How to make games to

How to Make Your Own Game

When you get stuck in a video game, you might head to GameFAQs to find a walkthrough to help you get through it. When you get stuck making your first video game, what can you do? That’s where this article comes in: think of this as a walkthrough for developing your first game.

My First Game

Before we get to the video game development walkthrough, I want to tell you about my first game. It was a simple text based adventure inspired by a MUD called Divine Blood:

I first programmed it as just a simple room using the TI-83+ Calculator, and later made into a full-fledged town using Java in my last year of high school. I never finished that game (it didn’t go beyond the first town) and I don’t even think I have the code any more.

Unfortunately, my experience isn’t uncommon for game developers. Many developers start a game but never finish it. So how can you increase your chances of finishing your first game? Enter this video game development walkthrough.

The Four Levels of Game Development

If developing a game is a game in itself, then it consists of four levels: Plan, Prototype, Develop, and Release.

Just like in a video game, each level is more difficult than the last. Each level also has its own encounters (the problems and difficulties you are likely to come up against) and its own end level boss (which signifies when you are ready to move on to the next level).

This walkthrough will guide you through the process of successfully creating your first game. It will incorporate resources and quotes from other game professionals, as well as insights about how implementing the walkthrough for my own first game would have helped me to finish it.

Level 1: Plan

Remember, the first 90% of your game takes 90% of the time; the last 10% takes the remaining 90% of the time. Plan accordingly.
— Ian Schreiber

The first level, and arguably the most important level, is planning — planning out every aspect of the game before you even begin coding. The goal of this level is to consider everything about your game up front so that you don’t have to improvise later.

When you first start making your game, the best thing to do is write down all the details. Think about everything you want in your game, and then write it down. Usually this is pretty easy at first, as your mind races with lots of neat ideas that you will want to incorporate into your game. However, as time goes by, this level becomes increasingly harder to complete.

As you jot down your ideas, also jot down the details of these ideas: how they will work, how they will affect the player experience, and how they will affect the gameplay. You don’t want to leave any big holes in your design that will cause you to struggle later. It becomes more difficult to finish a game as the problems you encounter increases. Thus, the secret to finishing a game is to deal with problems in small amounts and without letting them pile up all at once.

Take a look at these tutorials for more advice on planning a gamedev project:

Game development is about the trade-offs — great games don’t have to do everything, they just have to a limited number of things well.
— Patrick Wyatt

Because of this, it is extremely important that you do not skip this level and head straight into development (Level 3). If you did, you would encounter hard problems that would cause you to quickly become demotivated and stop. If you’ve played the Halo series, just think about how hard the game would have been if you encountered a Hunter pair during the first level of your first playthrough. You would have been hard pressed to continue playing if you kept dying over and over again to these massive obstacles.

This is why the main encounter for this level is a desire to stop planning and begin coding. Again, it is important that you plan out as much as you can before you begin coding. For you to have the greatest chance of finishing your first game, you must resist this urge and stick to Level 1.

The boss fight for this level is questions. If you review all your notes and you can’t think of any more questions, then you are ready to move on to the next level. If, however, you read over your notes and you still have a couple of questions about how things will work, you should probably work those out before moving on.

There are times when you can’t answer a question because it deals more with balancing issues rather than functional issues. In this case you are also probably ready to move on to the next level.

If I had planned out my text based adventure game properly, I would have mapped out the entire game, decided what all the items the player could purchase would be and where they could purchase them from, designed all the monsters and dungeons, and even figured out which loot would be dropped where and when. That’s a lot of detail that should be planned out before coding! For this reason, I don’t recommend making a text adventure game as your first game. Start small.

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Level 2: Prototype

Design is a process, not an outcome.
— Christopher Simmons

The second level of game development is prototyping. In this level, you test out the core mechanics and features of the game to work out any balancing issues. You want to flesh out your ideas quickly by using low fidelity prototyping so that you can know before you start coding what will and will not work.

If a game is fun to play at this level, you know it will be fun to play when it is finished. Remember that you will be playing this game a lot as you code it, so you’d better make sure it’s fun!

No matter what your score is, you’ll enjoy it, and want to play it again.
— Stan Jarocki

Think of it like level skipping using the secret warp pipes in Super Mario Bros. The first time you play the game, you’re probably going to play each level in order. It isn’t until the second or third playthroughs that you use the warp pipes to finish the game faster. The same thing applies with Levels 1 and 2, except that going back and forth between planning and prototyping helps you flesh out your ideas faster.

From Super Mario Wiki.

Levels 1 and 2 are interchangeable, as long as you don’t progress to Level 3 before you are ready. Maybe you want to test out your core mechanic before you spend more time on details. Perhaps you want to test out a new feature of your game to ensure that it will work as intended. These are all good reasons to want to prototype while you plan; just ensure that each prototype only focuses on one thing at a time, and that each time you prototype the gameplay it’s still fun.

Great gameplay is a stream of interesting decisions the player must resolve.
— Bruce Shelley

There are two encounters that you will most likely face in this level. The first is again the desire to just skip to the next level and start coding. The second encounter will be a desire to create higher fidelity prototypes. As good as high fidelity prototypes are, they are a dangerous path as they will increase your desire to start coding when you are not ready. To fight this battle, stick to quick rapid throwaway prototypes.

