Unity Technologies has announced the release of Unity iPhone 1.7, with iPad support. Unity is a 3D game development tool that works on multiple platforms, including Mac, Windows and the Web.

Unity iPhone has enabled developers up to now to deploy to iPhone and iPod touch devices, and with this release Unity iPhone 1.7 can also deploy to iPads. The new release adds iPad Simulator support, and lets you optionally build “universal” apps that can run on iPhone, iPod touch and iPad devices. Other improvements have also been made.

Apple’s iPhone OS 4.0 unveiling introduced a revised developer program license agreement that raised controversy by requiring that iPhone applications be “originally written in C, C++, Objective C or JavaScript” rather than working through an “intermediary translation or compatibility layer or tool”.

This wording has concerned developers relying on Unity and similar software. While it seems that Adobe is a major casualty of the revised agreement, Unity Technologies has a more optimistic outlook.

“While we don’t yet have a definitive statement to share at this time, we have a healthy, ongoing dialogue with Apple and it seems clear that it’s not their intention to block Unity and will continue our efforts to ensure compliance with the Terms,” the developers write in a statement announcing the new Unity iPhone release.

“While it’s possible that ensuring compliance could mean additional engineering on our part, our committed goal is to provide you with uninterrupted ToS compliant tools and we think we’ll be able to do that,” said the company.

Unity users interested in staying abreast of further issues are directed to keep an eye on Unity CEO David Helgason’s blog.