Game development industry is bursting with lots of excitement and creativity as mobile and video games are favourite among youth culture and kids. Game developers have successfully launched brilliant, unbelievable stories and graphics in past few years. If you are an emerging game development specialist thinking to make it big in the world of video games, you have sought a right place. Since the game development environment is growing more competitive than ever, you need more cognitive skills and original imagination to build games people will go fanatic about.
So if you have an outstanding idea that you believe can be expanded into an excellent game, this blog will be your comprehensive guide, a tutorial to help you with a game development process. First, start with small steps:
Get your game fundamentals right
First of all, game development is a huge field containing potential to transform virtual experience via interesting characters, crisp graphic details and power-packed actions. It is quite difficult for just one individual to build an entire game on his own within limited time frame. There is so much to consider before you actually step into the world of developing games.
1. Refresh your maths and physics
if you ask any veteran game developer, they will tell you how important it is to get your maths and physics right. Modern games have complicated physics simulation to make things appear real. So you need to learn its basic principles before you can give a shape to even the simplest game
2. Be organized
This is an important aspect of being a skilled game developer. Make a strategic approach while you write codes for the game. Be an organized planner so that you have clear idea of the type of game, its theme, story and graphic elements you are working on. Create the basic framework before you run into serious hurdles
3. Start by cloning
It is not bad if you can clo your favourite game before you master the art of developing the real, creative game dynamics. Go with the basics and try to clone the most recent ones making buzz in the market, gradually sinking into the coding of 2D games. Learn Flash for simple 2D web games
4. Try some classic themes
Be creative and attempt to build classic themes such as Alien attacks, Castle invasion, Empirical elements, Sniper actions or something as simple as Chain reaction until you get gather expertise to build 3D architectures of contemporary games
5. Expand your learning
Python is a good way to start programming followed by advanced languages like C, Java. Also turn to graphic libraries to mature your game design with animations like OpenGL, DirectX.
Know your role and skills by experimenting
Any novice trying to step into the game development world must understand that the entire process contains many demanding roles, each requiring distinctive talent and experience. Hence, one cannot nurture perfect understanding in each area at times. This is why it is important to master a few roles you are highly interested in and hire specialists for the rest of them.
Game development process is divided into jobs like:
- Graphics & animations
- Theme & story development
- Coding
- Game play
- Scalability and features
- Distribution and networking
- Testing
All these need a small yet complete team full of specialized members.
Try to determine where you most fit and what really appeals to you. Experiment with some of primary roles of game development to discover your skills in a couple of roles that you think you can immaculately perform.
Choose your tools.
By now, you must be prepared with your idea getting transformed into game visuals. Here at this stage, you should focus on tools and engines that will help build the architect of your game. You will find a great range of advanced tools available in the market, either open-source of premium.
But thinking that you are not competent with computer science and programming skills, we have culled a few set of popular game tools for you that has minimum learning curve and will help create your first prototype quickly. You can learn by fiddling with various elements within each tool.
1. Unity
Unity is a cross-platform mobile game development tool that has C# and UnityScript as supporting language. UnityScript is like JavaScript, its own language. The games built using Unity can be deployed across many platforms. Users can enjoy its both free and professional versions.
- Unity has its own physics engine
- Users can design particle system in Unity editor
- It allows you to use its editor to edit images and animations from animator window
- Its built in camera helps simplify navigation in the game world
- To view features easily, Unity has UI contains different components.
- It supports building wide variety of games
- It has asset store to paid assets for the game.
Games made using Unity: Assassin’s Creed: Identity, Escape Plan, Temple Run Trilogy
2. Twine
For gaming programmers with no coding experience, Twine could be an open-source program for you to create adventure games of your choice. You can share your creations with the world in HTML format. It relies on various editor to absorb codes and syntax so you can enter your text and commands into linked nodes.
- It is very easy to use and grasp and comes with basic principles of coding
- Twine allows you to scale your game if you possess good experience with web development
- It also allows you to embed photos, music, game prototypes you create to web page
You need to write your own codes if you want to make something complex. Also, you can’t rely on it if you wish to build action-based themes with agile pace.
Games made in Twine: Howling Dogs, Afterward
3. Stencyl
Stencyl is another game development tool created recently with quite user-friendly graphic interface. You can make a gamut of games of various genres with Stencyl. It has several samples games that you can tweak and change into the games you wish. Its primary version is free but Pro version is paid as it offers more assets and custom options.
- Just like Lego, users are allowed to build code blocks and from them logic statements
- Once experienced in coding, you can use blocks for editing and creating code from scratch
- With Actionscript3, you can make flash games and apps
- Stencyl games output flash files that are easier to share with others
- Users can upload their games to Stencyl’s site in case they don’t own personal hosting
- Its in-program asset server allows you to download and share code blocks, art assets or whole games
One of the down-points of Stencyl is that users need to save multiple copies of their game progress since the tools is new, ridden with a few bugs.
You can learn more info on how to make Stencyl games by visiting their own comprehensive website Stencylpedia.
Games made in Stencyl: Handheld Video Game, The Brim
4. GameMaker
GameMaker is one more considerable game development software with a free version that exports only executable files (.exes). The output sharable files have watermarks on them. Its premium paid version comes with more features and formats.
- For coding it offers drag-and-drop luxury to developers
- It has its own language like in Unity
- It comes with a tutorial for easy-to-grab guide on UI navigation
To quickly understand the functionality of the tool and make high-profile games, you can refer great deals of tutorials.
Games made with GameMaker: Spelunky, Stealth Bastard
Get some help whenever you feel
If you believe you can’t do everything on your own, you can divide the job among your team members. Get someone who is conversant with artwork and someone else specialized in game stories and character development.
You can refine your game by adding elements like assets, sound, art pieces. Explore SoundCloud where you can find open source music. For art, you may choose OpenGameArt.org.
Conclusion:
These are some of the points you can adopt in your next game development process. If you find it impractical to manage the technological resources on your own, you can also find help from outsource partners. As outsourcing is a modern wave in IT, you can hire an established off-shore game development company to build the entire game or specific part of it. Hopefully, you will soon make a successful, highly evolved game for today’s game lovers.