(Part 3) Reddit mentions: The best computer & video game strategy guides

I'm really torn on this whole Greenlight thing.

I read Anna Anthropy's book Rise of the Videogame Zinesters recently, and in it, she makes the case that gaming is reaching a point where it's becoming an accessible medium at a hobbyist level. It used to be that you had to be a master programmer or artist or have a team of people funded by a company to make a game, but now we're reaching a place where tools are bridging skill gaps and almost anyone can make games.

She compares it to other media (e.g. writing, video), where accessibility opened up the platform and allowed for a huge plurality of narratives, thoughts, and experiences -- a point touched on in the video when talking about YouTube. An open medium gives us tons of crap, yes, but it also allows people to make games and tell stories that are different and individual and that wouldn't otherwise get made.

And I can definitely understand the value in that. There are a lot of brilliant people out there with a lot of compelling ideas and experiences, and it's great that games are finally reaching a point where they can be used to capture and express those on an individual level. It's going to lead to more diverse narratives and mechanics.

But I struggle with Greenlight because I find myself at odds with what I think and what I want.

Truth is, I really like Steam, and I really like that it is more limited in what it offers. I benefit from that in the implicit assurance of quality that's offered, as well as in my ability to parse what I want from a finite set of options. If I want to get a racing game, I can compare a small number of them, rather than having to sift through hundreds of similar-looking entries, and when I buy that game, I can be reasonably certain that it's going to be a complete game, run decently well, and have a minimum set of production values. And even when that isn't the case, Steam is slick enough that it's easy to see that as the exception rather than the rule.

As a customer, Steam works well for me, and I worry what a massive influx of games would do it. On the other hand, I definitely want access to some of that influx through the convenience of my favorite digital distribution platform, and I, deep down, really do think that that influx should be able to be accessed even if I don't want it.

Greenlight seems like an attempt at that, but it's one that seems half-assed and cursory. Even with dozens of professional reviews, news articles, and videos covering a well-known game, people still struggle all the time with whether or not it's worth their purchase (just look at all the heming and hawing that goes on over a $5 AAA game any time there's a Steam sale). Yet, with Greenlight, we're expecting people to make snap judgments of a game's worth and quality using a couple of promo shots and paragraphs, and we're doing it by popularity which, as reddit regularly shows, isn't always a great metric. It seems reductive, and seems to favor things that many smaller games are less likely to have (e.g. great graphics). A submission could have amazing writing and an incredible story, but if it doesn't have a look good or have a well-known fanbase/personality backing it up, it's probably going to be dead in the water on Greenlight. The whole system feels like an improper response ("beauty contest") to the problem at hand (plenty of fish in the sea).

I don't really know where I'm going with all of this other than that Greenlight is confusing to me because I'm not sure what to think. I really like the idea of openness and accessibility, I definitely see both the benefits and drawbacks of not having that, and I'm stuck pondering a bunch of different implementation issues when I consider how things could be changed. I also think the whole thing would be easier if we weren't so damn reliant on Steam in the first place. I'm thinking maybe the answer isn't in letting every game into Steam but instead getting some of us out of it and into Desura, GOG, and other platforms. The games want to go where the gamers are, and right now we're sitting behind the walls and loving it.

I've recently completed my first game using Game Maker, and I couldn't be happier with the results. Game Maker is a pretty simple program to use, and it does wonders for making game development seem approachable and manageable. No coding is required, but you can still put in your own scripts if you want to get fancy (or you can just code the whole thing).

There is a pretty substantial free version that you can download here. Plus there are plenty of tutorials online that can help you out with the basics of making a game.

After that, I would recommend getting a book to help walk you through some of the more advanced things. Being a fan of platformers, I found this book to have everything I needed to help me learn what I needed to know to make my game. It has tutorials that walk you through step-by-step when creating a platformer game, and it does a great job of explaining what each and every bit of code does.

If making a platformer isn't your thing, you can maybe try this book. I've never read it, so I can't attest to what's in it, but it's written by the same people, so I'd imagine the quality is top notch as well.

Good luck with the motivation, man! Try not to compare yourself too much to other people though. Sure your first few games aren't going to compare to today's blockbusters. Hell, when you're starting out, you might even be envious of some indie developers as well. But these people have had years of experience. They started out making mediocre things too. You just have to keep at it, and eventually you'll be on the same level as them (and you won't even notice it!).

Pro-tip: Try to make as many games as possible, instead of trying to polish one game to perfection. You learn a lot more from completing projects than you can trying to perfect one. Having an opportunity to reflect on what you would do differently for next time is invaluable.

Anyhoo, just try to stay positive, and think about how awesome it is that you plan to make things that entertain other people (I mean seriously, how cool is that?!)

I don't know - I feel like I'm expressing myself badly here.

None of what you are suggesting are bad things. They're all sort of... no-brainers, but I just keep watching these scandals pop up and then fade out, over and over again... it breeds cynicism, I suppose, but I can't help but feel that we must be missing something, or that there's some other way of working at this.

I think part of it is this:

> And improving that relationship by fixing the content coming from the content creator is something I feel is extremely important.

because I just have no faith left in the games industry, much like I have little faith in the movie industry to improve itself, much like I have little faith in the music industry to improve itself. When you strap creativity onto a structure revolving around profit, I honestly don't think that is an avenue we want to be shoring up. The relationship of power between a consumer and a producer in our capitalist system is not equal. I would love to say that things like Bioware finally writing in a gay male NPC is progress, but the very fact that this bafflingly lukewarm tokenism is held up as an example of progressive games-writing is problematic in and of itself.

As to your points about the unique nature of the videogaming community, I believe that it's not specific to the medium, or at least not caused by the medium. It's very, very easy to trace the isolated, gender-segregated history of the tech and games industry, and how that reflects on a) what kinds of games are made and b) who those games are sold to, which leads to c) who gets inspired to make what kinds of games.

Have you read Anna Anthropy's Rise of the Videogame Zinesters? She calls for creation outside of capitalist systems of games-making. It reads more like a manifesto, which I think is a good thing, and ends in with a Twine tutorial. I think you would enjoy it.

eta: In hindsight I think this is a better way of articulating my point.

> we all contribute to the gaming industry by purchasing certain games we choose/enjoy

implies that all games arrive through the capitalist system, and I think that that's not true and also not the best way of doing things. And I would encourage alternatives as a way of trying to encourage or create less toxic communities revolving around games.

Hey! Sorry for the late answer, I was drowning under school projects.

My personal favorite is Introduction to Game Design, Prototyping and Development. It gives a lot of on-point theory, it explains iterative design and good practices, and it's all clear and much more practical than your average game design book. The first part focuses on game design, the second part on programming (it's meant for beginners, so I just skimmed it) and the third one is a collection of 8 tutorials showing you how to make a prototype for 8 different kind of games. It's very clear and very complete. The only problem is that Unity is evolving so fast that the book might be obsolete too soon.

I have the first edition of that book that came out in 2014, and when I read it (in 2016), there was already several lines of codes that were outdated in the tutorials. (A second edition came out in 2017, I don't know how it is!). There's an official website that lists those lines and tell you what you should put instead, but it's a bit inconvenient. However, if your main interest is the game design part, you're good to go!

Another one that you might like is Challenges for Game Designers. I haven't gone through it yet, so I can't attest how good it is, but basically it's a book that switches between theory and practical exercises. I don't believe there's a book out there that provides that many exercises, so that's really good for sharpening your skills. It's also cool because you can design your games without having to implement them at all (they can even be though as board games!), so you save all the time of production and really just foster your design abilities, which seems to be your focus for the moment.

Finally, while not being a game design book per se, I highly recommend Derek Yu's Spelunky. It's a making-of written by the creator of the game himself, and it's full of great advice about game development in general. Also, as he explains the process of creating the game, if you pay attention to what he's saying, you can learn a lot about the craft without being given straight out theory.

I hope that fits your request! :) If you have any other question, hit me up! Also, I don't know why you asked about books specifically, but if you want any other recommendation in other format (videos, blogs, etc.), I will happily provide them.

You might have better luck in /r/gamedev; designing/implementing a 3D engine is really hard and it's expected that you know how to program pretty well before attempting it.

I've not ever tried myself but I do have two older book recommendations.

Michael Abrash's Graphics Programming Black Book is a classic. It's very very low-level (everything is done in assembly language) but quite good and available for free.

https://www.drdobbs.com/parallel/graphics-programming-black-book/184404919

Second, I hear great things about Developing Games in Java by David Brackeen

https://www.amazon.com/dp/1592730051

Finally, if you're truly a beginner, you might want to start with game drawing concepts in general before trying to do 3D. Learning how to use an existing graphics library like PyGame might help you understand what must be under the hood. And so I can recommend Making Games with Python and PyGame by Al Sweigart.

http://inventwithpython.com/pygame/

Hope that helps.

