What The Tools Actually Do
A reference for the Unity MCP tool surface
Verified against a working setup on 2026-08-10
Knowing what is on the menu changes how you prompt. Ask for "check my scene" and the model picks a tool; ask for "profile the frame and show the worst samples" and it picks a better one. This chapter is the menu.
Tool families below are from the official Unity AI Relay (1.0.12-build.97), read live from a connected Editor. The community server exposes the first four families and none of the last four.
Reading your project
| Tool family | What it does | Reach for it when |
|---|---|---|
Console | Reads errors, warnings, logs | Always. This is the highest-value read tool. |
Project data | Asset taxonomy and counts | Orienting in an unfamiliar project. |
Find / grep | Searches assets and file contents | "Where is this referenced?" |
Scene | Reads the open scene hierarchy | Diagnosing setup problems. |
GameObject | Inspects components and values | "Why does this object behave oddly?" |
These five are read-only and safe to allow permanently. Most of MCP's value is here — you can get almost all of it without ever letting a model write.
Changing your project
| Tool family | What it does | Risk |
|---|---|---|
Script create / edit | Writes and patches C# files | Low on a clean branch — git shows you everything. |
Script validate | Checks a script compiles | None. Pair it with every edit. |
GameObject manage | Creates objects, sets values | High. Scene diffs are hard to read. |
Scene manage | Opens, saves, modifies scenes | High. Can overwrite unsaved work. |
Asset manage | Creates, moves, deletes assets | High. Moving assets rewrites .meta files. |
Menu item | Runs any Editor menu command | Highest. A menu item can do anything. |
The script validate tool is the underrated one. A model that writes code and then checks it compiled catches its own mistakes before you ever see them. Ask for it explicitly — "then verify it compiles".
Tools only the official relay has
These are the reason to prefer the official relay on Unity 6.3, and they change what you can ask for.
| Family | What it exposes | Why it matters |
|---|---|---|
Profiler | Frame timings, GC allocations, counters | Performance work stops being guesswork. |
Scene view capture | Renders the scene to an image | The model can look at your level. |
Camera capture | Renders through a game camera | Checking what the player sees. |
Asset generation | Materials, textures, animation clips | Blocking out placeholder art. |
Shader manage | Reads and writes shaders | Shader errors are miserable by hand. |
Package manager | Queries installed packages | "Which Input System version am I on?" |
The profiler family is the genuinely new capability. A model that can read GC allocation data can find the exact line allocating every frame — the problem object pooling exists to solve, and the one that is most tedious to hunt by hand.
A permission policy that holds up
| Group | Policy | Reasoning |
|---|---|---|
Console, search, read scene | Always allow | No side effects, most of the value. |
Profiler, capture | Always allow | Read-only. |
Script write, validate | Allow per session | Recoverable via git. |
GameObject, scene, asset | Ask each time | Hard to review after the fact. |
Delete, menu item | Ask each time | Unbounded blast radius. |
What to take away
- The read tools carry most of the value and none of the risk.
- Pair every script edit with the validate tool.
- Profiler and capture tools exist only on the official relay.
- Menu-item execution is the single most dangerous tool. Keep it on ask.