Written by veterans who are currently working in the game industry, Fundamentals of Game Development is unique because it provides the practical aspects of the processes involved in developing and completing game projects. Using examples and exercises, this book provides a hands-on approach that walks the reader through the entire process of developing a game from concept to completion. Ideal for introductory game development and game production courses the book covers history, game genre, design, story-telling, character creation, pre-production, code release, career descriptions, and more.
A common conversation in the game producing industry runs something like this:
'I've got this great new game, more than just a game it's a whole new concept that's going to revolutionize the industry.'
'Oh, I'm interested, tell me about it.'
'I can't do that, you might steal my idea.'
'Well then, at least tell me what language is it written in, what does it run on?'
'Oh, it's not written yet.'
What else can you say? The conversation is over.
There are a lot of good ideas. In fact, as this book says on one of the first pages, 'the idea is the easy part; it's turning the idea into an actual playable game that's the hard part.' This book is about the hard part, primarily that is the design of the game with a bit on production and marketing. It's an excellent introduction to how the industry really works, and yes, it is an industry with players like Microsoft, Sony, Nintendo huge companies with billions of dollars in annual revenue, thousands of employees.
This is not to say that there isn't room for new talent to come into the industry. There's always a need for good people and this book will help you if this is where you want to be.