> What would you recommend to a total newcomer who knows 0% programming, but would love to learn?

Python has been suggested. I found this book informative and fairly complete (from not-a-programmer to 3D in a few hundred pages).

From there, it depends on what he finds he likes of that experience. If he really likes the programming aspect, you could toss him in head first to C++ or get him into a easier start with Java (Slick2D (website currently down, hopefully temporarily) or JME would further smooth his acclimation to Java, FWIW). Maybe he really likes the game dev itself more, in which case Unity is probably a great option (no experience personally, but the community is ostensibly large and Unity itself conducive to easy game dev).

I think Angband benefits from the fact that it's still actively being changed and modernised. The current official maintainer of vanilla Angband is particularly keen on making the game fit better with modern play sensibilities. It's still very much Angband but it's designed to have a livelier pace, and some elements which used to be a bit of a grind (going back to town and selling stuff at the shops) have been reduced or removed.


It's still very much Angband and, as such, is a fairly old-school dungeon grind. But it hasn't dated as much as it could, in large part thanks to the changes made over the last couple of years or so. Of course, there are still those who will prefer older versions, but luckily most of the whole back catalogue is still available.


Curiously, I actually find that many of the variants now feel more dated than vanilla, simply because most are based on older versions. I've seen the name Frogcomposband thrown around a few times, though I don't know why. I haven't really played it. For me, the best Angband variants are the ones which either make the game shorter or turn it into something different. For the former type, Quickband and Tiny Angband dramatically reduce the length of the dungeon and also accelerate character advancement accordingly (Tiny is my personal favourite of the two). For the latter type I'd go for ToME2, though Halls of Mist has always intrigued me.


So yes, both Angband and its variants are still worth playing, but which variants and which incarnation of vanilla you'll enjoy depends on your preferences. Regardless, you should prepared for the reality that Angband in all its forms is fundamentally a grind. That's something which has fallen out of favour a bit these days, but I think it has its place. And personally I'd rather have Angband than Nethack. Infamously, Nethack relies on spoilers, while according to Craddock's Dungeon Hacks book, Angband was intentionally conceived to have little to no need for spoilers.

Never seen the third book but it looks like it could be helpful. I used this book to help me learn materials and other stuff, about 5 months ago, and its still pretty relevant. If you want to learn unreal script(custom c++ in the engine) then [this] (http://www.amazon.com/Unreal-Development-Game-Programming-UnrealScript/dp/1849691924) is the best book by a long shot. The UDK forums are also a great place to get help, especially the programming section on the forums.

Modern Recording Techniques for actual audio. Professor was a wealth of information, so we used a lot of handouts, but he did give us a recommended reading list:

Assistant Engineer's Handbook

Mastering Audio

Master Handbook of Acoustics

personally, i found having a copy of Practical Electronics for Inventors laying around super useful, as it explains circuits and what different diagram symbols mean and how to build basic circuits - awesome if for some reason you need to troubleshoot a piece of gear or you're just curious about what's going on under the hood

Hi there, TerraNisi was with this stuff. Just a bunch of Windows API C stuff. I'm surprised you like the knight game! I thought it totally sucked and was embarrassed to put it up on the page :)

For C/C++/DirectX I'd recommend trying to look at tigr. tigr has some very advanced code in there, but it's all dense and in one place. Anyone can slowly lookup piece by piece on the internet and learn about the DirectX or OpenGL implementation. The author, Richard Mitton, is a grumpy but generally nice guy. One could probably email him with a well thought out question and he'd be happy to answer. Just recently I was asking a question to him about his PNG loader/saver :)

It takes time to grind through since it's a lot to learn, but it if it's what you want to work on then totally worth it. For books and math I did like this one by Frank Luna. Again, it's a lot to learn, but once you learn it you know it forever.

Expensive but beautiful. I hope this means Amazon will have it soon, because that's my jam. My search didn't find it yet though. I also hope good ole fashion competition means they will drive the price down :-)

EDIT: found the placeholder - thanks Anthonok
https://www.amazon.com/dp/1911015214/ref=cm_sw_r_cp_api_qELPybN3NCCPW

What helped me get into game design and works for all sorts of people is [Game Maker Studio.] (https://www.yoyogames.com/studio)

It's a program that contains easy drag-and-drop code for beginners, and real deal code in its own, simple to use language (GML) that takes inspiration from many other languages. Many professional games have been made with Gamemaker Studio (like Nidhogg, Spelunky, etc.) and it is absolutely great for any 2D game.

If you wanna get pretty serious on using Game Maker (you should, it's awesome) I recommend this book made by the creators of the software. It teaches you by guiding you through making games. At the start you're making simple shooters, and by the end of it you're making huge maze games.

Game Maker is so easy a kid could do it, and once you get into it, has pretty much everything you need to make a successful professional 2D game.

If I may add, don't just make overly simple games or clones. Those are fine to get you in the mindset of designing games, and learning some basic dev skills; but they don't add anything to your portfolio imo.

One thing that is interesting is designing board and card games. Those games are all about designing systems that work well with each other and play well. If you can design a decent one, it speaks a lot about your capabilities as a designer. I highly recommend Challenges for Game Designers for that purpose.

Good luck!

Some attempt at a happy ending that ties into a theme.

Not sure if you guys have ever come across "Anna Anthropy". But she is a transgender video game developer who wrote a really interesting book on her life and career:

http://www.amazon.com/Rise-Videogame-Zinesters-Drop-outs-Housewives/dp/1609803728

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anna_Anthropy

"Rise of the Videogame Zinesters" is a fun, inspiring read. Not only does it feel good to see a feminist viewpoint in the game development community, but what she has to say about design, career, and artistic choices is really good as well. What she has to say is useful to anyone in a creative field, in my opinion.

Software means that you do all the math and rendering yourself and don't use the graphics card at all (which does a lot of the manual work for you). If you want to learn about 3D rendering I'd say a software renderer is the way to go.

There may be other software rendering books but the one I've read is Tricks of the 3D Game Programming Gurus-Advanced 3D Graphics and Rasterization by Andre LaMothe (https://www.amazon.com/Tricks-Programming-Gurus-Advanced-Graphics-Rasterization/dp/0672318350) I think it is a really great book and I've learned a lot!

Also there is a free video series called Handmade Hero (https://hero.handmade.network/episode/code) while he is only doing a 2d software renderer basically all of the 2d concepts apply to 3d and I find that he is a very good teacher.

Andre LaMothe has some amazing books on how to write games from scratch once you have learned C/C++. They are a bit dated, but his ability to explain math and other low level concepts is fantastic.

How to write a 3d game engine all in software (no opengl/direct x):

http://www.amazon.com/Tricks-Programming-Gurus-Advanced-Graphics-Rasterization/dp/0672318350/ref=la_B000ARBG92_1_4?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1405533453&sr=1-4

Writing 2D games:

http://www.amazon.com/Tricks-Windows-Game-Programming-Gurus/dp/0672323699/ref=la_B000ARBG92_1_8?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1405533453&sr=1-8

I would recommend reading his books, and porting his code to modern C++ and using the SDL lib to gain access to graphics and sound.

It's worth mentioning learning programming itself is a huge challenge. Learning game programming on top of that even more so. It's a process that will take most people a few years of constant learning before they start to get "good" at it. Don't get discouraged by how difficult it is to jump it, just keep at it.

For overall C++ I recommend Sams Teach Yourself C++ in 24 Hours. It is a really good book and got me through a few of my introduction modules in Uni. Once you have the basics down, I found the best book for getting started with DirectX 9 was this. The Author really knows his stuff and you start from the absolute basics of graphical programming and work up to some really cool stuff by the end. Again it is book I have used and have had great results from it.
Hope these will help you on your way.

Your criticisms are valid; Limbo was a puzzle game with few mechanics and limited player engagement. Compared to other puzzle titles it is lacking (it's no Portal, for sure); compared to other games released in 2010, it is not involving. Limbo is a short experience (two to five hours), and it's exceptionally short for the money ($15 on release). Your criticism reminds me of Will Freeman's review in The Guardian, where he calls the game a "traditional platform-jumping puzzle title" and notes "much of its brilliance is the work of smoke and mirrors".

Yet I think the criticisms are only touching on part of what made Limbo an interesting experience.

The limited mechanics and world interactivity reminded me of Another World (or Out Of This World, depending). Playing Limbo took me back a step to several games of yesteryear, reminded me of them, and showed me what an experience like that could be like remodeled in a new engine.

I thought the grayscale presentation was a striking choice, given how graphically-driven modern games tend to be. I liked the minimalist feel of the environment, and I thought the game did a good job of establishing and sticking to the tone set by the art. The game feels very, very lonely, as though the boy is trapped between worlds, much as the title would suggest.

