Original author: Geoff Howland game industry is probably one of the few charming work today in the world can be found. Under the cover of high-tech appearance, she allows you to fully enjoy the fun of creation and play games. Recently, some successful legendary stories took her more. ID Software has become a beautiful dream that must be a game developer who wants to become a game developer. Are you also a member of this guy? Ok, let's talk about how to enter this charming industry, or how you do a game. These both have some subtle differences, but in order not to combat your precious enthusiasm, this paper is prepared to avoid such annoying topics. I don't have to start, "I started there?" This is a sentence that every guy is asked at the beginning. The ancients: "Think Thinking", before you act, set a plan first, this is undoubtedly a wise move. Otherwise, you will only become a soul lost in the desert, and you will never find the oasis you eager. If there is no clear, reasonable, feasible plan, you will not be possible to get the results you want, the only result is that you can't do it. A comic illustration is the author I, three years ago, I step by step, the most important reason is that no one wrote this article to give me. If you come back, you have to make a new person to make a clear, reasonable, feasible plan, and send a baby to compete for the Olympic gold medal. The recommendation for this is to start with a small plan. Selected Goals "I want to find a job in the computer gaming industry." The standard answer to this goal usually comes down to "Be a game Demo." Does this do this exactly what? It represents you will write some programs, or do an animation, no longer a bunch of music and sound. But this is not just doing, these things must be suitable for video games, and it is best to have a part of video games with commercial plus professional standards. For programmers, this will result in a complex engine with 2D or 3D appearance, a lot of essential game auxiliary development tools, what is the map editor. The closer to the actual game product, the more likely, it is possible to give a more deep impression of potential employers or investors. For example, you have made a platform-style jumping game, there are various levels, scores, life, treasures, etc., you actually prove that you do understand the basic work of the video game, you also prove it. You have a positive initiative to complete a production project for potential employers or investors, and finally prove that you have perseverance to success. The more well your game products, the more you can find a job. Do not believe? Take you with your own position of your employer or investor, you have a hundred and thousands of job studios, you want to seek a difference in your company. If you are not a charity, you will choose Who ? Can the guy who can help you make the best product? Isn't you most want to hire a squeeze? Further play your imagination, maybe your game product is so good, so that Bill children will take your corner, beg you to bring him to conquer the treasures in the world of kindergarten? "I just want to seek fun from making computer games." You will be able to stop you from doing yourself, no one will stop you. You are like living in vacuo, you can do not need smart external assistance. You can join some groups to develop shared software, you can also do it yourself. Before joining a group, you must know a fact, that is, in this group, especially in the long-distance group work, it will encounter more difficulties. This fact can be described by formula: new problem = problem itself people and people's problems. "I need to find a publishing publisher so I can use game sales revenue to protect yourself all.
"It's very good, but unfortunately, the records started from a long time have shown that others think so. Your only way out is to let your hands are better than anyone else, and look You can make a lot of money. It can be inferred that a demo program that can actually operate is to help you attract publishers. This is only a demo animation. Now the exempt from the publishing publishers is The exponent grows, and it is easy to make their golden years in their golden years. So what is the degree of the Demo to consider? Human experience, at least there is at least a level, or a region where you can actually play, this matter, you do more, you will get more about the goal of you. You should also The artistic style of the game has a complete concept. If you can't complete this style in the actual demo, it is best to want to use a detailed description document to explain it so that the publishing publisher can understand your intentions. Your game Demo does not have a music sound? This is not a fatal injury. In the eyes of publishing the publisher, these things will be done in the later stage of the game production, they will organize a group of professional hands to do This kind of thing. Tell you this purpose is to reduce your excessive worry about you. But you have to understand, this is not the best solution that makes your game better, so that you usually have grass. You can count on other people who don't know more enthusiasm for your game. The amount of them will only be put on the power for your remuneration. When you do your Demo, you must Remember to show two points. If your game wants to win with technical difficulty, you will try to show all kinds of techniques you demonstrate in Demo, which will prove that you can complete this game, not your high hands. It is necessary to remember the second point. It is necessary to find a feeling in Demo. Of course, it is best to be the kind of you hope. A fun game will definitely feel better than another. The game is much better, at least will play more of the things that attract publishing issuers. Finally, you must also take into account a more brutal reality, that is, the actual situation of domestic publishing pubes will be bad than above. It is necessary to deal with these guys without anything. The only thing they are interested is how much you can earn from you and your game, that is, they can only help you when making games. Go to the investment before your game is still not completed, there is a good way to funerate your game and your enthusiasm. This may be a minor reason to be disappointed. "I have to be more than ID." Mighty! "(Or" I want more than xxx! ") Seeing ghosts, everyone thinks so. Countless groups and individuals put into the energetic exceeding your imagination. However, until now, this game developer The holy cup is still floating in the horizon. You have to understand that Rome is not built a day, the career of the ID is not starting from the Quake & Quake II, nor from doom, even Wolfenstein 3D is not. They do it at first It's some small things, a lot of 2D games. You can put your first game item as a great magnificent, and I will find that the actual needs of the actual needs will be found in the actual needs. I have done it for a thousand years. I have to estimate that I have not so long life, maybe you can do? Therefore, for a novice, the best start or throws these unrealistic ideas, starting from some simple games or game Demo And try to express them.
