By Matthew Haas
Instructor
Computer & Information Science
Corning Community College
contact: haas@corning-cc.edu

• A plan: what are you making?
  • is it feasible?

• creativity
• problem solving
• troubleshooting
• programming
• reading / observing / comprehension
• attention to detail
• experimentation / research
• abstraction - be able to dive deep into many levels of thought
• writing - ability to express thoughts
• math / numerical literacy - know how to manipulate numbers in a favorable way

• ability to focus and pay attention to minute details for long periods of time
• ability to work on a large, multi-faceted, and complex problem without being able to necessarily see tangible results until it is much closer to completion
• ability to experiment and dabble; there's no “recipe book” you can follow to make a game. You need to understand underlying concepts and know how to apply them in a particular situation

• GameMaker
• Unity
• What development environment / system / game engine you're going to use
  • while many of these things are productively utilized by professional game developers, they ultimately require a knowledge of the underlying basics of logic - the process of instructions the computer is performing to accomplish the task at hand.
  • focusing on these gamedev tools without a fundamental underlying understanding of programming and problem solving will lead to dead ends, as you will be “boxed in” with respect to what you can do
    • you can have the finest, latest, and greatest jet, but if you don't know how to pilot it, you're not going to be able to do all that much with it.

• whatever “fun” you experience playing games will NOT translate to creating games:
  • creating games can be frustrating
  • creating games will result in many failed attempts
  • creating games involves coming up with ideas
  • I daresay creating games is MORE fun than playing games, but it isn't possible until you disconnect from it needing to be as fun as playing games.
  • the more you want to create a game (at the cost of anything else), the less successful you will be. To become good at creating games, you need to focus on many things that don't seem game-like (programming, reading, writing, math, thinking) for an extended period of time before you are able to successfully undertake such an endeavor

• It just takes perseverance and effort.
• In my Spring 2019 Computer Organization class, we learned aspects of how the underlying hardware of a system works.
• This semester, I chose (well, I asked, the class enthusiastically agreed) to explore the 1980's Nintendo Entertainment System (NES), where the aim was to create games (ROMs) as a demonstration of concepts learned and efforts expended.
  • We weren't unsuccessful:
    • https://youtu.be/ZYIv1fFfWDM
    • There are other efforts underway as well:
      • https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PL172Xo7heu1adC57cUiyMBhsMh5wnc_eL
      • And in my Spring 2019 Systems Programming class, we also explored applying concepts through games (using SDL):
        • https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gxB98OAwDHY
    • want to see them in action?

• established and refined reading, writing, thinking, mathematical skills