What are you looking to get from the course

Unity Courses Talk
#1

If you watched the stream, this question was sort of asked but think it was just broke down to design or code. Here we could be a little more articulate about what each of us is looking to learn from this course.

My self, looking to learn a little more about game design in general from the top down. Sure we can all sit at a table and jot down notes in a note book about what we want out of a game. I have only read one book about game design and it was eye opening. Things a person wouldn’t normally think about come to light. The coding side of things will be cool, looking forward to seeing some patterns really driven home. Again have read the Game Programming Patterns book by Robert Nystrom. Ben mentioned this book and I would highly recommend it. It’s geared at creating your own game engine, but the main point of the book is patterns in general. There is only so much a person can read before you must start putting it into practice for it to really hit home.

So in summation I would say I am more interested in the architecture and processes.

#2

I have to agree with you @Brad.M. There are a lot of people, like myself, working solo on projects. Going through the Unity course, I began setting goals for myself. I would slowly begin phasing out 3rd party artwork, and start using my own. Now, dealing with 3D, I do not use outside art at all. Everything going into my games thus far is created by me. I also have a course on Udemy that teaches how to create your own RPG music for beginners. A lot of hats to wear, but I am starting to rely only on assets made by me and not some 3rd party or someone from the outside I have to wait on.

While this may seem like a lot, I find that it breaks the monotony. If I have been coding for awhile, and need to take a break to make some art assets, now I am doing something new and giving my eyes a rest from coding. I am sure the same will be said about the music. It is a lot for one person to take on, but I enjoy it… not getting burned out.

#3

I am much more interested in learning the programming side of things rather than game design. Say 75% development and 25% design. Personally I am new to Unity and OOP but I have existing knowledge of game design. I also do not know how to best structure up such a big project.

I would also argue that good design does not make a game if you don’t know how to execute it. But if you have a lot of knowledge of how to develop games then you can always work on improving your design skills later. It is much easier to design a game if you know what you can and cannot do.

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#4

well, as a normal member not a life access member i didnt watch the stream.
but i’d like to throw my thoughts too.
honestly it really is true that a lot of people do actually underestimate design and call it easy. but after reading half of {jeremy gibson introduction to game design} i did realize that design is actually, not easy, and it raelly is a skill that needs honing up like any other skill, like coding and art and sound creation.
but well, most people who took the course are probably programmers so its understandable that they want to get into the coding asap. and, this is a course aimed at intermediate coders so, it makes sense .

to be honest, at the moment im at the conceptualizing phase of creating my very first serious project (over the span of the entire next year).
at the moment, im at the design phase/planning phase. so it would be really cool if i were to start out by game design class as of now. but sadly i’ll be late on that. (because we dont get access till march).

so, just due to time difference between my access and the fact that, im starting this serious project now. i’d choose programming :slight_smile: .

still under normal circumstances im not really sure what i’d choose, because even if i can structure my game correctly if i suck at design, then it means nothing. but design classes can be too full of theory and too boring sometimes, so im not really sure what i’d choose :smiley: . (though i might end up picking programming ).

#5

I am going at it solo as well, so I want a little of everything. I am mostly excited to see what a game needs to get on steam early access. Some of the other aspects I am looking forward to are, game play, proper structure in design, and of course programming. I am currently going through the blender course to be able to create my own assets, and I will be looking for a good music and sound course to be able to make my own sound assets.

#6

It was recorded and is available on the GameDev.tv YouTube channel :slight_smile:

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#7

thanks rob, i’ve already watched, and it really was super helpful :slight_smile: especially the GDD and 1 Page GDD part, im actually in the midst of making my own GDD for my game, so those were the parts i wanted :slight_smile: . was really glad to see em.

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#8

Ah, sorry, didn’t realise - but glad you’ve seen it :slight_smile:

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#9

@EricPhillips would you mind sharing the info on that music course either here or to me as a PM?

I’m looking for a mix of both, game design and the coding. I’m solo too and working to learn graphics a bit which I’m rather a potatoe at. :slight_smile:

More the design aspects on this one I think, the thought process and so forth. I have ideas but they are pretty fragmented. lol

#10

@EricPhillips, I am also interested is this. One-third of my life is devoted to music, one-third to martial arts, one-third to game creation.

As such I am a competent musician, with good knowledge of music theory, have ProTools and a number of plug-ins and would be extremely interested in this music design course.

Regards,
Vaughan.

#11

Sure! Here is the course. It is put together nicely. You might want to wait for a Udemy sale to go through though: https://www.udemy.com/gamemusiccourse/

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#12

It’s currently on sale for $10, though the sale ends today. I’m considering getting it.

#13

Initially, I was going to type “as much as I can get”, but actually that might not be true. As much as I would be happy to learn more about coding, too few tutorials on the web touch on proper architecture and design principles - particularly when you are solo or a small team (and tend to do everything by the seat of your pants…like me). Database design, progression structure, scaling of content - wish I had the patience, time and perseverance to read ‘real’ books about it, but alas I am a visual person. I’m already inspired by the technical docs that have been done for the course game and hopefully there will be more of that in the course itself.

Or maybe I just hope to be pleasantly surprised :gift:

#14

As I said in the Introduce Yourself Topic, I’m an IT student. By the end of that bachelor student’s are expected to present some management software they’ve developped. Teachers are ok if I develop a game as long as it is complex enough in the front end and that it relies on a relationnal database.

I have to finish that project by the end of April 2018, so I don’t aim for a finished RPG but at least I’d like to have a character creation module that brings the player to a map where he can fight other players. (Basically I just want the PvP part of an MMO in the big PVE world map and one area/town will be safe for the player to learn, train, buy equipment etc)
All the character attributes, equipment, inventory, skills, level, coordinates in the world would be saved in DB as long with the players informations to allow them to login. It could all be really simple (not many skills and objects available in game) but it has to work for April 2018.

