Hello!
I haven't been on here much for a little while. I haven't had a chance to get my shmup on in a serious way and hit the leaderboards.
One reason is because I'm developing a shmup-inspired game.
The other is because I created a step-by-step course on game development, and programming geared for beginners. (cue the reason I'm positing)...
So, my course is pretty big and covers pretty much the core of everything you need to make a 2D game in Unity, and it teaches you C# as you move through it.
No prior experience necessary. I show you everything, in detail, anticipating probable questions and answering them as you move along.
Why am I posting this here? Well, because the entire course just went free, and I know at least some of you are devs or interested in developing games (particularly in 2D).
You can get it all here at: http://www.devu.com/unity
There are also written transcripts for all of the lessons (I think), as well as project files, Q&A, and eventually there will also be quizzes.
Also, please share! I'm not making anything on this... just exposure!
Thanks in advance!
Steven
My game development/programming course (now free)
-
casualcoder
- Posts: 347
- Joined: Sat Apr 21, 2012 4:35 am
- Location: West Coast, Canada
-
Pixel_Outlaw
- Posts: 2646
- Joined: Sun Mar 26, 2006 3:27 am
Re: My game development/programming course (now free)
How portable are the lessons if the student is not using Microsoft Windows as their development environment?
I suppose people could spin up a Windows VM if they do hinge on Visual Studio.
That said, is the end result portable to Linux and Mac without too much fuss?
Just thinking about the popularity of Steam these days and the 3 operating systems it supports.
I might learn C#.
I've currently gone to the length of embedding Common Lisp into C++ just to make game programming more palatable.
Free information is always great though!
I bet a lot of guys on here have shot the core enough to know what would make a good shmup and just need a push in the right direction.
I suppose people could spin up a Windows VM if they do hinge on Visual Studio.
That said, is the end result portable to Linux and Mac without too much fuss?
Just thinking about the popularity of Steam these days and the 3 operating systems it supports.
I might learn C#.
I've currently gone to the length of embedding Common Lisp into C++ just to make game programming more palatable.
Free information is always great though!
I bet a lot of guys on here have shot the core enough to know what would make a good shmup and just need a push in the right direction.
Some of the best shmups don't actually end in a vowel.
No, this game is not Space Invaders.
No, this game is not Space Invaders.
-
casualcoder
- Posts: 347
- Joined: Sat Apr 21, 2012 4:35 am
- Location: West Coast, Canada
Re: My game development/programming course (now free)
I don't know a lot about Visual Studio on Mac but that would be the only Windows-centric part of this lesson material.
However, C#/Windows is making a big cross-platform push nowadays so I expect all of the dividing lines to go away (if they haven't already).
Just found Visual Studio for Mac posted November of this year here:
https://www.visualstudio.com/vs/visual-studio-mac/
If all else fails, Unity runs native on Mac and you can use it's own IDE called Monodevelop that looks and behaves very much like Visual Studio.
None of the lessons would be different, coding-wise, if you're using MonoDevelop (except for the one on debugging in Visual Studio, but that's not very important).
One of the selling points of Unity is that it's heavily cross-platform with "not much fuss." That means Linux, PC, Mac, Mobile... pretty much anything. The "fuss" part would be in the platform-specific parts such as using touch for control vs keyboard, or adjusting to smaller/larger viewports of tablets/phones vs monitors. Otherwise, it's all pretty damn easy.
Also, highly recommend C#. As mentioned, there's a big push from MS to take it far and wide and there's been a lot of industry adoption to that end (IE: Unity, Xamarin, MonoGame, etc).
Programming apps and games in C# is "easy" when compared to lower-level or native languages.
Above all, I got into Unity because its just really fun to quickly get things going and trying out any gameplay mechanic you have in mind. Also, tonnes of community support, documentation and real-time discussion around this stuff unlike a lot of other technologies.
Steven
However, C#/Windows is making a big cross-platform push nowadays so I expect all of the dividing lines to go away (if they haven't already).
Just found Visual Studio for Mac posted November of this year here:
https://www.visualstudio.com/vs/visual-studio-mac/
If all else fails, Unity runs native on Mac and you can use it's own IDE called Monodevelop that looks and behaves very much like Visual Studio.
None of the lessons would be different, coding-wise, if you're using MonoDevelop (except for the one on debugging in Visual Studio, but that's not very important).
One of the selling points of Unity is that it's heavily cross-platform with "not much fuss." That means Linux, PC, Mac, Mobile... pretty much anything. The "fuss" part would be in the platform-specific parts such as using touch for control vs keyboard, or adjusting to smaller/larger viewports of tablets/phones vs monitors. Otherwise, it's all pretty damn easy.
Also, highly recommend C#. As mentioned, there's a big push from MS to take it far and wide and there's been a lot of industry adoption to that end (IE: Unity, Xamarin, MonoGame, etc).
Programming apps and games in C# is "easy" when compared to lower-level or native languages.
Above all, I got into Unity because its just really fun to quickly get things going and trying out any gameplay mechanic you have in mind. Also, tonnes of community support, documentation and real-time discussion around this stuff unlike a lot of other technologies.
Steven