The use of lighting was key; when you're working in grays all you really have is light and shadow, so you've got to make the most of it. There's a scene where you're holding on to a bug that's trying to fly up towards the light, but the leg you're on breaks, trapping you once again; later, when you encounter the spinning blades, lighting reflects them at massive size in shadows behind you, making them seem even more fearsome and lethal than they already are. I thought this was very nicely done.

I thought the sound design was spot on, from the gentle sounds of wind or water, to the more rumbling background tone that sets in when you first encounter the stabbing arms of the spider-creature. Sound also really made the "HOTEL" sign scene for me, as you can hear and see electrical transformers exploding as you try to cross the letters. This does a great job of adding to the tension.

In terms of story, the game gives you nothing to speak of; there were some promotional materials that read "Uncertain of his sister's fate, a boy enters Limbo" - but that's it. The game doesn't otherwise explain itself. As I played I felt the journey was the important and transformative element, more so than any "reward" at the end, and I felt that way right up until the final shot.

As an older human, I've attended my share of funerals. I've lost family over the years. I'm dreading when I first lose a friend or lover, and I can't even consider how I'd feel to lose a parent, let alone a sibling that I've known since they were born. I do know each loss takes part of me with them - the dead keep the parts of me I've given to them.

I had felt like the boy was already dead early into the game, but when you get to the final scene, and she's there - there's this pause, and the boy does not approach. What can you say? You've come all this way; are you even sure this is what you want? Did you make this trip because you were unable to come to terms with your loss, unable to achieve peace? How did the boy even start this journey? There's a visual of the boy breaking to pieces as you go through the final jump -- was this emblematic of his heart shattering when his sister died? Does his literal falling to pieces give us his reason for being here?

The last scene takes place in the same sort of forest as the opening. Post-credits, if you watch all the way through, the background remains on the same shot - though no bodies are present, and we can hear the buzzing of flies. Did the sister die there? Did the brother die there? Did he kill himself in an effort to find her, to be reunited? There's room for speculation and interpretation.

I thought quite a bit about the end of Limbo, and about death, and about family. I had a strong emotional response to the work; I found it impactful, meaningful. The game teased quite a lot out of me - I'm over 4,200 characters into my reply and I feel like I could still go on at some length.

Not bad for a two-hour title.

I measure Limbo's "goodness" by the impact it had on me, and how often I thought of it, or of how I still think of it, so I've no doubts at all - it is a good game.

But I'm evaluating by a different set of criteria than the mechanical, too.

---

One extra thought.

There's a pretty fine read out there called "1,001 Video Games You Must Play Before You Die". It covers video games from the late 1970s up through very early 2010. Snippets about each title were written by a battery of reviewers, many of them British (allowing access to perspective on titles that might not have made it across the pond, such as PC titles released only on the ZX Sinclair and the like).

When they chose to include a game it was because something about the title was unique, special, innovative, or trend-setting. In some cases they might add a second or third title in a series while skipping the original; in others, they add obscure games I'd never heard of, though I consider myself well versed.

Point is, part of their consideration includes the time and place in which a title existed. As an example, Asteroids (1979) was an important title in gaming history, a landmark title for its era, though almost no aspect of it holds up today.

Limbo may be something of that order. When it was released in 2010 it was a special sort of title. It reached 3rd overall on XBLA that year. (The top two were a little more conventional; Dead Rising 2 took the #1 spot, and Trials HD had #2. #4 went to another indie darling - Castle Crashers.)

Despite the short runtime and relatively high launch price, Limbo connected with a great many people. And it got a whole lot of words out of me on an otherwise sleepy Tuesday morning, nearly six years after it's release.

Limbo was a good game.

The Ultimate History of Video Games: From Pong to Pokemon--The Story Behind the Craze That Touched Our Lives and Changed the World by Steven Kent

Game Over: How Nintendo Conquered The World by David Sheff

Joystick Nation: How Videogames Ate Our Quarters, Won Our Hearts, and Rewired Our Minds by J. C. Herz

Masters of Doom: How Two Guys Created an Empire and Transformed Pop Culture by David Kushner

Digital Play: The Interaction of Technology, Culture, and Marketing by Stephen Kline, Nick Dyer-Witheford and Greig De Peuter

Replay: The History of Video Games by Tristan Donovan

All Your Base Are Belong to Us: How Fifty Years of Videogames Conquered Pop Culture by Harold Goldberg

Vintage Games: An Insider Look at the History of Grand Theft Auto, Super Mario, and the Most Influential Games of All Time by Bill Loguidice and Matt Barton

There is a large amount of UnrealScript tutorials, examples and code, avaliable online, for free.
UnrealScript may seem now a bit of a black art... It isn't, just stay with it. :)
After you get used to the API, google will be enough to find details.

Here are a few links to get you sorted:

• http://www.design3.com/training-center/engines-sdks/udk/coding/unrealscript-api-essentials
  
• http://allarsblog.com/unreal-tutorials/
  
• http://udn.epicgames.com/Three/DevelopmentKitFirstScriptProject.html
  
• https://krisredbeard.wordpress.com/projects/tfp-demo/ <- Some nice code here.
  
• http://www.moug-portfolio.info/?page=tutorials
  
• http://udn.epicgames.com/Three/DevelopmentKitGems.html
  
• http://www.magicstonestudios.com/tutorials/programming/references.php
  
  
  Book:
  
  
• http://www.amazon.com/Unreal-Development-Game-Programming-UnrealScript/dp/1849691924
  
  Software:
  
  
• http://unrealxeditor.wordpress.com/
  
  
  Level design links:
  
  
• http://www.worldofleveldesign.com/categories/cat_udk.php
  
• http://www.juliantrutmann.com/level-design/
  
  Book:
  
  
• http://www.packtpub.com/unreal-development-kit-game-design-cookbook/book?utm_source=moddb.com&utm_medium=article&utm_content=other&utm_campaign=mdb_009802
  
  Hope it helps, good luck.
  

I'm not really sure what sort of book you're looking for here. The study and thought of games written in long form is sort of broad. I would recommend Replay: The history of videogames for just long form analysis of videogames in general. It's all really interesting stuff that gets into such detail you wont read past the Nimrod computing machine from the 1940s world fair until a chapter or two in, but again, I don't really know what you're looking for other than "very in-depth book about videogames".

I don't want to undersell replay though, it's a fantastic book. There's no way you wont read it and come away with some impossible tales to tell your friends and it does get pretty deep into just how the technological limitations, economic conditions, and corporate culture of the 70s, 80s, and 90s shaped what we know as genres today. It's good stuff.

There hasa been a confirmed list of the 17 games:

1. Balloon Fight
   
2. Donkey Kong
   
3. Donkey Kong Jr.
   
4. Dr. Mario
   
5. Excitebike
   
6. Ice Climber
   
7. Kid Icarus
   
8. Kirby's Adventure
   9, Mario Bros.
   
9. Metroid
   
10. Punch-Out!! Featuring Mr. Dream
    
11. StarTropics
    
12. Super Mario Bros.
    
13. Super Mario Bros. 2
    
14. Super Mario Bros. 3
    
15. The Legend of Zelda
    
16. Zelda II: The Adventure of Link
    
    from the amazon uk listing

While software and programming are valuable, a foundation in thinking like a designer has been more important in my experience.

I recommend Challenges for Game Designers by Brenda Brathwaite. I've used this book as an instructor for an intro to game design undergrad course, but it should work as well for a younger audience. The activities are designed to teach critical thought about games and prototyping, and require no special equipment or skills to complete. And it's the way a lot of studios begin the design process -- with pen and paper, or a whiteboard, prototyping and play testing ideas before investing in engineering time.

The challenges are quick, fun, and allow you to jump right in to designing game systems.

https://www.amazon.com/gp/aw/d/1542453313/ref=mp_s_a_1_1/147-2061481-7178413?ie=UTF8&qid=1494701669&sr=8-1&pi=AC_SX236_SY340_QL65&keywords=challenges+for+game+designers&dpPl=1&dpID=51tUh1y6F1L&ref=plSrch

If you're interested in programming games (which it sounds like you are), I would suggest learning DirectX. Using a pre-made engine will never teach you as much as learning to create the engine yourself (when it comes to programming, that is). Pick up this book, it will explain everything you need to know to create a graphics engine (and there are PDF and CHM versions you can find online).

Make a simple engine based on the book's examples. Then try to do things in your own way. Google for "component-based design" and see if you can implement an engine that uses that.

More specifically, you should use absolutely use C++. You should start with a 2D game (or a text-based game). Don't expect to do anything major design-wise; it's about building your skills.

In addition, you probably haven't learned much in the ways of linear algebra (which is what graphics and a lot of gameplay is based on). I don't know any specific resources, but you should understand vectors (dot and cross products) and matrices (how to create scale, rotation, and translation matrices and how they have those effects on vectors).

Good luck!

If you want to be a good writer, you have to read.

If you want to be a good game designer, you have to play.

