How to start making games

The modern gaming industry is a relatively new, but already quite extensive, rapidly developing market. Every year there are new technologies and platforms, new programming courses for teenagers, which open up incredible opportunities for knowledgeable and smart developers. New genres are developing.

 

The games involve huge audiences of new, inexperienced players. And most importantly, all this creates excellent conditions for us, developers, and for you, future developers.

After all, with such a pace of development, large companies cannot cover the entire market. And even one developer has a chance to make a successful game and turn a hobby into a full-time job.

So friend, you’ve decided it’s time for you to become a great developer, don’t know where to start?

Let me take you on a winding path to a fairy tale, magical forest called Gamedev.

What should be your first game?

Your desire to develop is incredible, but at the initial stages you can very easily lose it, you decided to immediately create a large 3D open world, MMO RPG, FPS, rogue, the like, which you will never finish and you will forever be disappointed in yourself and in the industry.

1. The first thing you need to remember is that great victories start small. It is absolutely not worth taking on a game in which there will be more than a few mechanics, and best of all one. You won’t be able to immediately brag about this game to your friends, but you need to be a strategist and think far-sighted. If you think there are no simple good games, how about Tetris, Zuma or Flappy birds?
2. Secondly, the genre should also be chosen simpler, for example: platformer, clicker or puzzle.

The more popular the genre you choose, the more tutorials, ready-made solutions and topics on the forums.

We decided on the idea and genre. How to write your own game?

At the moment, there are many working engines of different levels in the network. And everyone is good at something. Which one is right for you?

Unity! Look, despite the number of cool engines on the market, they are conditionally divided into two categories:

1. the most popular
2. more niche.

Niche engines are better for specific tasks. But at the same time, there is less material about them on the network. Also, you need something more versatile so that you can try different things as you learn.

Remain popular: Unreal, Unity.

Both are free, both are cross-platform and have roughly the same functionality.

But Unity makes it easier to understand the interface, which is very important for you right now. Games on it are not very heavy and can be downloaded to the browser or mobile platform. And there are many more tutorials for beginners on it.

Graphic arts.

In terms of graphics, you can choose to your taste. It won’t change the complexity of development much. CG, that is, computer graphics, is conditionally divided into 3d and 2d. Since we’re going to make a small simple game, it’s best not to draw the third dimension. In addition, 3D programs are quite demanding on hardware. But if you still want to give it a try, Blender is for you. It is most commonly used in game development and is free. We also suggest getting started creating 3D characters in our Blender courses. Online courses on 3D graphics are based on learning the basic tools and functions of 3D modeling in Blender. In the lessons of this direction, objects are created, an image, a scene are created. We get acquainted with the basic tools, create textures and materials.

 

Programming courses: for or against? The most important part is the implementation of plans.

Unity uses the C Sharp programming language, so in the near future, learning C# will take up almost all of your free time.

Now you have two paths:

1. You can immediately google how to make a specific idea in Unity that you have. Believe me, most of the mechanics have long been explained in articles and videos, and in this way you will quickly create your first game, but learn little.
2. Or, much more effectively, first set aside time to simply learn C# and the Unity interface.

We offer programming courses for teenagers. The Unity course gives you the opportunity to create your own game, embody the brightest ideas. For 18 hours of the course, you will get an excellent base for starting and master the necessary tools to create your own game!

Let’s summarize.

• Take a simple game with one mechanic.
• In Photoshop, draw a simple pixel art graphic for it.
• Learn to program in C Sharp. With due diligence, you will have time for this.
• And with the help of Unity, bring your idea to life.

Good luck!