Game Design
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Framed Ink: Drawing and Composition for Visual Storytellers (9781933492957): Marcos Mateu-Mestre, Jeffrey Katzenberg: Books
Just so we're all clear, I am a 20+ year vet working as a designer in the film industry. The author, Marcos Mateu and I are colleagues, and we work together at DreamWorks Animation. Does that mean I'm biased? Absolutely!
Art and Design in Photoshop: How to simulate just about anything from great works of art to urban graffiti (9780240811093): Steve Caplin: Books
In this unique book, acclaimed master of photomontage and visual trickery Steve Caplin shows you how to stretch your creative boundaries. Taking the same tried-and-tested practical approach as his best selling How to Cheat in Photoshop titles, Steve's step-by-step instructions recreate a dazzling and diverse array of fabulous design effects. You'll learn how to design everything from wine labels to sushi cartons, from certificates to iPod advertising, from textbooks to pulp fiction. Written by a working pro, the clear guidelines pinpoint exactly what you need to know: how to get slick-looking results with minimum fuss, with a 16-page Photoshop Reference chapter that provides an at-a-glance guide to Photoshop tools and techniques for less experienced users. Steve explains both typography and the design process in a clear, informative and entertaining way. All the images, textures and fonts used in the book are supplied on the accompanying CD-ROM.
Product Description Just when you think you've learned all that you could ever know about working in Photoshop, digital artist and photomontage king Steve Caplin comes along with yet another masterful method for creating incredible works of art in Photoshop. This time, he'll show you how to create complete images, from start to finish, entirely within the software program. No source material, photographs, or existing files from other software packages are needed, saving you valuable time and resources. The techniques you'll learn in this ground-breaking new book will help you combine your artistic vision and skills with an understanding of how to manipulate the built-in Photoshop filters to produce impressive, eye-catching artwork.
100% Photoshop: Create stunning artwork without using any photographs (9780240814254): Steve Caplin: Books
Directing the Story: Professional Storytelling and Storyboarding Techniques for Live Action and Animation (9780240810768): Francis Glebas: Books
The goal of this book is to help you get your audience "lost in the story" of your movie. It details a lot of professional directing techniques and principles to help aid storytelling. The writing is clear and Francis Glebas even storyboarded a whole short story to serve as an example, in addition to the many examples already provided. Using storyboards as a primary tool, he goes through the various storytelling techniques used in films , like ways to pace/cut scenes, introducing themes and story structure subtly, directing the audience's eyes, creating characters people can related to, etc.
The Complete Guide to Game Audio, Second Edition: For Composers, Musicians, Sound Designers, Game Developers (Gama Network Series) (9780240810744): Aaron Marks: Books
"Aaron's book is recommended reading in my USC and UCLA Composing Music for Video Games courses. It is a well-rounded presentation of what we video game composers do every day. Anyone wanting to know more about this great industry should start here!” "Aaron Marks the spot.This book does a great job at covering the important areas of game art production, like what is to be expected from a game artist and what a game artist should expect to encounter while working in the game industry, but the author doesn't elaborate enough on the problems that are associated with modeling and texturing for games, i.e. the technical aspect. He over emphasizes what game art should look like, but does not dwell on how to achieve the best, most efficient results on modeling and texturing objects that may be difficult to work well in real-time game environment. There is not enough "meat on the bones", sort of speak. The author covers a wide range of topics briefly, highlighting pros and cons and then quickly moving on. Personally, I was left with many unanswered questions, chapter after chapter. The examples throughout the book were oversimplified; using pine trees, wooden crates, and basic shapes (triangles, squares, and circles) to get some of the points across.
Creating the Art of the Game (0752064714095): Matthew Omernick: Books
Game Development Essentials (9781111307653): Jeannie Novak: Books
The third edition of Game Development Essentials: An Introduction is packed with critical information for those seeking a career in the game industry. As in previous editions, the book opens with great coverage of the history of the game industry, a standard foundation for game development students. Additional chapters break down more specific elements of game development, such as genres and storytelling, introducing critical terminology and covering core topics. I really love the writing style of the book. It's very approachable and easy to comprehend, even if a student has absolutely no background in games.