Next, let's talk about how to do it. If you try to make a game but I don't know where to start, then I can make the best suggestion for you is to learn, and learn a lot of pile. thing. Before you learn, you will throw your own game about all the fans of your own game, and then take it into the field you want to be involved. An annoying reality is the game industry. You must learn C , preferably Microsoft Visual C . Fortunately, if you only want to play a game for yourself, how do you do it, you don't have any effects in Visual Basic, Delphi. Once you want someone to spend money, please write the game, then it is best to follow this. Programming ability is the basic point of creating video games. The game industry leads to the consequences of radiopage development. If you are not in this area, you better displace yourself to make a game, so as not to be in the future. what? Do you not understand the programming or want to give up? Ok, let's take a look, what can you do. By the way, as mentioned above, you can learn C first, learn from learning, you should be able to understand the game routines you interested in. However, don't expect to learn from the short few months, you can master your programming, although some fraud written books are enough for a week. Or as an example, although it has spent more than a decade in the game programming, although the growing body seems to be implied with some evolution, it still has a very far from the end, it seems to have unlimited long. The road is going. "What platform should I choose?" Of course it should be Windows 95/98 because it has at least 80% of the share of personal computers, and most of them will become more in the future. Is the user gathered to gather a banknote? "How to learn to program?" Although there are many university colleges in China, you can't find the game profession. Therefore, you only have to buy two suitable books. The following topics should be considered when you purchase books. * C * Windows API's * DirectX * Game Programming * Math About C books, it is best to focus on standard C , so as not to disperse your learning attention. Regardless of the future platform, these foundations will be useful. At the same time, proficient in C will be great to your future debugging procedures. As for the book of Window's API (Application Programming Interface), don't go see those talks about MFC (Microsoft Foundation Classes), you don't talk about MFC, you should go. The reason is very simple, we don't have to use MFC at all. Its class is big and slow, it is simply intended to work with our game needs. DirectX is a special API under Windows 95 for processing access to graphics, sound, network, and 3D acceleration hardware. For details, please refer to the "Microsoft DirectX 6.0" Legend of Microsoft Directx 6.0. " Microsoft offers some source examples for DirectX, follow Microsoft's practice, they are hard to read. The book involving this topic is best to tell you about every line of code of each example source, how do you use them in your own production.
If a book is found from the head to the end, it is speaking for a particular project service for this book. For example, it is designed for DirectX, you don't buy it! This book will only make the problem, the more complex, they do not explain the content you really should understand. A good book about Game Programming should teach you a variety of basic elements, to guide you how to write a computer game, which will take you into the simplest and most direct elements involved in making video games. For beginners, see those books involving many different types of games may have greater harvests than only to talk more about a particular type of game. Math is definitely something essential to make video games, no mathematics cannot be applied to video games. For beginners, we should remember the basic algebra, familiar with triangular operations and geometry, etc., 3D graphics involved complicated, don't touch it at the beginning. Your best plan is not to take 3D games as your starting point, it is far beyond your ability. Step by step, so you must do it, step by flying over the Grand Canyon, you can't do it, please remember, you, I am just ordinary people, not the superman in the cart. If you still don't understand this, you can think about a fact: 3D games will take millions of dollars to budget. "Should I still do it alone or partner?" This is actually a full look at your personal preference. Can you get along with others? Are you willing to take responsibility with others? Can you organize other people? Or you want some people to lead you? I personally think that when you start, you are still more appropriate. At least you need to be a programmer with enough capabilities, and do some small games personally. What picture is needed, you can draw it yourself, even if you have a bad thing, this process is just to give you a valuable experience. When you start with a higher standards and requirements, you will bring you great help when you start with higher standards and requirements. Another way is to use some ready-made resources. For example, in the internet to search for some shared picture libraries, you can save you a lot of time, you have to see, these things are bad, maybe more than your programmer Level of university is strong. Some people steal resources from the ready-made games, if you want to make a work, please carefully consider the adverse consequences of this move. When you decide, please use a specialized generner, try not to go too much from you, so you will not work together. Don't believe you can try it, so you will find that you can't get what you need on time. If you consider the establishment of a production group, the most important thing is to carefully choose your team member. Manager is a time-consuming work, even if many people have done, how do you really do it? Once the project is allocated, a guy's delay will delay your project progress. "What should I create?" Naturally, you will think of it, which type of game should you do? " Flight simulation, driving racing, shooting shooting ...? It is naturally that you need to consider it. You can actually complete and attract your own type. Only in this way, when you encounter difficulties, there will be passion to overcome it and finally complete your game. It's easy to imagine, if you let you do your kind of game that you are not interested, will you have enough motivation to complete it? Many people first think of is the role playing game. However, according to the actual situation, it is very unwise to play the role playing game as your first game. Just mentioned a sentence, I have this unblocked past, leading four people to be busy for a year and a half.
