Create Computer Games_ Design and Build Your Own Game

Description

This book explains the basics of game design using the free game devel- opment tool Unity. This book was created to make Unity accessible for young adults who are interested in the process of game design but don’t know where to begin.
Game design is tough. It involves figuring out and understanding everything from design to coding. Knowing where to begin is daunting and can feel inaccessible. Just keep in mind that no one starts off great at game design. You don’t need to know everything to start, and thinking that you do is one of the hardest challenges to overcome.
This book was written to get people like me to start thinking about game design in a different way. This book isn’t about making a perfect game or about teaching you everything about game development or even Unity. This book is a starting line. It teaches the basics and encourages you to think about games differently.
This book was written with the thought that games are tough to make and that coding is confusing. Think of this like a cookbook that explains why you use two eggs instead of three and what the pepper does to help bring out the flavor. The codes and game development that this book walks you through are approached from the bottom up. Things make sense when you understood why certain codes or components are needed. Just knowing the ingredients to a recipe doesn’t teach you how to cook.

Introduction
About This Book
Foolish Assumptions
Icons Used in This Book
Where to Go from Here
CHAPTER
01 Chapter 1: What Is Game Design?1
Thinking about What Makes Fun Games Fun
Asking the Right Questions before You Begin
Creating Your Game on Paper
CHAPTER
02 Chapter 2: Unity: The Software You’ll
Use to Build Your Game
Getting Organized
Creating a New File
Understanding How Unity Is Laid Out
Navigating the Scene
Creating a Game Object
Creating and Using Prefabs
CHAPTER
03 Chapter 3: Creating Level
Understanding the Importance of Level
Designing Your First Level

Contents
Creating the Gray-Box Level
Giving Your Level Objective and Direction
CHAPTER
04 Chapter 4: Camera, Character, and Controls
The Three Cs of Game Development
Creating a Character Stand-In
Thinking about Code
Adding Rigidbody Component and Understanding Box Colliders
Coding Your Player
Coding Advanced Movement
Coding Pickup
Creating Tags and a User Interface
Coding Your Camera
CHAPTER
05 Chapter 5: Making Your “Game” into a Game
Thinking About What a Game Is
Creating and Coding Your Obstacles
Creating Respawn Points
Coding Respawn Points
CHAPTER
06 Chapter 6: Play Testing
Defining Play Testing
Knowing When to Start Play Testing
Deciding Who Should Play Test Your Game
Contents v
Knowing What to Look For
Handling Feedback
Finding the Problems in Your Game
CHAPTER
07 Chapter 7: Fixing and Adjusting Your Game
Turning Criticism into Construction
Punishing Your Player Less
Creating a User Interface Tutorial
Preventing Wall Climbing with Raytracing
CHAPTER
08 Chapter 8: Animating in Blender
Mixing Things Up with Blender
Downloading Blender
Opening Blender for the First Time
Creating a New File in Blender
Figuring Out the Blender Interface
Navigating the Interface
Editing Your Object
CHAPTER
09 Chapter 9: Creating Your Assets
Thinking about Theme and Style
Creating Your First Character
Creating the Enemy Grunt
Creating an Environmental Hazard
vi Contents
Creating the Moving Platform
Creating the Coin Pickups
Customizing on Your Own
CHAPTER
10 Chapter 10: Animating Your Characters
Defining Animation
Learning Animation
Animating Your Player Character
Animating the Enemy Grunt
Animating the Environmental Hazard
Animating a Moving Platform
Animating the Coins
CHAPTER
11 Chapter 11: Coloring and Lighting Your
Game Level
Changing the Ground Color
Editing the Environmental Lighting
Understanding Lighting
Creating Fog
CHAPTER
12 Chapter 12: Importing Your Characters
into Your Game�
Fixing Your Player Character for Importing into Unity
Importing Your Player Character into Unity
Importing the Other Characters and Objects
Contents vii
CHAPTER
13 Chapter 13: Play Testing (Again)
Testing the Second Time
Fixing Your Game
Wrapping Up the Noticeable Issues
CHAPTER
14 Chapter 14: Finalizing Your Game
Creating Multiple Levels
Resetting the Level
Exporting Your Game
Continuing Your Game Design