishonored, and No Man's Sky. The shader content is primarily for the Unity Game Engine, but Dan also mentions what applies in Unreal Engine for anyone interested.

The videos on the channel are well-structured and well-paced, with a light comedic touch that doesn't distract from the main topic.

Daniel Ilett

Daniel Ilett's channel explores shaders in Unity built using Unity's Shader Graph in the Universal Render Pipeline (URP). The channel's tutorials cover popular shader effects, including holograms, outlines, dissolves, and cel shading.

It also recreates cool effects from popular video games such as Metal Gear Solid, The Legend of Zelda, and Pokémon.

Honorable Mentions

Freya Holmér discusses mathematics and its application to shaders and video games in general, using creative and easy-to-understand math graphics.

Although it's not a YouTube channel, gamemath.com is a helpful site for anyone struggling to understand vectors, world space vs. local space, matrices, among other video game math concepts.

C# & Scripting

Height Above Sea Level

Height Above Sea Level is a beginner-oriented channel dedicated to teaching aspiring game developers how to code in C#, the scripting language of the Unity Game Engine. It has a playlist covering the fundamental C# concepts you'll apply when making your game in Unity.

There are bi-weekly questions posted on the "Posts" tab to help reinforce your C# knowledge, along with scores of short videos for quick reminders of things you forgot or may have missed.

Jason Weimann (GameDev)

Jason Weimann's channel is code-oriented, specifically with the Unity Game Engine. Its content ranges from writing tests for Unity games to common design patterns game developers should know.

Jason Weimann also has podcast-style videos where developers come together to discuss industry news, best practices, and other game development-related topics.

Turbo Makes Games

Turbo Makes Games is a code-oriented YouTube channel dedicated to advanced Unity game developers. The content covers Unity's flagship Data-Oriented Technology Stack (DOTS) and the Entity Component System (ECS), designed to build large games while maintaining good performance.

Beginners will struggle to grasp most of the concepts discussed, but advanced Unity game developers intending to build larger games will likely reap the most.

Honorable Mentions

Despite being away for quite some time, Infallible Code still offers useful insight into writing and debugging video game code using the Unity Game Engine.

Animation

iHeartGameDev

iHeartGameDev covers the animation process in Unity, from setting up the 3D model to creating state machines. The content is beginner-friendly and includes C# code along with the animation. Most of the videos are over three years old, but are still applicable today.

FImpossible Creations

FImpossible Creations is one of the few YouTube channels that teaches how to work with animations for animals and other multi-legged creatures. The content covers inverse kinematics, an important concept in animation you'll encounter if you want the characters in your game to pick up objects or interact with swords and other weapons.

If the game you're making in the Unity game engine has animals or non-humanoid characters, FImpossible Creations is a gold mine that'll help you animate them.

Video Game Artificial Intelligence (AI)

Holistic3D

Led by Dr. Penny de Byl, Holistic3D tackles simple artificial intelligence in video games to complex non-player character (NPC) systems. Dr. Penny earned a PhD in Artificial Intelligence in Computer Games, and her courses have been featured on the official Unity Learn website.

The content is structured a lot like a university course, and you'll be learning from someone who's an experienced university professor in real life.

AI and Games

AI and Games discusses artificial intelligence in popular video game titles such as Alien Isolation and Hitman. The content is more theory-oriented and doesn't include making a game in any game engine, but it's still a valuable resource for understanding what makes good AI and why.

AI and Games is a great channel if you're looking for inspiration for the AI in your game or want to learn more about how AI in games has evolved over the years.

Visual Effects (VFX)

Gabriel Aguiar Prod.

Gabriel Aguiar Prod. covers visual effects in the Unity Game Engine, Unreal Engine, and Godot. The visual effects range from muzzle flashes to anime water commonly found in stylized games.

If you're an aspiring game developer who enjoys the artistic side of game development, particularly VFX, this is a YouTube channel worth checking out.

All-in-one

Brackeys

Certain YouTube channels cover a broad range of topics and are best viewed as an all-in-one solution. Brackeys is arguably the largest game development channel on YouTube, with content dating back as far as twelve years ago.

Its content covers shaders, animation, lighting, audio, 3D modeling, C#, and more. Brackeys also hosts multiple game jams each year with thousands of participants, so if you're looking to flex your game development skills in a jam, this is a great place to do it.

Unity's YouTube Channel

The official Unity YouTube channel is the best place for the most accurate and up-to-date content on the Unity Game Engine. Updates to the engine, upcoming conferences, show reels, tutorials, and more are posted on the channel. The content also covers popular topics like cameras, 2D games, shaders, and more.

Game Design

Game Maker's Toolkit

Game Maker's Toolkit is one of the most popular YouTube channels covering game design principles in video games. Some of the videos also explore level design and environmental design, so there's something for any aspiring game developer interested in the design aspect of game development.

Game Maker's Toolkit, commonly referred to as GMTK, is another channel with regular game jams if, for some reason, you miss out on Brackeys' game jams.

Mobile Game Development

Creauctopus

Creauctopus, headed by mobile game developer Ivan, teaches you about mobile game development, monetizing your mobile game, and all the details involved with publishing to the Google and Apple app stores. Ivan is an indie developer whose mobile games have been downloaded over a million times across Android and iOS devices. The channel also shares revenue earned from various mobile games and how to maneuver through different ad platforms.

Publishing/Industry Knowledge

Thomas Brush

Thomas Brush's channel features podcast-style interviews with successful indie game developers and industry veterans. The majority of the content focuses on the path to publishing your indie game, life as a solo game developer, and revenue earned from indie games. If podcasts are your thing, you'll probably enjoy the content on Thomas Brush's channel.

Game Development Challenges

Dani

Dani's YouTube channel is filled with wacky, over-the-top, and funny content of video games and game development. He's well known for recreating Among Us in 3D, Fall Guys, and multiple other video game genres using the Unity Game Engine.

If you're in for a bit of entertainment, Dani's channel is sure to provide it. Just ask his 3.56 million subscribers.

Blackthornprod

Initially starting as a channel focused on teaching art and using Unity, Blackthornprod has pivoted to game development challenges involving multiple developers. Its most popular videos involve challenging game developers to make a game without communicating in a specified timeframe.

The challenges are both entertaining and provide good insight into the concessions that are made when there are deadlines but no interactions.

Mix and Jam

Mix and Jam is a channel that recreates game mechanics from popular video game titles in the Unity Game Engine. Some of the videos include mechanics from games such as Overwatch, Balatro, The Legend of Zelda, and Red Dead Redemption.

These are some of the current game development content creators, and the number will grow as more people start creating more content.