But if you are gonna play... then learn to make them too:

Good book on Game Design: Level Up by Scott Rogers

Design your own games easy: GameMaker and I suggest the book The Game Maker's Apprentice or Stencyl or even App Inventor for Android

"I am probably judgmental here but from personal experience I find that time used in video games and lack of curiosity usually go hand in hand - people who have a wide set of intererests, intellectual ones, don't usually get much out of games"

Those who do play video games can build up skills in other areas.

For instance, I could pick up how to use Blender to mod my games

[I could rap about video game things]
(https://youtu.be/j50u0zUeCmU)

You can learn leadership skills from managing a guild in an MMO

There are countless other examples but I would say that these all take intellectual individuals to learn complicated programs, skillsets, and social skills in order to do these things. I would be hard-pressed to say that these people don't have a wide set of interests.

You bring up fiction but I would like to point out that many games contain many hours of reading themselves in a fictional setting, depending on the genre.

From a more scientific standpoint, I would like for you to consider a few studies.

Strategic video games actually improve self control in adults. Self-control is a major indicator of future success in individuals. EDIT @1:46CST: Whoops, linked wrong study, fixed now.

["In a sample of over 3000 young children across six European countries, high video game usage (playing video games more than 5 h per week) was significantly associated with higher intellectual functioning, increased academic achievement, a lower prevalence of peer relationship problems and a lower prevalence of mental health difficulties. High video game usage was not associated with an increase of conduct disorder or any externalizing disorder nor was it associated with suicidal thoughts or thoughts of death. ."]
(http://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s00127-016-1179-6?no-access=true)

The two most interesting books I've read on video games have been Tristan Donovan's fascinating history of the medium, "Replay: The History of Video Games". It is a very in-depth history that gets down into a lot of nitty gritty stuff about the birth of video games and stays very in-depth up until about the late 90s when it starts to go big picture. Still a great read.

If you're looking for something that's more of a critical piece, I'd suggest Brendan Keogh's close reading of Spec Ops: The Line, "Killing is Harmless". It's an incredible way to enhance your playthrough of what is already an incredibly emotional game. Keogh breaks down everything from the allusions to literature and film to the significance of scripted events in the game. The only advice I have is if you haven't played the game before and you try and read along as you play the game you do get hit with some spoilers as Keogh assumes you've finished the game when you're reading the book. Still def worth your time though.

11 years ago I had to write a software rasterizer that was GL 1.1 compatible. It was supposed to run on a headless server. For various reasons we couldn't use Mesa (an OpenGL software renderer), so I was tasked with writing our own.

The whole thing simply rasterized to a block of memory, which could then be saved in various formats or blitted to a window for real-time graphics. Feature wise, it was pretty complete, save for some obscure OGL features we didn't need. It ran at 20-30fps for (then) moderately complex scenes with a few thousand triangles, more than fast enough for rendering stills on the server, given the expected number of requests per second and caching.

Computer Graphics: Principles and Practice helped with some aspects, but the best resource back then was Tiricks of the 3D Game Programming Gurus which I use as a reference to this day.

One of the best resources out there, especially for Patreon supporters. I found this book to go hand-in-hand with this, I'd even go as far to say it's a must read, with great examples and modern practices.

https://www.amazon.com/Multiplayer-Game-Programming-Architecting-Networked/dp/0134034309

It's a good mix of gameplay tips (including speed running stuff) and retrospective information. Easily one of the best games related books I own. The nes one is just as good.

https://www.amazon.com/dp/074401767X/ref=cm_sw_r_cp_awdb_t1_OcG-Ab2RVATPN

Just got myself a ripped Breath of the Wild soundtrack, and I thought "man, this thing is a total mess. I need to clean it up!" So I went to amazon's high-res photo cache and got to work! It's based on the awesome-looking Piggyback guide: https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/1911015214/ref=oh_aui_detailpage_o00_s00?ie=UTF8&psc=1

I'm also prettying up the tags on the soundtrack, which I'll post when I'm done if there doesn't end up being a better one floating around first.

Enjoy 😄

Sweet action, thanks OP!

For anyone interested, here's my usual Nintendo Book recommendations ;).

• Zelda BOTW Collectors
  
  
• Zelda BOTW Regular
  
  
• Art & Artifacts
  
  
• Hyrule Historia
  
  
• Art of Splatoon
  
  
• Art of Fire Emblem Awakening
  
  
• Playing with Power
  
  
• Super Mario Adventures
  
  
• The World of Professor Layton
  
  Would be REAL nice if the Deluxe BOTW guide or the Mario Bros. Encyclopedia would go up right about now as well ;)

The history of the United States video game crash, and Nintendo's success, it seems every video game journalist needs to do it.

People should check out a book like Replay : The History of Video Games if they're curious for a much more thorough account.

Here are some of the highlights you don't usually see video game journalists mention.

It happened in the United States, and not the world, during a US recession. Part of Nintendo's success is they simply weren't caught up in it, they were a Japanese company that hadn't really entered the US market yet. They got to learn from all of the mistakes made by US companies.

VCR sales were rapidly rising as video games declined. Home computer prices were coming down sharply. There were too many different consoles competing with each other.

Way too many games and systems were manufactured, not just E.T. Retailers massively discounted many of these unsold games once they decided to get out of video games and flooded the market, depressing prices everywhere.

Arcades were also crashing, there was a giant boom based on the sudden national popularity of games like Pac-Man, but when that interest subsided, the income was spread way too thin. Those games were bought using credit from the manufacturer, a bunch of arcades defaulted on those loans leaving all those video game companies with tons of debt. Arcades and arcade manufacturers responded by trying to milk the people who were still playing by making games much harder and more expensive, and it just drove them away faster.

US Retailers didn't want to stock the NES, even with the new name, the toy peripherals, etc, until Nintendo made an interesting move to prove the retailers and analysts wrong. They did a massive marketing blitz in just New York, and offered the retailers full money back on anything they stocked that didn't sell. It worked and they started spreading around to other large cities before a nation wide launch, to prove its appeal.

Hey, a while back I too decided to learn UDK, I ended up finding a good book(http://www.amazon.com/Unreal-Development-Game-Programming-UnrealScript/dp/1849691924/ref=pd_sim_b_1) on it. This book does a great job of showing the unrealscript side of things and really helped me get my feet of the ground. Not sure if this is exactly what you are looking for, but I hope it help!

What are dictionaries? What is Wikipedia? What is google? Sorry if I'm being flippant, but the whole "language is fluid and nothing can ever truly be defined" argument is hogwash. In the case of an authority on the matter, or with enough common consensus, words can be defined and generally accepted for what they are across various groups of people. In this case there are a good handful of authorities on the matter. Also a fair number of journalists, news sources, and various users that can agree.

I think it's disingenuous to say roguelikes cannot be defined well enough for people to understand what they are (or really most words, for that matter). It's fair to say many don't understand or know what the term really means, but I'd wager they haven't even bothered to try google, which immediately gives a clear and concise definition from Wikipedia at the top. All it takes is doing a bit of research.

Nice, still have mine they sell for a good price I believe.

edit:

amazon.ca

amazon.com

ebay

great find :D

I TAed a seminar for incoming college freshman with no prior programming experience, learning video games using Game Maker. It went extremely well.

I'd strongly recommend this book. It's great to let them do a few projects where it tells you exactly what to do and why you're doing it and gives you all the art assets already so that you can focus on just getting it up and running. After they've made a few using the tools provided, they can then apply those skills with their own ideas.

When I was about your age I devoured this book: https://www.amazon.com/Tricks-Programming-Gurus-Advanced-Graphics-Rasterization/dp/0672318350

While the C++ in there may be a bit dated at this point, I think it would still provide a great foundation. It teaches you to write a 3D rendering engine entirely in software without using the GPU. Once you get through the book you will have a much better idea of what graphics APIs are actually doing under the hood and in hardware.

Also, I highly recommend this sequence: https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLZHQObOWTQDPD3MizzM2xVFitgF8hE_ab

It's very visual and intuitive and doesn't get too bogged down in equations. Even if you don't have a bunch of formulas memorized as a result of going through it, you should come out of it knowing what all of the tools that you need for 3D math are and what they can do.

I should probably use a throw-away for this but, there's this book: http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/1593272588

Yes, it's WoW themed, but it's really more about the leadership than the specifics of one game. At least I think so. Been a while since I read it.

Finally played the game. How old are you? If you're in your teens, you did a really great job and should be proud of yourself. Game engines require some advanced programming knowledge to get right, but keep with it. I can also highly recommend this book. It covers 2D and 3D game engines.

Unfortunately no. I haven't read any python books, except for a "Game Programming with Python and Pygame" (this one I think: http://www.amazon.com/Beginning-Game-Development-Python-Pygame/dp/1590598725). It was a decent-enough book but I don't remember whether the "python" portions taught you to be "pythonic" or not.

