Creating Video Games

Lecture Slides and Readings

TOPIC	LECTURE SLIDES	READINGS
Class Information and Resources	Introduction (PDF) Project 1 Introduction (PDF) Project 4 Introduction (PDF) Back of the Box (PDF) High Level Design Document (PDF)	“SNAP!”: Warm-up Activity to Elicit Ideas on Open Data (PDF) Zoss, J. Matthew. “The Art of Game Polish: Developers Speak.” Gamasutra, December 22, 2009.
Designs: Decisions, Choices, Agency	None	Extra Credits. “Choice and Conflict.” March 24, 2012. YouTube. Rose, John. “Addressing Conflict: Tension and Release in Games.” Gamasutra, July 29, 2010. Extra Credits. “Easy Games.” March 6, 2012. YouTube. Kilgore, Chad. “Understanding Challenge.” Gamasutra, January 8, 2013. Extra Credits. “Playing Like a Designer, Part 1.” April 7, 2012. Youtube. Extra Credits. “Playing Like a Designer, Part 2.” April 7, 2012. YouTube.
Design: Brainstorming and Prototyping	Brainstorming (PDF) Paper Prototyping (PDF) Prototyping Map (PDF) A Selection of Indie Games (PDF)	Zimmerman, Eric. “Play as Research: The Iterative Design Process.” July 8, 2003. Osborn, Alex F. “Creative Collaboration by Groups.” In Applied Imagination: Principles and Procedures of Creative Problem-Solving. Charles Scribner’s Sons, 1953. Fullerton, Tracy, Christopher Swain, and Steven S. Hoffman. “Prototyping.” In Game Design Workshop: A Playcentric Approach to Creating Innovative Games. 2nd ed. Morgan Kaufmann, 2008. [Preview with Google Books] Fullerton, Tracy. “Digital Prototyping.” In Game Design Workshop: A Playcentric Approach to Creating Innovative Games. 3rd ed. A. K. Peters / CRC Press, 2014. ISBN: 9781482217162. [Preview with Google Books]
Testing	Testing (PDF)	Extra Credits. “Playtesting.” May 19, 2012. YouTube. Fullerton, Tracy, Christopher Swain, and Steven S. Hoffman. “Playtesting” and “Functionality, Completeness, and Balance.” In Game Design Workshop: A Playcentric Approach to Creating Innovative Games. 2nd ed. Morgan Kaufmann, 2008. ISBN: 9780240809748. [Preview with Google Books]
Software Engineering	Game Engines (PDF 1.7MB) Version Control (PDF) Coding Tips (PDF)	Fowler, Martin, and Kent Beck. “Bad Smells in Code.” In Refactoring: Improving the Design of Existing Code. Addison-Wesley, 1999. ISBN: 9780201485677. [Preview with Google Books]
Project Management	Vision Statement (PDF) Agile Project Management (PDF) Agile Software Development (PDF) Team Dynamics (PDF)	Keith, Clinton. “Agile Development,” “About Scrum,” “Agile Planning,” and “Agile Design.” In Agile Game Development with Scrum. Addison-Wesley, 2010. ISBN: 9780321618528. [Preview with Google Books “Scrum Project Backlog.” Agile Bench O’Connor, Rory, and Shuib Basri. “The Effect of Team Dynamics on Software Development Process Improvement.” International Journal of Human Capital and Information Technology Professionals 3, no. 3 (2012): 13–26. Dorairaj, Siva, James Nobel, et al. “Understanding Team Dynamics in Distributed Agile Software Development.” Agile Processes in Software Engineering and EXtreme Programming 111 (2012): 47–61.
User Interface	None	Norman, Donald A. “The Psychopathology of Everyday Things.” In The Design of Everyday Things. Basic Books, 2013. ISBN: 9780465050659. Quintans, Desi. “Game UI by Example: A Crash Course in the Good And the Bad.” January 22, 2013.
Marketing and Business	None	Gworek, Jonathan D. “The Low Down on Startups.” Morse, Barnes-Brown & Pendleton, P. C. September 2001.