The most appropriate idea is that your first game is so simple, so that you must not fail. Many people are starting from making bricks, pile of squares, eating peas. If you have this idea, you should stick to it until this game is completely realized. Remember, before this game is not completed, don't worry, don't start doing other so-called bigger, better games. Game design is largely that you can stick to the end, in this process, about one in every fifty game is completed, do you want to be a member of the forty-nine? ? "How to achieve my game?" First give your game to a good plan, describe the content of each screen from the end to the end, and how the player interacts with the computer. One reason that needs to be described in detail is that if you don't know what you want exactly, in this case, you will hesitate, change your idea from time to time, and continue to join some of your procedure can't coordinate. Things ... How do you guarantee that you can do it? Don't say it is done on time! In this way, we really need a design document to finally talk about this topic. In fact, the developers of each game will have a very detailed design document, about this, some people say: "A design document should be exhausted to any two Different development teams will write a same game according to its guidelines. "Once you consider people who make the thousands of explanations made by the same thing, you can experience the huge significance of design documents. So what is the design document? A design document usually divides many entries. As the saying goes: "Wonderful is better than see", you will understand that you will understand. I. General description 1. Background story 2. Game introduction 3. Table of the game 5. Definition and description 6. Game introduction process 7. Game selection process 8. Game start screen 9. Game process 10 . Games 11. Game milestones 12. End game 13. Exit Game II. Screen Description and User Interface Specification 1. Game Introduction Process or Game Opening Animation 2. Game Select Screen 3. Options Before the Game Start Screen 4. Game Screen 5. Screen Flowchart 6. Control III. Art Specification 1. Color and Resolution Mode 2. Mask Color 3. File Type and Naming Rules 4. Background Art List 5. Foreground Art Listing List 6. Character art list list IV. Music sound specification 1. Sound effect list list 2. Dublinary list list 3. Music list list and its description V. Instance specification (specific implementation) 1. Project implementation process and staff arrangement 2. Finance Milestone 3. The required function and process 4. Information required for roles 5. How to draw 6 on the screen 6. The number of frames required for each second. The resource library required for game development 8. Flowchart VI for the entire game from head to tail. Artificial Intelligence Specification 1. Knowledge needed to know 2. The actual behavior of the role is different from the real behavior in the real world. 3. Fair considering VII. Legal materials 1. Copyright Notice 2. Secure agreement You have seen it, just one Simple outline is so long. Once the title is given, this document will become very large. A large and medium-sized projects will have at least one hundred or more documents. So how much is the design documentation? Don't worry, for balance, you will always stop one day. Excessive writing is actually not a good thing, you will consume enthusiasm in depression, and finally eliminate the project. Although the documentation is so expensive, this effort is definitely worth it.
Your thoughts will be fixed during the documentation, you will force yourself, "How do I do this?" When you do a game, you can master this is absolutely necessary, it will give you a correct direction. In any case, you should at least take a few days to write some documents. Use this time, you can complete a preliminary framework. From this start, with the progress of the game, you will continue to find something that something you can't be implemented. At this time, you should go back and modify the document. Follow this process, you will not deviate from your ultimate goal. Some people may ask me to just want to make a small game, then I still need to write a design document? The answer to this question is definitely "want". In addition to laying the foundation for you in the future, there are two main reasons: First, in this case, design documents will also guide you to program; second, because it is a small game, then design documents are not too long. What else is there? Stick to write! Next, it is important to consider everyone who cares about it: What should I do when I can't solve the difficulties in the production process? Who will encounter, even a very experienced game developer It will also encounter obstacles that he feels over. Fortunately, this is a network era, you will find your urgently needed help on the Internet. However, due to too few Chinese information, this should come with a condition, that is, your English ability value is not lower than those who speak English. As far as I know, there are many related guidelines for game development, and search engines can be easily discovered. If you don't know the keywords used to search, you can try "Games Programming", and the remaining work is to browse the search results one by one. I used this method to find a lot of good things. If this is not enough, you can go to the news group test. However, before you first post, you should pay attention to observation for a few days, see how people here are doing, so as long as they go, they will laugh and dissent. With a long history of Rec.Games.Programmer news groups were divided into Comp.Games.Development. * A series of newsgroups, which is definitely where you often go. If you can't get this news group, Microsoft's msnews.microsoft.com is also a worthwhile. As for those news groups in China, what is the forum, don't do it, they can't help you. Be sure to choose the appropriate group posts when using the news group, do not take the problem of DirectX or ask for a design group or an art group. After making a post, even if no one immediately answers, we must wait for two days to post another two days. So, day, year, year, one year, finally one day game! What should I do now? This is what you should think about how to publish your masterpiece! The purpose of do you do this game will not just take yourself to steal? Let's take a look at those ways to help you complete this. I am sure that some people think about it, try to sell their game software, but I really can't think of such a better thing. Remember the published publisher mentioned earlier? You can have courageous to find them (animals that are reward), they will help you put the game with the store's shelves. But let this group of guys so the only reason is that your game product is good enough, at least better than most of the games already placed on the shelf. There is also a way to distribute your game software through regular software sales channels. But you have to carefully consider the ability of the channel to promote game software to avoid pearl. Although there are already these ways, some people like to use shared ways to issue their own game software.