If you already know how to program, something like Project Euler is interesting because if you go and look up solutions to the problems in python, you'll find a lot of really neat uses of idiomatic python, generally involving their lists/collections. That's really the only thing I used when "learning" python, and truthfully I haven't really used it much in the last few years so I've probably forgotten a lot.

Xcom Resurrection, "Bridging the narrative between EW and X2". Breaks the lore at points like how shield bearers are deployed before they're canonically rolled out... but it's good if you overlook them. https://www.amazon.com/XCOM-2-Resurrection-Greg-Keyes/dp/1608877124

​

There's a sequel, Escalation. Haven't read it yet but it looks good.

Sound Reproduction: The Acoustics and Psychoacoustics of Loudspeakers and Rooms is a superb book (the author is well known in the industry). Very detailed, very factual and all about how you'll hear the music in a room. Tons of data and graphs from studies and measurements. Deliciously, also has details on how the specs of a product can be manipulated. You can see a shorter paper by the same author at Loudspeakers and Rooms for Sound
Reproduction—A Scientific Review.


Master Handbook of Acoustics is also good.

if your interested in an over-all history of video games The Ultimate History of Video Games by Steven L. Kent is a good read with a focus on arcade and early console games while Tristan Donovan's Replay: The History of Video Games has more of a focus on the development of pc games.

I think this originally appeared in Half-Life 2: Raising the Bar. It only had a short print run, but PDF copies are floating around the web. It's a pretty neat book on the making of HL2.

Heres some book I have bought in the past on Programming. You can just download a PDF/e-reader file if you dont want to spend the money, but I would recommend supporting the author.

Programming:

Python Game Developement

Pro Python

Java For Dummies

How to Program Java

Networking:

Networking All-In-One

Networking: A Beginner's Guide

General:

Computer Repair with Diagnostic Flowcharts

Code: The Hidden Language of Computer Hardware and Software

Rather than just listing my favourites, I would like to point you to 1001 Video Games You Must Play Before You Die.

After a long time of video game abstinence it helped me to get back on track. If I now start a project I use it to research similar games of the genre. Although not quite up to date anymore (~2010) it is a great place to get started ...

Check out “Dungeon H@cks” by David L. Craddock. It gives a nice, comprehensive overview.

The creator of Dys4ia (and Mighty Jill Off, and other games, Anna Anthropy) actually wrote a book related to this subject, called Rise of the Videogame Zinesters: How Freaks, Normals, Amateurs, Artists, Dreamers, Drop-outs, Queers, Housewives, and People Like You Are Taking Back an Art Form. Which I haven't read, but I'm sure will interest you.

xiaorobear wrote:

The creator of Dys4ia (and Mighty Jill Off, and other games, Anna Anthropy) actually wrote a book related to this subject, called Rise of the Videogame Zinesters: How Freaks, Normals, Amateurs, Artists, Dreamers, Drop-outs, Queers, Housewives, and People Like You Are Taking Back an Art Form. Which I haven't read, but I'm sure will interest you.

Work through the exercises in "Challenges for Game Designers" https://www.amazon.com/dp/1542453313/ref=cm_sw_r_tw_dp_x_atKDybA1PP1PT - Both of the books you referenced have a lot of theory and exploration, but CfGD has plenty of actionable exercises. There is a ton of value in prototyping and exploring the space non-digitally, even if you're more focused on making digital games.

I effing love that book and I'm glad I got a copy while I still could.

I agree that books explicitly devoted to Roguelikes are rare, let alone for Roguelike Development. In fact, I only know of 3 related to either:

• Dungeon Hacks
  
• One Week Dungeons
  
• @Play: Exploring Roguelike Games
  
  That said, I imagine there are other books that are directly applicable to Rogulike Development, such as that PCG book I linked in the OP. Maybe there are some strong AI, Game Design, or even UI books that roguelike devs here have found applicable?

UDK has its own language called Unreal Script. It has some influence from Java and C++ but also has big portions that is unique to itself.

There are a few books and a good amount of information on Unreal Script.

Unreal Script Home
Learn Programming With Unreal Script
Unreal Development Kit Game Programming with UnrealScript: Beginner's Guide

A Google search will show you some more as well.

I did graphics in uni on a game dev course. Really it only takes one two semesters to become sort of competent with graphics. In the first course we learned about how polygons were rastered and wrote a software rasterizer, and in the second we took that knowledge and used DirectX and implemented graphics techniques with that.

I'm not really sure on a good source to learn how a rasterizer works, since I no longer have the course material, but I found this Frank Luna book really useful while getting started. I'm sure there's an equivalent for more recent versions of DirectX.

Its a really good question - with many good answers (and many bad). Pardon my brevity:

http://brewhouse.io/2015/10/14/game-programming-design-patterns.html

https://www.amazon.com/Multiplayer-Game-Programming-Architecting-Networked/dp/0134034309

Ana Anthropy, Rise of the Videogame Zinesters - Ana is a trans woman who writes more about game creation than gaming community, but I think she's awesome.

Thanks, ordered the Breath of the Wild CE guide for $27.59. Seemed like a good price. https://www.amazon.ca/gp/product/1911015222/ref=od_aui_detailpages00?ie=UTF8&psc=1

some general thoughts from my side:

• I can recommend these two books:
  
  
  • Everest - Master Handbook of acoustics
    
    
  • Newell - Recording Studio Design
    
    
• room treatment without measuring in pointless imho, so I highly recommend renting a mesurement system for a day and figure out what the exact prolems are
  
  
• you can use some FEM model to simulate your room acoustic situation in order to find possible speaker positioning and sweep spot, BUT it doesn't make real life measures superfluent and it is not trivial to set up such a simulation, because you need to know the physikal behavior of your walls, floor and cieling. But it's absolutely possible to get a first feeling, even as an non-professional.
  
  => only AFTER you have done this, finding proper treatment options and suggestions from other users will be sucessful
  
  Cheers
  

I think minigames being in BotW are a pretty safe bet now - taken directly from the description of the official player's guide (which can be seen on Amazon, among other places), it says:

> Also includes optional challenges, mini-games, unlockables, Easter eggs, and more.

It's not as reliable as seeing the minigames for ourselves, but it'd be kinda weird if the description mentioned them without any reason. So here's hoping!

The official BoTW guide book suggests playing in the Zora, Gerudo, Rito and Goron order. Not sure if that reflects the same thinking suggested in the article, but I think it's pretty compelling.

It is a different way of making games for sure.. Takes a lot of practice. I have spent the last 8 months doing almost nothing but multiplayer programming. I have some random videos about various aspects on it. I will just link some content here. In addition, I have just created a UDP framework for making multiplayer games. It simplifies writing your buffers and handles connection management (something you must do manually when using UDP).

​

GloomyNet Intro (Ongoing Series):

https://youtu.be/7GRh3bjG9zY

​

Talk about a lot of essential multiplayer concepts here:

https://youtu.be/9dNIy_mXUU4

​

THE MULTIPLAYER BOOK (In C++ but lots of useful concepts):

https://www.amazon.com/Multiplayer-Game-Programming-Architecting-Networked/dp/0134034309/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1539322352&sr=8-1&keywords=multiplayer+game+programming

​

THE BLOG POSTS FOR MULTIPLAYER:

https://gafferongames.com/

​

You will need to learn about data types, buffers, UDP (unless you are planning to do a smaller game.. you can use TCP). Learn about reliable packets, unreliable packets, and then... you can start..

​

​

​

Interesting, well put together!

EDIT: For anyone who wants even more background info Half-life, in particular Half-life 1 and Half-life 2, I recommend the book called Half-life 2: Raising the Bar.

I do know of this book.

https://www.amazon.com/Procedural-Generation-Design-Tanya-Short/dp/1498799191

But I don't know how it is. I've actually been meaning to ask about it here one of these days. It has the great Tarn Adams of Dwarf Fortress name on it but I don't know how much of him is actually in it. And I honestly don't put much trust in amazon reviews anymore.

I read through Multiplayer Game Programming, which covers a pretty generic approach to 'locked timestep' netcode. From that, I was able to build out a basic server/client framework to really grasp the concepts. I enjoyed the book and the approach of writing the system from scratch (figuring out RTT's, how far ahead the server should run, etc). FWIW, I built out my client/server experiment simply using Node and socket.io - you could probably do something similar.

I'd also suggest checking out the recent Overwatch Netcode/ECS GDD talk (around 22:30), which covers the same basic premise as the above mentioned book uses.

Thanks! Glad they're helpful to some people, just trying to do stuff that would have been helpful to me starting off. As far as next talks:

Jason and I did chapters in this book, which came out recently: https://www.amazon.com/Procedural-Generation-Design-Tanya-Short/dp/1498799191

We also did a more academic style paper on the sultan history generation system:
http://dl.acm.org/citation.cfm?id=3110574

My next talk will probably be on map generation system in general, and maybe the sultan dungeon map generation subsystem in particular. I was thinking roguelike celebration, but it overlaps with my annunal vacation week this year. So maybe next year!