I think this course won’t use a relationnal DB neither will it use network, but I’m working on that right know. What I am looking to get as soon as possible is how to create a world with boundaries (that bring you to another map or invisible boundaries that change the gema rules like if you enter the town you can no longer attack even if you are still on the same map), how to allow players to create a character with a few variations in the mesh (hair, body shape, eye color, clothes etc) and of course learn a bit about how to create a balance in all the game math, I mean make all the numbers coherents between health, damages, mana, all the different bonus/malus you can get etc. I hope it is all gonna be covered soon enough for me to apply that to my project :slight_smile:

Do you guys think it is too much for a one man/year job? Am I too optimistic about the amount of work this is? Again I’m not aiming for a sellable game but for something that works (begining and end) even if not all features are not yet implemented you can still play it.

I’m so excited about this course anyway!

#15

I’m most interested in the architecture of the game, including when to write tests + how to organize them (many game programming books now mention writing tests for your code but don’t really explain what a good test is + how test-driven dev is used in games). I think for a larger game it will get harder for a solo dev to catch problems introduced to systems after initial dev/testing of those systems + am very interested in solutions to manage changes to a larger program in a professional way.

In particular, I would like to know how an indie dev approaches testing to ensure framerate, bugs, etc. are at an acceptable level before releasing a demo or full game (with so many different hardware configurations, what is the best strategy to minimize negative player experiences?). I see a lot of small indie games bashed not for their game play but for the tech issues + on a demo for a crowdfunding project this can be the death of the game, especially if the dev is not able to promptly fix issues - players quickly lose confidence that the dev can deliver). Maybe a small section on areas to check for optimization before releasing a demo or finished game would be helpful.

I’d like to learn more about cleaning up code + assets + packaging everything securely for release of a demo + a complete game (and more about structuring a demo for the game that is effective for a Kickstarter or Steam Greenlight campaign). There are some “security” assets for Unity but I’m not sure what the real world security concerns are for an indie game using Unity, so any tips about that aspect of releasing the game would be useful. Also interested in Steam platform use/integration of features like achievements + cards, etc.

I feel like there are a lot of great game design resources but that there are few aimed at solo devs anymore (many books presume you want to be employed in a larger game team + coach you for a designer-isn’t-coder approach rather than a solo dev/tiny team where you would be able to rapidly prototype your own systems + begin testing immediately), so if design is a core focus, I hope it is in that context of a designer/programmer who is testing the design ideas as we are developing our system architecture. I feel like this is the way most really small teams are generally working since it is hard for a design-only person to acquire a team who doesn’t resent implementing some “idea person’s” design (ignorant since game design is a complex skill in itself, but everyone thinks they can do it well enough, kind of like being a writer).

I’ve been kicking around with game dev + design resources (all self taught) for years + am still not confident about being able to pull it all together, to take things past the proof of concept stage into a polished, releasable game that can be tested + patched + supported confidently so players are not disappointed with a lot of technical issues right out of the gate. I guess my big fear is that my code + my skill will not be sufficient to respond quickly + professionally with a good fix (that doesn’t break anything else) when players report problems with the game. I feel like there is a high expectation of quality even for smaller games + that it’s quite easy to lose ppl who would otherwise be really happy to support your project over technical flaws.

#16

I want to see how you guys implement:

  • Character creation / leveling / etc.

  • Skills tree maybe?

  • Item / Gear creation

  • NPC interaction / roles

#17

As I’m also gonna go solo on this project, I want to know pretty much everything about everything. My ‘problem’ is that I find every aspect of game-making incredibly interesting, that it will probably overwhelm me. The key will be to set realistic goals, so I will face an additional challenge to curb my chaotic enthusiasm :smiley: .

#18

So I plan to start as a solo developer, but I think to realize any goals I will need a team.

That said what I want to get from this course is the project management side of game development, concept to product. The original course is great but a bit more task oriented, so how to handle the asset and audio pipeline so it all comes together is huge. Even if you are solo, you still have to do the same things. Along with that, just how the collaborative efforts work together to make a game “fun”

#19

I’ll be heading into this project solo and my programming experience is about as deep as the Complete Unity Developer course plus a few game jams and dumb projects I’ve started myself. I’m an artist and musician so programming is my focus.

I’m looking to learn about the intermediate topics such as Events, Delegates, Object Pooling, etc. Techniques that we’ll be able to apply to virtually every project we ever make in the future. Specifically, I’m looking for a great explanation on why and how these techniques work and a clear set of videos to implement them (which Ben and Sam are great at doing). I’ve watched a few videos on YouTube on these techniques before, but many are convoluted and assume too much so skip over the fundamentals.

I’ve also watched a few of Casey Muratori’s Handmade Hero series videos and he does a great thing where he implements a digital whiteboard to explain what he’s doing and why. It’s great for understanding the decisions that are being made and the pros and cons to each decision they’re making. For someone like me who’s still learning the OOP paradigm, it also helps abstract it all. I hope Ben and Sam implement that technique of presentation in this course.

#20

Hey just wanted to chime in with my opinion on this as well.

I’m currently only doing self teaching methods (As well as all of your courses) I’ve put a lot into this and plan on putting much more into it. I would have to agree with some of the people above, I would like to focus on the programming part of it more than the visual designs. I REALLY want to see that multiplayer system for local and internet (mostly internet) implemented into the course. I would rather have the knowledge to create my own systems, instead of importing someone’s and having just enough knowledge to make it work for my needs.

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