Rigidbody forces and velocity in Unity - Mini Project: Build & Apply

Rigidbody forces and velocity

📖 Scenario: You are creating a simple Unity game where a ball moves when forces are applied. You want to control the ball's movement using Rigidbody physics.

🎯 Goal: Build a Unity script that applies a force to a Rigidbody and then reads its velocity to display how fast the ball is moving.

📋 What You'll Learn

Create a Rigidbody variable and assign it in the script

Create a Vector3 force variable with exact values

Apply the force to the Rigidbody using AddForce

Read the Rigidbody's velocity and print it

💡 Why This Matters

🌍 Real World

In many games, objects move realistically using physics forces and velocities. This project shows how to control and monitor that movement.

💼 Career

Understanding Rigidbody forces and velocity is essential for game developers working with Unity to create smooth and realistic object movements.

1

Create a Rigidbody variable

Declare a public variable called rb of type Rigidbody inside the class.

Unity

using UnityEngine;

public class BallController : MonoBehaviour
{
    // Declare a public Rigidbody variable called rb
    
}

Need a hint?

Use public Rigidbody rb; inside the class but outside any method.

2

Create a force vector

Create a private variable called force of type Vector3 and set it to new Vector3(0, 300, 0) inside the class but outside any method.

Unity

using UnityEngine;

public class BallController : MonoBehaviour
{
    public Rigidbody rb;
    // Create a Vector3 variable called force with values (0, 300, 0)
    
}

Need a hint?

Use private Vector3 force = new Vector3(0, 300, 0); inside the class.

3

Apply force to the Rigidbody

Inside the Start() method, apply the force to rb using rb.AddForce(force);.

Unity

using UnityEngine;

public class BallController : MonoBehaviour
{
    public Rigidbody rb;
    private Vector3 force = new Vector3(0, 300, 0);

    void Start()
    {
        // Apply the force to rb here
    }
}

Need a hint?

Write a Start() method and call rb.AddForce(force); inside it.

4

Print the Rigidbody velocity

Inside the Update() method, print the velocity of rb using Debug.Log(rb.velocity);.

Unity

using UnityEngine;

public class BallController : MonoBehaviour
{
    public Rigidbody rb;
    private Vector3 force = new Vector3(0, 300, 0);

    void Start()
    {
        rb.AddForce(force);
    }

    // Print the velocity of rb inside Update()
    void Update()
    {
        
    }
}

Need a hint?

Use Debug.Log(rb.velocity); inside the Update() method to see the velocity in the console.