Game Development @ VGBA

[Spiderpig24]

If you get it now does it stay free forever or is it just free until the 8th of April?

[Nerdysimmer]

If you get it now does it stay free forever or is it just free until the 8th of April?

As far as I've been informed, it's free when you download it, and it'll stay free under your account, must as Valve did with Portal with their Portal giveaway thing. Though the free version of Unity 3D is very limiting of its features.

[Nerdysimmer]

http://nerdysimmer.deviantart.com/#/d4tmw61
Main Menu Theme for Delirium, a psychological horror puzzle game coming soon to XBLIG

[super-mega-hyper-sonic]

I am going to be (Hopefully) doing a Game Development course at Collage when I leave school. Looks really amazing and defiantly something I would be interested in.

[Nerdysimmer]

To those who want to get into game design through Unity3D but don't want to go through the process of scripting or programming.



This is a good investment.

[Nerdysimmer]

[Ronthis the Werewolf]

Whatcha making?

[Nerdysimmer]

It's a 3D side scroller where the player has the ability to spawn platforms at the press of a mouse button. They allow the player to ascend higher as well as protecting him/her from hazards that come from above and below.

So far, three levels are in production, and it's mostly done by myself along with some help from fellow students. Not bad for three weeks in development, by my book.

The first playable will be available for download on May 11th of this year. It's not going to look pretty, but it's functional.

[Ronthis the Werewolf]

It's a 3D side scroller where the player has the ability to spawn platforms at the press of a mouse button. They allow the player to ascend higher as well as protecting him/her from hazards that come from above and below.

So far, three levels are in production, and it's mostly done by myself along with some help from fellow students. Not bad for three weeks in development, by my book.

The first playable will be available for download on May 11th of this year. It's not going to look pretty, but it's functional.

Ooh, sounds pretty cool.

[woopwoop11]

So, I heard about Kill Murder Island you guys are making. I like what I see so far.

[twoxT]

It's a 3D side scroller where the player has the ability to spawn platforms at the press of a mouse button. They allow the player to ascend higher as well as protecting him/her from hazards that come from above and below.

So far, three levels are in production, and it's mostly done by myself along with some help from fellow students. Not bad for three weeks in development, by my book.

The first playable will be available for download on May 11th of this year. It's not going to look pretty, but it's functional.

Sounds awesome. It reminds me of the Desmond levels in Assassin's Creed Revelations.

[Nerdysimmer]

Sounds awesome. It reminds me of the Desmond levels in Assassin's Creed Revelations.

Welp, forgot to put a link in for a download for some of you to play.

I was able to churn out a single playable level, but more are in production. Originally it was for my game design class last semester.

For recent news... Quoted word for word from my Tumbling blog.

Semester is over, learned how to Unity, better organize my arrays of data in a program, created my first 3D prototype, and took a speech class, something that I’ve been putting in the back burner for so long. The last class I need to take isn’t being offered in the summer, so I decided to spend the summer teaching myself everything game development related that college has failed to teach me, along with my music project.

So anyway…



This is the prototype I’ll be playing around with throughout the summer to get myself more accustomed to the interface with Unity, along with Blender, 3D Studio Max, or Maya. This is based off of Metroid Subzero, a fangame I’ve done during my blissful days as a young game designer, and one of the last games I’ve dabbled with Multimedia Fusion 2.



I’ve started working on it back in October of 2007, during the time I was still in high school. The project died during the second quarter of 2011 after I put it off for too long because of college. Angered a lot of people as well.

I don’t want to be pressured into developing a full game out of this because of my reluctance to develop games using an existing intellectual property, though if the single level comes out well, and the gameplay mechanics work wonders, I may reconsider it.

The gunship and Samus models were [deleted]stolen[/deleted] borrowed from the dark corners of the net. Both had their textures and normals already, though, the Samus model wasn’t skinned.


The Varia Suit Samus model and it’s skeleton in Blender. Still have to weight it.