A Theory of Fun for Game Design (9781932111972): Raph Koster: Books
Raph Koster's _A Theory of Fun for Game Design_ is certainly a book worthy of a place on any game designer's shelf. For those who attended the original lecture that spawned the book, there isn't a whole lot that is new, but it's great to have it in book form. For those who did not, the book can be quite revealing, particularly for those who have struggled to adequately define just what games and game design is all about. Perhaps more importantly, though, is that Raph has written a light, frequently humorous, and sometimes touching book that should make a great gift to those of us who have parents or spouses who DON'T understand why we're wasting all of our time with games. Rather than try to explain it to them, you can simply hand them this book, and they can come to appreciate the scope and depth of the subject without being overwhelmed. And at times the book is quite poignant on a human level.
Jesse Schell, game design professor at Carnegie Mellon University, wrote an introductory book that was published in August, titled "The Art of Game Design: A Book of Lenses." The back overleaf quotes Will Wright saying, "Easily the most comprehensive, practical book I've ever seen on game design." I will try to briefly state why I agree and offer details to help you decide if this book is for you.
The Art of Game Design: A book of lenses (9780123694966): Jesse Schell: Books
I really enjoyed this book, and I think it's definitely worth considering if you're interested in how stories can be told in video games. I've bought plenty of books about video game design and storytelling. (I'm a programmer who's been making video games professionally for about 10 years -- I wish more people would include their personalbackground in their book reviews...) Some books on game design are written by people who obviously have more "static media" backgrounds like books or movies, and don't understand the fundamental problem of making a story in a situation where the audience has freedom to do what they want.
Character Development and Storytelling for Games (Game Development Series) (9781592003532): Lee Sheldon: Books
Rules of Play: Game Design Fundamentals (9780262240451): Katie Salen, Eric Zimmerman: Books
There are very few books about the theory of game design. Most of the books which purport to be about game design theory have titles like _Game Design: Theory and Practice_ [Richard Rouse III: 2001], and focus much more on the latter than the former, usually in the context of commercial computer games. The exceptions to this rule generally approach the subject of game design theory from a particular perspective, e.g., as a communication method or "future's language."Game Coding Complete, Third Edition (9781584506805): Mike McShaffry: Books
As someone who just has about 3 years of programming experience and is finishing up high school this year, I found this book to very helpful. I got Tricks of the Win Game Programming Gurus one year for Christmas, and although the later chapters such as AI, multithreading, and physics modelling were pretty good primers, all the DirectX material were essentially rehashes of the SDK docs. Just about every other game programming book that focused on DirectX had the same kind of characteristic...most of the DX material could just as easily be found in the SDK docs. But when I came across Game Coding Complete, I saw it had a lot of good, practical information; I couldn't put it down.When I read The Ultimate Guide to Videogame Writing and Design I was expecting quite a lot from a title like that. As a well read veteran game designer with over 34 million units sold to date, as well as game design professor at USC, I thought I had seen every element and angle in game development. Not only that, at USC we have developed a pretty robust curriculum on how to build great narrative into a solid game.
The Ultimate Guide to Video Game Writing and Design (9781580650663): Flint Dille, John Zuur Platten: Books
Game Engine Architecture (9781568814131): Jason Gregory, Jeff Lander, Matt Whiting: Books
Jason Gregory's book offers a 10,000-foot view of game engine architecture, covering every system found in modern game engines, and detailing how those systems interact. It details the subjects at a level easily understood by anyone with a modest level of programming experience -- even non-programmers can gain a solid understanding of engine design from the book. This would make a great first book for anyone interested in programming game engines, either as a hobby or a future career. However, it is important to clarify the limits of the book.Beauty is in the eye of the beholder, so let me tell you what I was looking for: a non-academic AI book with practical examples for implementing genetic algorithms and neural nets. I don't have a math degree (though I understand basic algebra and remember a bit of trig), and I learn best by doing hand's on project, not by theorizing. This book fits the bill perfectly. It is well written, humorous, clear and patient. The examples are interesting enough that you can see how they would be useful for solving other problems, not necessarily game related.