Necessities for Game Development

It's always nice to sit down relax and play a great game. From the classic retro games to the new God of War games, there's always something for everyone. It’s sad why not everyone can appreciate games though. Essentially games are just interactive stories that bring you out of the world of the mundane into a universe of endless possibilities. This is why there are so many different types of video games because it allows the developers to express themselves in creative, spontaneous and interactive ways.
Ever since the first Pong game introduced in roughly thirty years ago, games have evolved and changed the way we play drastically. Graphics have gotten better, music is more dramatic, processors and hard drives have become bigger and stronger and there’s no end in sight to what video games can’t do at this point; since technology is getting better by the second. These advances in technology have not only changed the way we play but also how the developers make them. Programming video games became so easy normal neighbourhood kids began developing games to their hearts’ desires. Now with the new advancements in video game industry, making games is a stressful and time consuming process especially for AAA style games. (The term AAA game refers to the most popular games that are developed by companies such as EA Games, Ubisoft, Bungie, etc.)
AAA games aren’t the only kind in development though. Independent game developers program all different kinds of games like flash games for example. Flash Macromedia is a program that allows animators to make little animations and gamers to make video games. These games aren’t high tech geniuses like Halo or Gears of War, but that doesn’t mean these plays aren’t fun and enjoyable. If you’re a beginner programmer starting off with Flash games is a great idea because it allows you to build the basic and necessary skills you need to understand how game development works.

1. THE PLAN IS ESSENTIAL
The very first thing you want to do before you get into the nuts and bolts of creating your game is to first plan your game out. If you’ve suddenly had an idea for the greatest game in your whole entire world, write it down. Think about it, brainstorm, come up with a storyline (if the game calls for one), and write down how the game will be played (1st person, 3rd person, etc).
There are many more things you will need to consider when writing a plan, but that will be covered in more detail in another post.

2. Figure out the game platform
What platform will your game run on? PS2? Xbox? Pc? If you’re a beginner you will most likely not be writing a game for platforms PS2 or Xbox. The first platform you will be programming on is the PC.
Now that you’ve figured out your platform what are its limitations? When we’re trying to figure out limitations we need to think in terms of processor, ram, graphics, etc. What things will limit you from creating your masterpiece? You will always be limited to what you can do graphically be of the type of graphics card you have, limited in memory, length and speed of your game in terms of processor, ram and all those other goodies as well. You need to first look at what you have in terms of hardware and figure how much you can do with this.
There will be more to come about this subject later.

3. How will you program it?
What programming software will you use to make your game? Flash? RPG Maker? These programs are possible ones to use. You can google game programming software and find many more.
Do research on these programs and try to figure out which one will be better to use in terms of the nature of your game. Look at your game and figure out what qualities of these programs will best help you bring your game to life. Is your game in 3D? If it is, then you will want a program that is capable of programming 3D games.
More on this topic later.

4. Computer Languages? What?
Alongside with graphics, the computer language is the most important thing to consider. You need to learn computer languages in order to program your game. Since there are a dozen different languages you have to figure out which language you need to learn. Going back to the programming software you’ve chosen, you need to find out what languages the program works with. Is it C? C+? ActionScript? As soon as you figure this out you need to go out and learn it. There are books you can buy, you can go to a college or university and take some courses and even major in computer science.
The easiest program to start with is ActionScript, which Flash Macromedia uses. There will be tutorials on some of these programming languages later.

5. Graphics
Now we have to thing about graphics. Since you’ve got your plan all finished, this will mean you already have your ideas for graphics drawn out. It’s okay if you don’t have EVERY piece of artwork fully completed as long as you have the general idea planned out you should be able to manage.
What we have to do now is find out what graphics software we’ll be using. Again consider your programming software and find out what capabilities it has in terms of graphics. Some programs will give you the workspace to make the graphics right on the program, while with others you’ll need to use other third party programs. The simplest program you can start with is your Paint program that you have on your computer.
You’re graphics may not look perfect, but with a little more practice you may get them to look better. If you’re not an artsy kind of person, maybe you have a friend that’s an artist. This is always the perfect time to have a partner in crime to help with these things.

6. Let’s get started!
You’ve got your plan, you know how to program, you have the graphics, now it’s time to write the program. During this process you may be changing parts of your plan to accommodate for unexpected glitches that may have occurred. Just remember, your plan is a nice layout, you’re allowed to play around with certain aspects of your game.
More on this later.

7. Test your game
Play your game and see how it flows. Are there problems or glitches you didn’t see before? This step allows you to make gameplay modifications like is the game too hard or is one part too long, etc. You need to make sure your game flows.
You can also show off your game by having your friends and/or family play it and give you their opinions. This is the hit or miss step where you find out if your game is fun or not. Most likely you’ll only have to make some tweeks to the overall design to make your game more fun to play. If you have to take your game back to step one that means your first plan wasn’t good enough. Hopefully at this point though you will know your mistakes and be able to write a new and improved plan.
More on this later.

8. Show your game to the world
How will your game be published? Are you just going to host it online or do you think it’s good enough to go to a publishing company? There are many things to consider at this step and very careful measures you’ll have to take.
More on this later.


Now that I’ve given you the basic steps to game development and design you can begin to think about what you want to do in order to develop your first game. If this is intimidating to you, don’t be discouraged. Anyone can make a video game with the right resources and if you have any questions feel free to contact me. My goal is to help you be able to make your own video games.

Good luck!!!

YoYo