The Audio engineering sub has a very good ‘fundamentals’ page here.

Some of the following books are about specific aspects of sound design, some focus on acoustics, some on the technical aspects of engineering and some on psychoacoustics. They are all really good references.

Designing Sound. Andy Farnell

Master Handbook of Acoustics. F.Alton Everest

Audio-Vision Sound on Screen. Michel Chion

The Sound Studio - Alec Nisbett

Spectromorphology - Explaining Sound Shapes. Dennis Smalley

An Introduction to the Psychology of Hearing. Brian Moore

Sound System Engineering. Davis/Patronis.Jr/Brown

Master Handbook of Acoustics. F.Alton Everest

I haven’t run a guild in over a decade, but I still have my copy of The Guild Leader’s Handbook. You may find it helpful, even though it’s a bit old.

There are some fairly cheap used versions; might be worth a look.

Remember it's a serious position regardless of how serious your group is. There is going to be a lot of responsibility for setting up the back end and ultimately doing your best to keep raiding fun and successful for your group. If you don't mind reading, try this book, you may be able to find a PDF of it floating around but I think it is about $3 if you buy a used copy.

http://www.amazon.com/The-Guild-Leaders-Handbook-Battle-Scarred/dp/1593272588

Thanks! I've already started reading Beginning Game Development with Python and Pygame, but those look interesting too.

This is one of my favorite game design books and it focuses on procgen. It’s edited by the guy who made Dwarf Fortress and most of the authors are practitioners rather than researchers which is a perspective I like.

I'm basically following along with this outdated book which is required for my game design course: http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/1590596153/ref=oh_aui_detailpage_o02_s01?ie=UTF8&psc=1

The movements are declared with GMS's event/action GUI. I wish I could explain it better, but this is literally the first day that I'm using GMS. The only script that I wrote is for the game pause functionality and as well as the text prompt window.

This is what all 900 koroks and 120 shrines look like plotted out on a map. Kind of looks like a splatfest because I just used whatever stickers I had.

In all honesty, it was a complete pain in the arse because I missed 7 koroks at the end, and I ended up using an online map anyways. It was very much an eye test throughout, and it didn't help that 2 weren't even on the map (I think). But I finally got them all.

If you're curious where I got the map, it came with this guide:
https://www.amazon.ca/Legend-Zelda-Complete-Official-Collectors/dp/1911015222 , and then I had it laminated it.

It came back to my mind after browsing through 1001 Videogames You Must Play Before You Die, or rather this interactive list. I don't have a warm spot for JRPGs as a genre since they seem so very grindy and prone to excessive length and my standards for video game narratives have only gone up, but probably I have space for one good JPRG still.

Yep, there's a few in fact. Some based on WotC too.

• https://www.amazon.com/XCOM-2-Resurrection-Greg-Keyes/dp/1608877124/
  
• https://www.amazon.com/XCOM-2-ESCALATION-Rick-Barba/dp/1608879925/
  
• https://www.amazon.com/XCOM-FACTIONS-Kevin-J-Anderson/dp/1608879976/
  
  EDIT: I did not know about that last one though. November 2018, pretty recent.

Tutorials

• GameDev Java Game Programming 1
  
• GameDev Java Game Programming 2
  
• GameDev Java Game Programming 3
  
• Keyboard and Mouse Input
  
• Active Rendering
  
• Stone Paper Scissor
  
• Open GL tutorials
  
• Double Buffering, Movement, Collision Detection
  
• Advanced Vectors
  
• Regular Expressions
  
• Pong
  
• 2D Java Game Video Tutorials
  
• A few small game tutorials
  
• NewBoston Game tutorials : source
  
• BlackJack
  
• Poker
  
• ApexJava Youtube tutorials
  
• ThousandCodes Java Tutorials
  
• Dice Game
  
• Turk4n's game tutorials
  
• A few Java Game tutorials
  
• MrJavaHelp Tutorials
  
• Mouse Acceleration
  
• Java 2s Tutorials
  
  ---
  
  Libgdx Specific
  
  
• BadlogicGames
  
• libgdx wiki intro tutorial
  
• Updated tutorial based on above
  
  ---
  LWGJL Specific
  
  
• Accelerated Java Game Tutorials
  
• LWJGL Ninja Cave Tutorials
  
• SHMUP with source
  
• NeHe Tutorials
  
  ---
  Engines, Frameworks, Libraries
  
  
• Slick2d
  
• Java Monkey Engine
  
• LWJGL
  
• PulpCore
  
• JGame
  
• Golden T Game Engine
  
• Espresso
  
• Xith3d
  
• jPCT
  
• Ardor3d
  
  ---
  Source
  
  
• Ultima Clone
  
• First part of a Link to the Past in java
  
  ---
  Books
  
  
• Killer Game Programming in Java
  
• Developing Games in Java
  
• Beginning Java Game Programming
  
• Advanced Java Game Programming
  
• Pro Java 3D Game Development
  
• AI Algorithms for a Prototype Game Software in Java 1.6
  
• Introductory Programming with Simple Games: Using Java and the Freely Available Networked Game Engine

https://www.amazon.com/dp/1911015214/ref=cm_sw_r_cp_api_i_S-2FDbJ4ZPZV2
Basically just the official guidebook as a huge, pretty hard cover. Got it a few months after the game was released!

Thanks! :)

So the book is available here if you're interested. Someone has uploaded the list of games here if you just want to see what games are in the book. I also actually have a website letsplay1001.com as an alternative place to keep track of the games I've played but it's been hard to keep the YT series up and keep the website up to date (and admittedly it's a little out of date right now).

With absolute pleasure:

https://imgur.com/a/E6iuQzI

The book is called: Rise of the Videogame Zinesters: How Freaks, Normals, Amateurs, Artists, Dreamers, Drop-outs, Queers, Housewives, and People Like You Are Taking Back an Art Form

Link to amazon: https://www.amazon.ca/Rise-Videogame-Zinesters-Drop-outs-Housewives/dp/1609803728

The citation is from the first chapter, the file I found had no pagination.

this is the book ive been reading to try and get some DirectX graphics going:

http://www.amazon.com/Introduction-Game-Programming-Direct-9-0c/dp/1598220160/ref=sr_1_6?ie=UTF8&qid=1323366015&sr=8-6

well written, very good read.

This was recently released: https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/1138595306/ref=dbs_a_def_rwt_bibl_vppi_i0 . Haven't looked at it yet myself, but it's the same author as https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/1498799191/ref=dbs_a_def_rwt_bibl_vppi_i1 which is quite good.

Not a lot out there (that I know of) focuses on the fall half, but I feel like you'd appreciate these:

From For Amusement Only: the life and death of the American Arcade by The Verge

Replay: The History of Video Games

The Arcade Experience: A Look Into Modern Arcade Games and Why They Still Matter

Game Over: Press Start To Continue, The Maturing of Mario

As a guild leader for many many years, my best advice is simply "don't." Or better "why?" How you answer why is really rather important.

If you're dead set on it, the Officer's Quarters articles on WoW Insider are often decent (as is the book the author of OQ wrote). At the very least they'll give you some ideas of things you might deal with as an FC leader.

http://wow.joystiq.com/category/officers-quarters/
http://www.amazon.com/Guild-Leaders-Handbook-Scott-Andrews/dp/1593272588

http://www.amazon.com/Developing-Games-Java-David-Brackeen/dp/1592730051/

It is old and looks to be out of print but you might be able to find a cheap used copy. At the very least you can check out the source code here:

http://www.brackeen.com/javagamebook/

It uses Java2D to do a simple platforming game and then goes on to make a simple 3D game using its own scan-line renderer. Obviously, if you want to make a 3D game you probably want to use something like OpenGL but this does a good job of explaining the basics.

I'm still holding my hope that the upcoming XCOM 2 Novel (not to be confused with the pre-XCOM 2 launch novel XCOM 2: Resurrection) ties into what the not-yet-confirmed-but-I'd-be-damned-if-I-don't-believe-it's-real expansion is about.

> the Resistance gains new allies in fighting a new powerful alien enemy force

As vague as it can be, but I'd be surprised if "new allies" refers to plain old humans. At the very least give me Vahlen-certified gene-modded human monsters, to get some closure of what happened to Big Sky, Vahlen and her maimed team after the Alien Nest.

---------

Btw, aside from smaller DLCs, XCOM related content seems to be always initially planned for November or close-by.

• XCOM:EU released on October the 8th, 2012
  
• XCOM:EW released on November the 14th, 2013
  
• XCOM 2: Resurrection (the first novel) on November the 10th, 2015
  
• XCOM 2, planned for November 2015, but got delayed until February 2016.
  