I was hardly taught how to work with models in college, with the exceptions of importing a model into a Unity or UDK project. So throughout this week, I’ve dabbled into Blender and 3D Studio Max, playing around with the skinning and rigging tools.

I can say I’ve had a much easier time learning how the interface works than I’ve had when I first dabbled into C++ programming; that nearly made me hate programming. Thankfully, data structures made me love it again.

[woopwoop11]

Nerdysimmer, these models are looking great

[Nerdysimmer]

Nerdysimmer, these models are looking great

They aren't mine. The textures, normals, and meshes were ripped from Metroid Prime 2, I've only applied a cube map to make them look shiny, as well as rigging the Samus model.

[Nerdysimmer]

Okay, so a few pointers I'd like to bring upon to some of you who are interested in the field.

1. If you're just starting out as a game designer, start small. Breaking ground with a bunch of ideas, or an idea that you think will be the idea to end all ideas will make the game development process completely unfocused. One day you'll create your Magnum Opus, you just need to have more experience in the industry. Have patience.

2. If you are in the heat of development, make sure to get yourself nourished and have a good night's sleep every now and then. Staying up long hours glued to your project isn't very sound, and in fact will cause a bunch of problems like eroding your motivation to finish in time for the deadline.

3. During a brainstorm, always consider people's ideas, even if you think they are bad. Many times they will generally build up to even better ideas.

4. Ideas sound amazing on paper, but all in all, they're just ideas.
Step 1: Think of an idea, can be anything, really.
Step 2: Play with it.
Step 3: Figure out what's wrong with it.
Step 4: Repeat Step 2.

5. When working with any program, do not be afraid to play with the interface, you're not trying to disarm a bomb. As a game developer, or anyone who is intuitive with using a computer, the best way to learn how to use a program is to dabble with it yourself. If you don't understand how a certain function works, do not waste more time trying to figure it out yourself and find some help online.

6. Do not be afraid to ask for advice from other game developers, or follow their blogs, but don't share your ideas if they hold dear to you. The worst answer you could get when asking for help is "no," anything worse is a variation of it.

7. Search up podcasts or speeches from game designers to gain a deeper insight of more ideas and the industry. http://www.altdevblogaday.com/ is very insightful for many game designers. Attend game development conventions, network with other developers, and attend panels. Don't be afraid to ask questions if your curiosity needs to be remedied.

8. READ THESE BOOKS DAMMIT THEY ARE GOOD FOR YOUR HEALTH

9. Play Metagame. It's an awesome game of Apples to Apples, except instead of trying to make the player laugh, you're persuading certain points about certain games (as well as trying to make him/her laugh with questions such as "What is the sexiest game title?") It'll benefit your critical thinking of what you like about a certain game, and what you don't.

[mchapra]

[Spiderpig24]

[amad2]

Thanks for the tips, Nerdy! I really wanna get into game development (mostly as a programmer), is there anything you guys can recommend to an amateur who knows the basics of coding to start off with?

[Nerdysimmer]

Thanks for the tips, Nerdy! I really wanna get into game development (mostly as a programmer), is there anything you guys can recommend to an amateur who knows the basics of coding to start off with?

Just keep on learning new languages and new things related to the language of your choice. Most programmers get their fun by just programming away figuring out how some of the syntax works. My suggestion for you is to learn a few things about Data Structures, and make a small text based adventure using classes, trees, hash tables, and graphs.

Microsoft Visual Studio is a good environment for learning C++ and C#, while Textpad with the JDK is a good tool to start with for Java based development. Unity3D uses C# as one of the languages to script with, and it's more recommended to use than Javascript if you want a more broad approach when programming how the mechanics work, especially if the mechanics are modular.

I still recommend you to have the mind of a game designer and read Schell's Art of Game Design. It won't teach you how to make a game, but it benefits your thinking of what makes a game good for the player, and may alter your way of how to program mechanics.