dimanche 8 juillet 2012

What Must to Know to Become a Video Game Designer?

By Will Keating


Its loads of fun being a video game designer but there is also a lot that you need to know!

Fortunately there are some totally wonderful courses on the market that will teach you all you need to know. But do not think that you need to wait until you start taking those classes to begin learning techniques required to become an amazing video game designer. The resources are already at your fingertips. There is tons of stuff that you can begin learning and doing right now and this piece is going to show you the best way.

Game Graphics

Obviously a big part of a video game designer's job involves graphics. It would be a great help if you could draw by hand but it is by no means an essential skill. If you can't draw at all then I highly recommend picking up a book like this one which teaches you some basic drawing techniques. If you can already draw or want to push your knowledge further then I also recommend picking up a book about drawing the anatomy because this really helps when it comes to character design.

The other "visual" aspect of the job is 3D modeling and animation of all the graphic elements in the game. One of the most frequently used programs to do this is called Maya 3D. You should really think of buying this product and doing a few training programs like the ones on Lynda.com because software programs like this is much simpler to understand if you can see what the teacher is really doing rather than reading it out of a book. If you don't want to take the leap and buy Maya then you should definitely check out a free choice called Blender. It works reasonably the same and will most definitely put you in a better place any would be if you hadn't learned anything at all.

Game Writing

All good games have a good story behind them and the video game designer is often tasked with writing it (especially in smaller studios). So practicing your writing skills will give you a big advantage when it comes to starting to learn to become a designer. You can start by writing short fiction stories about 1 to 2 pages in length. Make sure to always build up to a "conflict" and then resolve it. Having a conflict or climax in your stories creates anticipation and makes the reader, or in the case of video games that player, want to continue so that they can find out what happens in the end.

Gradually you can start to write more lengthy stories and focus on developing the particular characters personalities and histories. Having deep and established characters is a way to get the player more connected in the game world itself. Eventually you'll should start writing your stories in the form of a script because any game the scenery and world itself is provided by the graphics so you don't need to worry about describing them in the story.

Game Programing

In major budget studios commonly it's the job of the developer to code the game but it is usually useful for the designer to know a bit of code themselves. This helps them to know exactly what is and isn't feasible for a game. For example the game designer might want to design a game that demands 4 player cooperative gameplay which may not be possible on the device that they are designing for. In smaller studios however, the designer may perhaps also have to take on the job of the developer as well so having some programming under your belt could come in really handy.

One of the much easier ways to start to learn the basics principles of game programming is to develop flash games (and it will also test your design skills). ActionScript, the language of flash programming, is straightforward to learn and you will quickly have your first game up and running. Another cool game design computer software is Game Maker. This has drag-and-drop code snippets to help you create games a lot faster whilst also teaching you the basics of how games are developed.




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