Making a Game: What To Do After You Have an Idea?

I Followed the Advice in the First Installment and Made an Idea Web… What’s Next?

If you haven’t already, please find my previous article on game creation, and make sure you have everything listed down and ready to roll. So, now that you have an idea matrix, and have a reasonable idea of what kind of game you want, with some idea of the technical features it should have, where do you go next? Well a question has to be answered first: Do you have a decent understanding of C++, Javascript, or another standard gaming language?

What I’m trying to ask is:

I Do Indeed Have a Good Understanding of a Language!

Well kudos to you, because when I started developing I had not an ounce of knowledge (other than basic computer engineering experience), so you have a leg up on where I started. However, it is often difficult for experienced or seasoned programmers to port themselves from hard coding service software to creating 2D and 3D games. For the record, although it seems obvious, it is recommended that you begin with 2D games and move on; as the code gets exponentially more difficult when programming in the third dimension. Now there are a couple of routes you can go.

Route 1 for making your own game

If you have coding experience and the first route I would recommend is using a premade game engine such as Unity3D or the Unreal Development Kit (UDK).

The reason I recommend this is because, coding experience or no, you still lack experience in game design, which is a very unique skill that must be honed over time. Using an engine greatly aids the creation of a game, but still allows for (and often requires) some level of scripting in common languages. Additionally, it is fairly easy to create games in either 2D or 3D, as the GUI (graphical user interface) is very user friendly and forgiving.

Route 2!

The second possible route for creating a video game is through hard coding a custom engine; this can get very tricky for those who only have moderate programming experience. Although you will have more customization options is you code your own engine, my opinion is that the game can ultimately suffer because everything has to be created from scratch. Using a premade game engine allows the game developer to be creative, without forgetting key features and mechanics that would otherwise be trivial and overlooked. There are dozens of tutorials floating around YouTube, and online course sites that provide fantastic explanations of the capacity of game engines as well as what tools are available.

Well, I Have Absolutely Zero Coding Experience

If this is the case, then you are in the position I was in when I first started. But fear not game dev hopefuls! Although you have a steeper hill to climb, the goal is far from impossible. However, unlike those with previous programming experience, you only have one route to take if you want to be able to create a game with some level of efficiency. You must use a previously crafted engine such as Unity3D or the UDK. Thankfully these engines, as well as a few others, are largely forgiving for those who have no programming experience. However Unity and UDK will require some scripting; this is where tutorials become your bible.

Now since this is an article, I will not go into how to use these tools, but I will point you in the right direction to learn. Many people turn to Youtube when they get started, and that is precisely what I did when I began. Although there were a great deal of video tutorials, many of them were difficult to follow or did not serve my purposes for actually learning, but instead just held your hand through the process and didn’t explain the ‘why’ aspect. I decided to try one of the Unity courses on a website called Udemy.com and I could not have been happier. The instructor was clear, and I found myself adept with the Unity3D tools quickly. The main drawback was that once my class was over I wanted to learn more of the scripting, and found that there was a scarcity of this information on the website. A lot of scripting can be found on Youtube, but choose carefully as much of the ‘learning’ is not exactly substantial. However, you will have examples to go off of.

So What’s The Skinny On What I Need To Do Before I Read the Next Article?

Said plainly, keep the idea matrix you created in sight to remind you of your goals and keep you on track. Additionally, decide which route you are going to take if you are an experience programmer and then, for both groups, decide which engine you want to use. This is an important process, so what I recommend is looking up the pros and cons of each of the available engines, deciding what you want your game to do, and which engine does it most efficiently. No matter which engine is chosen, it will be a challenge, but sticking with it will be more than worth it in the end, trust me!