• The untitled second novel, listed for November the 14th (like EW), 2017.
  
  The only one that doesn't fit as tidily in the list is the console port of XCOM 2, on September 2016, but if I had to roll the dice, I'd say we have a 90% chance to hit an expansion on November.

It's covered in the book. If you're like me, and don't care to read it, you can listen to this guy read/summarize it.

But the quick summary is that the game effectively picks up right after the resistance gets the ship in working order.

There is also a great chapter on his methods in the book Procedural Game Design.

https://www.amazon.com/Procedural-Generation-Design-Tanya-Short/dp/1498799191/ref=nodl_

not trying to be snarky, but hire a pro. randomly, and blindly throwing acoustic treatments into an environment is a quick way to waste money.

treatments are not universal, and different treatments and approaches are used to deal with different issues.

what issues are you trying to deal with by using these "clouds"

what dose the architect, GC, acoustician and the HVAC/ mechanical contractor, and the electrical/ lighting contractor? Any of these parties will have something to say, as you need to know flow treatment will be supported by the building structure, not block HVAC ducting or airflow. not obstruct/ interfere with lighting, work esthetically within the space, meets code, dose not interfere with any installed sound/ pa coverage and then control/ adjust the sound of the room.


all that being said heres a decent enough book start with as far as reference material
https://www.amazon.com/Master-Handbook-Acoustics-Sixth-Everest/dp/0071841040/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1467930274&sr=1-1

This book is the most practical one I've find for learning and practicing game design..

https://www.amazon.com/Challenges-Games-Designers-Non-Digital-Exercises/dp/1542453313/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1509774270&sr=1-1&keywords=challenges+for+game+designers&dpID=51tUh1y6F1L&preST=_SX218_BO1,204,203,200_QL40_&dpSrc=srch

Art of Game Design is usually the one everyone always recommends, it was my first game design book and I honestly, as a beginner, I found it more harmful in the end than helpful.. You should read it after you have some experience with design..

Raising the Bar is pretty good, if somewhat difficult to find a hardcopy of.

There's Dungeon Hacks which came out just a few months ago. You can also find a fair bit of history on places like Roguebasin (see the sidebar) or often just the official game sites.

Thanks for the links everyone! I also managed to find some more resources:

BOOKS

• Multiplayer Game Programming: Architectured Network Games
  
  
• Development and Deployment of Multiplayer Online Games [Indiegogo; available October ish]
  
  BLOGS
  
  
• How to Become a Great Network Programmer
  
  
• Writing Server and Network Code for Your Online Game
  
  
• Let's Make a Multiplayer Game (XNA, but has a few examples of code/AI separated between master and client)

• Procedural Generation in Game Design
  
• Game Mechanics: Advanced Game Design
  
  The first book has been mentioned before. Dormans, the co-author of the second book, is the developer of Unexplored.
  
  I've read both books and I highly recommend them.

If this is a topic that interests you I highly recommend Procedural Generation in Game Design by Tanya Short and Tarn Adams. It's a collection is essays by devs about procedural elements and how they interact with and influence design.

This book is excellent and relatively new: https://www.amazon.com/Procedural-Generation-Design-Tanya-Short/dp/1498799191

Find a copy of this and read the section on monitor placement

http://www.soundonsound.com/reviews/mixing-secrets-small-studio

And/or a look at

https://www.amazon.com/Master-Handbook-Acoustics-Sixth-Everest/dp/0071841040

Literal chapters of information required before anyone can give you anything that resembles a helpful answer to your question, unfortunately. Acoustics are pretty complicated.

I bought this one: https://www.amazon.com/Multiplayer-Game-Programming-Architecting-Networked/dp/0134034309/

It is pretty solid and goes into depth on both RTS and FPS games which require different ways of thinking about how to manage latency, packet loss, and other dynamics.

Find something that interests you. So what kind of a person are you, do you want to see your end results or do you want to solve hard problems that never look pretty but are fun to solve? What are the projects that you thought of. You say you want to make games, did you familiarize yourself with a graphics API? Multimedia API? If you're doing 3D graphics unless you're a guru in matrices you'll find hard intersting problems. Try doing things incrementally. Decide on something basic you want to do and add features as you like. I don't know how many large projects you've worked on but the devil is really in the details.

Can't vouch for the quality but maybe books like this, this and this.

Worth mentioning is that "Playing with Power" is MUCH cheaper on Amazon than on Gamestop

I really like.

Challenges for Game Designers by Brathwaite and Schreiber: https://www.amazon.com/Challenges-Games-Designers-Non-Digital-Exercises/dp/1542453313/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1493469101&sr=8-1&keywords=challenges+for+game+designers

Game Design Workshop by Tracy Fullerton: https://www.amazon.com/Game-Design-Workshop-Playcentric-Innovative/dp/1482217163/ref=pd_sim_14_1?_encoding=UTF8&pd_rd_i=1482217163&pd_rd_r=C4KTX74FX6FRDX63HCJQ&pd_rd_w=EuUkE&pd_rd_wg=y877F&psc=1&refRID=C4KTX74FX6FRDX63HCJQ

*Kobold Guide to Board Game Design: https://www.amazon.com/Kobold-Guide-Board-Game-Design/dp/1936781042/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1493469414&sr=1-1&keywords=kobold+guide+to+board+game+design

Well, it's the follow-up to this book from last year, the reviews of which aren't exactly flattering. Sounds like a rather mediocre cash-in.

This is pretty handy.

direct amazon link (not a personal reference link like some reddit scumbags do)

https://amzn.com/074401767X

There's this official novel for XCOM 2 which is enjoyable given the appropriate level of expectations. It's official prequel for the game.

https://www.amazon.com/XCOM-2-Resurrection-Greg-Keyes/dp/1608877124

Edit:

Xcom 2 tosses out most events from previous games in more ways than one. But to get the most of the book and the game, you'll want to brush up on the main characters from XCOM EU: Shen, Bradford, Vahlen, and Van Doorn.

http://www.ufopaedia.org/index.php/Raymond_Shen_(EU2012)


http://www.ufopaedia.org/index.php/Bradford_(EU2012)

http://www.ufopaedia.org/index.php/Vahlen_(EU2012)

http://www.ufopaedia.org/index.php/Peter_Van_Doorn_(EU2012)

UK prices seem to be around £60 - £150 ($90 - $225), where the highest going price was for a sealed copy.

Might be more results in the US. Hop onto eBay, go to the advanced search, and tick the "completed listings" box as part of your search.

Edit: on Amazon US, the sensible used ones are going for betwen $70 and $190, depending on condition. That doesn't necessarily mean they're actually getting sold at those prices, of course.

If you have 2 players outside the bound you mean? There are a number of different strategies for that. None of which you'll find in reddit or on youtube. If you're interested, this book is a half decent starting point https://www.amazon.com/Multiplayer-Game-Programming-Architecting-Networked/dp/0134034309

It seems to take place decades after XCOM1 (maybe commander was cryogen, "now that we have our best weapon", could be the command center or the commannder himself).

Which could mean that the forces seen in XCOM1 could be a scout force? And that invasion occurs following the events of XCOM1.

They're actually releasing a book that might explain some of the missing time: http://www.amazon.ca/XCOM-2-Resurrection-Greg-Keyes/dp/1608877124

No but holy shit that looks amazing! I may have to pickup the physical copy of that one. I got the Playing With Power: Nintendo NES Classics back when i came out a few months ago. Its a damn good book as well, but this Ultimate Guide seems to blow it out of the water.

This is good if you're willing to spend money.


Edit: You should also look up youtube videos for learning how to make the maps and stuff. (That book is mainly for Unrealscript)

its available on amazon canada as well - https://www.amazon.ca/gp/product/1911015222/ref=oh_aui_detailpage_o00_s00?ie=UTF8&psc=1

My personal advice would be to learn some regular old Programming first. Jumping straight into UnrealScript and Gameplay Programming is kinda like trying to build a House without ever having touched a work tool.

Theres lots of stuff you need to understand from a basic level, and while it might be possible to throw together some very simple mechanics currently, the quality is gonna seriously suffer. A bit like my first shed

But if you seriously want to just jump into it head first: Unreal Development Kit Gems by Rachel Cordone might be somewhat useful

Cool! You should check out Developing Games in Java by David Brackeen. On his site, he also put together a swing canvas based 3D game.

https://www.amazon.com/Developing-Games-Java-David-Brackeen/dp/1592730051

Sample code is here: http://www.brackeen.com/javagamebook/

something like This?

The XCOM 2 tie-in novel, that explains what happens between the games, and gives us a rough time when XCOM failed.

