How Games Get Made: The Stories of the People Who Make and Play the Games We Love is your all-in-one comprehensive deep dive into the lives of developers and online platforms that create and broadcast your favorite games. What is it like solo developing a game from scratch? Is employment stable in the industry? And just how do people end up as gaming-focused Twitch streamers or YouTubers for a living? All these questions and more are answered through interviews with the likes of David Cage of Quantic Dream, Feargus Urquhart of Obsidian Entertainment, and Sean Baptiste of Bethesda among many others! Wondering what it's like to work in a corporate setting versus an indie studio? Trying to break into the gaming industry as a content creator? Look no further! How Games Get Made not only goes in depth on the developers, but also takes a comprehensive look at how games get marketed through traditional means as well as through platforms like YouTube and Twitch!

Get a head start on making your games efficiently by avoiding common design and development pitfalls. Video games combine art and programming; this unique position has opened up opportunities for many pitfalls. This book takes you through the fundamentals of game making and the usual mistakes and bad practices that can harm your games. We start with the common difficulties and challenges, ways to find the gaps, and game design. Next, we discuss game engines and other tools you need to choose while making a game, how you should choose them, and the design documents you need to make. We also cover simple but important tweaks in game mechanics as well as the look and feel of your game. We will also discuss conventions for naming, code structuring, project structuring, and coding. Your thought process will be guided in a way that you can look for the proper approach to make a successful game. The book sheds light upon how to improve the overall game experience and finalize the game for release. Along the journey, we will explore some interesting stories of games and mythology as well. By the end of the book, you will know about the basic life cycle of a game development process and how to not make a game. What You Will Learn Discover the fundamentals of game design See some intermediate coding tricks to make your games better Grasp the pitfalls to avoid while designing and programming games Master the different conventions and practices for file naming and structuring your projects Who This Book Is For People who want to make games. Basic programming experience is assumed.

Create the Digital Games You Love to Play Discover an exercise-driven, non-technical approach to game design without the need for programming or artistic expertise using Game Design Workshop, Third Edition. Author Tracy Fullerton demystifies the creative process with a clear and accessible analysis of the formal and dramatic systems of game design. Examples of popular games, illustrations of design techniques, and refined exercises strengthen your understanding of how game systems function and give you the skills and tools necessary to create a compelling and engaging game. The book puts you to work prototyping, playtesting, and revising your own games with time-tested methods and tools. It provides you with the foundation to advance your career in any facet of the game industry, including design, producing, programming, and visual design.

The biggest challenge facing many game programmers is completing their game. Most game projects fizzle out, overwhelmed by the complexity of their own code. Game Programming Patterns tackles that exact problem. Based on years of experience in shipped AAA titles, this book collects proven patterns to untangle and optimize your game, organized as independent recipes so you can pick just the patterns you need. You will learn how to write a robust game loop, how to organize your entities using components, and take advantage of the CPUs cache to improve your performance. You'll dive deep into how scripting engines encode behavior, how quadtrees and other spatial partitions optimize your engine, and how other classic design patterns can be used in games.

When Russell joins Black Arts games, brainchild of two visionary designers who were once his closest friends, he reunites with an eccentric crew of nerds hacking the frontiers of both technology and entertainment. In part, he's finally given up chasing the conventional path that has always seemed just out of reach. But mostly, he needs to know what happened to Simon, his strangest and most gifted friend, who died under mysterious circumstances soon after Black Arts' breakout hit. As the company's revolutionary next-gen game is threatened by a software glitch, Russell finds himself in a race to save his job, Black Arts' legacy, and the people he has grown to care about. The deeper Russell digs, the more dangerous the glitch appears -- and soon, Russell comes to realize there's much more is at stake than just one software company's bottom line.

Catch a glimpse inside a school bus and you’ll see lots of kids looking down. What are they doing? They’re deciding on strategy, building cities, setting traps for monsters, sharing resources, and nurturing critical relationships. Over 90 percent of kids ages 2–17 play video games. In Video Games: Design and Code Your Own Adventure, young readers learn why games are so compelling and what ancient games such as mancala have in common with modern games like Minecraft. Kids will even create their very own video games using software such as MIT's Scratch! Using a familiar, high-interest subject, Video Games introduces foundation subjects such as geometry, physics, probability, and psychology in a practical framework. Building Tetris pieces out of Rice Crispie Treats and designing board games are some of the hands-on projects that engage readers’ building skills, while writing actual game code opens digital doors readers may not have known existed.

Inspired by the groundbreaking A History of the World in 100 Objects, this book draws on the unique collections of The Strong museum in Rochester, New York, to chronicle the evolution of video games, from Pong to first-person shooters, told through the stories of dozens of objects essential to the field’s creation and development. Drawing on the World Video Game Hall of Fame’s unmatched collection of video game artifacts, this fascinating history offers an expansive look at the development of one of the most popular and influential activities of the modern world: video gaming. Sixty-four unique objects tell the story of the video game from inception to today. Pithy, in-depth essays and photographs examine each object’s significance to video game play—what it has contributed to the history of gaming—as well as the greater culture. A History of Video Games in 64 Objects explains how the video game has transformed over time. Inside, you’ll find a wide range of intriguing topics, including: The first edition of Dungeons & Dragons—the ancestor of computer role-playing games The Oregon Trail and the development of educational gaming The Atari 2600 and the beginning of the console revolution A World of Warcraft server blade and massively multiplayer online games Minecraft—the backlash against the studio system The rise of women in gaming represented by pioneering American video game designers Carol Shaw and Roberta Williams’ game development materials The prototype Skylanders Portal of Power that spawned the Toys-to-Life video game phenomenon and shook up the marketplace And so much more! A visual panorama of unforgettable anecdotes and factoids, A History of Video Games in 64 Objects is a treasure trove for gamers and pop culture fans. Let the gaming begin!