Also, Dr Vahlen had a hidden base in an active volcano before she "disappeared completely" so, a mad German scientist with a secret base in an active volcano ...

http://www.amazon.co.uk/XCOM-2-Resurrection-Greg-Keyes/dp/1608877124/

The creator of this also just published a book that came out like last week.

http://www.amazon.com/Rise-Videogame-Zinesters-Drop-outs-Housewives/dp/1609803728

At one point in time I wanted to play all the games in this book: https://www.amazon.com/1001-Video-Games-Must-Before/dp/0789320908

Well I started with Python, which there is an ABUNDANCE of tutorials for. I also used pygame. The tutorials for pygame are slightly less common and useful, but I initially learned the basics with a book.

This is definitely the course we're on, and it definitely sucks.

Still, we can either look at it as an inevitability or try to fight against it. And there are still champions out there fighting for a more democratized culture of games creation. I see no reason to resign ourselves to that fate yet - though it's almost certainly far too late for the current blockbuster AAA environment.

Acoustics is a huge topic, grab a book: https://www.amazon.com/Master-Handbook-Acoustics-Sixth-Everest/dp/0071841040/

In short it tells how remaining XCOM comes together and joins up with some resistance fighters and acquires the new Skyranger and the mobile base they use in XCOM 2. It has a lot of background information about the world. Many of the familiar faces like Shen, Vahlen, Bradford are in the book and some of the new faces as that are coming in XCOM 2.

This is the book: http://www.amazon.com/XCOM-2-Resurrection-Greg-Keyes/dp/1608877124/1

It's live now on Amazon for $79.99. Amazon will honor the lowest price before release.

Here are the links to the guide on Amazon (EU).

Deluxe Guide UK

Deluxe Guide ES

Deluxe Guide FR

Deluxe Guide DE

Deluxe Guide IT

(Warning, very hardcore) This book literally creates an entire 3D engine: http://www.amazon.com/Tricks-Programming-Gurus-Advanced-Graphics-Rasterization/dp/0672318350

It's all pure CPU so you learn exactly what is happening.

This one?


https://www.amazon.com/Legend-Zelda-Complete-Official-Collectors/dp/1911015222/ref=sr_1_2?ie=UTF8&qid=1550865713&sr=8-2&keywords=botw+guide


I want to say that it was $39.99


This is the new version (I think)


https://www.target.com/p/legend-of-zelda-breath-of-the-wild-the-complete-official-guide-by-piggyback-hardcover/-/A-53395522

Here's the books:

Legend of Zelda: Art and Artifacts Limited Edition

Legend of Zelda: BotW Official Guide Collector's Edition

Legend of Zelda: BotW Official Guide Deluxe Edition

The Arts book is a collector's item as well as something I'd sift through from time to time. A coffee table book basically. The CE guide arrives on 3/3, so once I beat Zelda once, I'll use it to collect everything. The DE is just another collector's item/coffee table book once it arrives on 3/31.

The Legend of Zelda BOTW Piggyback Deluxe guide now availble on Amazon US
https://www.amazon.com/Legend-Zelda-Breath-Complete-Official/dp/1911015214/ref=sr_1_2?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1487351890&sr=1-2&keywords=the+legend+of+zelda+breath+of+the+wild+the+complete+official+guide

Amazon
https://www.amazon.com/Legend-Zelda-Complete-Official-Collectors/dp/1911015222

The Master Handbook of Acoustics is a solid choice.

You can apparently get the Fifth Edition for $10 used.

Actually, Amazon lowered their price for Collector's Edition:

https://www.amazon.com/Legend-Zelda-Complete-Official-Collectors/dp/1911015222/ref=sr_1_2?ie=UTF8&qid=1486906995&sr=8-2&keywords=breath+of+the+wild+piggyback

$24

https://www.bookdepository.com/The-Legend-of-Zeld-Breath-of-the-Wild---The-Complete-Official-Guide/9781911015253?ref=grid-view

$28

Well, you said video games so everyone started listing video game stuff, but I'd suggest taking a different tack. Start off by learning some game design by making some boardgames together:

https://smile.amazon.com/Game-Design-Workshop-Playcentric-Innovative/dp/1482217163/

https://smile.amazon.com/Challenges-Games-Designers-Non-Digital-Exercises/dp/1542453313/

i recently found a cheap NES Mini and consider getting a guide since i don't have the time to re-learn and find everything again.

i found these 2 guides

'Playing With Power: Nintendo NES Classics' - https://www.amazon.com/Playing-Power-Nintendo-NES-Classics/dp/074401767X/

'NES Classic: The Ultimate Guide: Tips, tricks and strategies to all 30 games' - https://www.amazon.com/NES-Classic-Ultimate-tricks-strategies/dp/1540331814

 

any recommendations?

If you want a book about the making of Half Life 2 with lots of concept art, there is one already:
https://www.amazon.com/Half-Life-2-Raising-David-Hodgson/dp/0761543643

You might want to check out this book.

If you want to learn the basics get this book

That is where I started.

I do believe it was the back up that he broke into. I agree, you'd assume they'd have redundant back ups, but it was compromised in such a way (from the Article I read in 'biography' about Half-Life 2 and it's development, that put it behind schedule.) Also, the code stolen, was then compiled, so there was a pretty decent chunk of it.

EDIT: This is the book Half-Life 2: Raising the Bar

I think you might be a little late: http://www.amazon.com/Replay-The-History-Video-Games/dp/0956507204/ref=sr_1_4?ie=UTF8&qid=1371550963&sr=8-4&keywords=replay

I can recommend it btw. Not the greatest writing, but so many interesting tidbits.

There is this book that might help:
https://www.amazon.com/Multiplayer-Game-Programming-Architecting-Networked/dp/0134034309/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1497045503&sr=8-1&keywords=multiplayer+game+programming
but this is general and not specific for GameMaker. As I recall GameMaker has some tutorial on this stuff but I am not sure.

This are some sources that helped me understand how to create online games, warning: it's a rabbit hole, don't lose the focus on your game:

https://www.amazon.com/Multiplayer-Game-Programming-Architecting-Networked/dp/0134034309

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z9X4lysFr64&feature=youtu.be&t=1852

www.gabrielgambetta.com/client-server-game-architecture.html

https://developer.valvesoftware.com/wiki/Latency_Compensating_Methods_in_Client/Server_In-game_Protocol_Design_and_Optimization

https://www.gdcvault.com/play/1014345/I-Shot-You-First-Networking

https://api.unrealengine.com/udk/Three/NetworkingOverview.html

http://fabiensanglard.net/quakeSource/johnc-log.aug.htm

I'd suggest starting here: http://www.amazon.com/Master-Handbook-Acoustics-Sixth-Edition/dp/0071841040

How about a book? F. Alton Everest/Ken Pohlmann - Master Handbook of Acoustics

According to the book Dungeon Hacks, which covers the history of the Rogulike genre, both hack and moria where clones and not forks. Back than rogue was not open source and neither the creators of Hack nor Moria had access to the source code.

There is this.

This is not exactly what you are talking about, but it's got walk-throughs for a bunch of games. I remember buying some of the guides for the walk-throughs back in the day, especially Zelda.

Nintendo Book

Ever taken a look at this?

Valve released a book about Half-Life 2's development called Half-Life 2: Raising the Bar.

http://www.amazon.com/Half-Life-2-Raising-David-Hodgson/dp/0761543643/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1404234956&sr=1-1&keywords=half-life+2+raising+the+bar

Been there, done that, bought the book.

http://www.amazon.com/Half-Life-2-Raising-David-Hodgson/dp/0761543643

25 Used from $80.60
12 New from $85.00

> and the bar for what people expect has been raised,

you might say they are... rasing the bar?

Many of these can be found in this book.

http://www.amazon.com/Half-Life-2-Raising-David-Hodgson/dp/0761543643/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1260086777&sr=8-1

http://www.amazon.com/gp/aw/d/0761543643
Have a look at that.
The books called 'Half-Life 2-Raising the bar'

http://www.amazon.com/gp/aw/d/0789320908/ref=tmm_hrd_title_0?ie=UTF8&sr=&qid=

Replay: The History of Video Games

I feel obligated to link to the book on proc gen, co written by the creator of Dwarf Fortress.

https://www.amazon.com/dp/1498799191/ref=cm_sw_r_cp_awdb_t1_WXb5BbJ35M53M

It isn’t a coincidence how you feel about it.

The Game Maker's Apprentice: Game Development for Beginners (Book & CD)

https://inventwithpython.com/pygame/chapters/?

Oops that's the one you said it isn't. Tried to look some more, this has a chapter on AI so maybe it is it? http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/1590598725?ie=UTF8&tag=kelpiesoft-20&linkCode=as2&camp=1789&creative=9325&creativeASIN=1590598725

https://www.amazon.com/Guild-Leaders-Handbook-Strategies-Battle-Scarred/dp/1593272588

I think this is the one being referenced.

http://www.amazon.ca/XCOM-2-Resurrection-Greg-Keyes/dp/1608877124
Ayup.

This one here :P