You can build prototypes without any code at all if you use a beginner-friendly gamedev tool like GameSalad or Construct 2. Here are a few tutorials to help you get started with those:

How To Make A Video Game From Scratch: Learn How

Ever wanted to learn how to make a video game? You can! Follow this guide on how to make a video game from scratch & learn to make your own game.

Last Updated: January 31, 2022

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Learning how to make a video game from scratch can be a very fun and rewarding process. With the rise of mobile gaming, people throughout the world are taking advantage of the huge video game market by creating and selling their games. Naturally, the number of people who are learning game development has also increased.

Different video games for different platforms and operating systems are created slightly differently, but they are all based on the same general concepts.

You will need to learn how to code in at least one language before you can make your own game, especially if you want to be able to customize the way it looks and works. Programming is the basis of video game development, and learning how to make a game from scratch involves learning how to code.

In this guide, I will introduce you to the main principles of video game development. I’ll show you the general steps that you need to follow when you’re finding out how to make your own game, and I’ll introduce you to the different programming languages that are used to build games on different platforms.

Finally, I’ll give you a brief insight into a few of the other things that you will need to learn if you’re serious about learning how to make a video game from scratch, instead of simply by following a template.

Table of Contents

Game Development vs Game Design

Before jumping into the main steps that you will need to follow to make your first game from scratch, it’s important to consider the difference between video game development and game design. Note that you will need both if you want to learn how to make a game on your own.

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To put it simply, video game design refers to the actual artistic design of a video game. Game designers spend their time conceptualizing new aspects of their games.

They work out what a game needs to include, how the game should react under certain conditions, and exactly what needs to be created to make the game as good as it can be.

In the rest of this guide, I will focus on the development side of learning how to code a video game, but it’s important for you to understand that you will have to design your game before you can program it.

Note that it’s entirely possible for the game designer and the game developer to be the same person. The design and the development process can be completed side by side if you’re building simple games.

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How to Make a Video Game: 5 Steps

At first, learning how to make your own game can appear very difficult. You might be tempted to back off and leave game development to the experts. However, I wouldn’t recommend doing this! Instead, you should put in a bit of work to learn the basics of video game creation. It isn’t as hard as you might think.

With this in mind, here’s a very general step by step guide to help you learn how to make a video game. Note that the exact process varies according to the type of game you’re building and the platform you want to release it on, but this will give you an idea of what’s involved.

Step 1: Do Some Research & Conceptualize Your Game

The first thing that you need to do when you’re trying to create your first game is to think about exactly what sort of game you’re planning on creating. Do some research and find out exactly what skills you need to build this game, and what sort of features it should have.

If you’re serious about learning how to make a video game, then you should take a couple of introductory courses before you move any further. For example, if you’re interested in building a 2D role-playing game, I would recommend having a look at something like the Learn to Make a 2D Game in Unity course.

Alternatively, if you’re serious about creating an advanced video game, you might need to put some more effort into it. This study program will suit you best, as it offers two different courses to make sure you get a well-rounded education.

Step 2: Work On A Design Document

Once you’ve figured out how to make a video game, conceptualized it, and started to think about what you want it to look like, you need to put together a design document. For most people, a design document is a brief outline of a game, what it should look like, and what you need to do to build it.

When you’re putting together your design document, consider the following things:

Once you’ve put your design document together, it’s almost time to start programming!

Step 3: Decide Whether You Need Software

However, more advanced games can require very powerful and specific software such as 3D modeling programs and image editors. This advanced software can cost a lot, which means that you need to pay careful attention to your budget.

Note that you will also need a computer with a high-quality processor and a lot of RAM to run much of the software required to create complex games.

Step 4: Start Programming

Once you’ve downloaded the required software, it’s time to start coding! Although more complex games require game engines to run on, simple mobile games don’t need anything like this. Simply decide what language you’re going to write your game in and get right into it!

If you want to know how to make a video game with a lot of variabilities, such as an RPG game, then you should look at the Unity Video Game Creation Tutorial. This course contains an incredible 28 hours of video lectures. It will teach you everything you need to know to start using the Unity editor.

Step 5: Test Your Game & Start Marketing!

Knowing how to make a video game will not make it successful, to be so you will need marketing. The first thing that you have to do is make sure that you test everything about it so you can remove any bugs. This can take an extremely long time, so make sure that you’re prepared to sit down for hours at a time testing things.

Marketing is relatively straightforward. I would recommend hiring a marketing consultant to at least get you started, especially if you don’t have any marketing experience yourself. Getting your game out there for people to purchase is slightly more difficult, and you have some options:

These are just a few of your options. Again, speak to an expert if you’re not sure what the best way to sell your game is.

What Languages Can I Use To Make A Video Game?

Simple mobile games can be created using a wide range of programming languages. If you’re proficient in one language, you probably have enough knowledge to learn how to make a video game for mobile devices.

However, more complicated games designed for computers or consoles will require a much deeper understanding of programming languages and how they can be used to develop games. A few of the languages you can use to make your own game include:

JavaScript

Learning how to make a game with JavaScript is quite simple. As noted above, you can create simple mobile apps and games by combining JavaScript, HTML, and CSS with the PhoneGap platform.

Millions of people throughout the world have a working JavaScript knowledge already, which means that they already have the majority of the skills that they need to start building their games.

I would recommend starting with a simple JavaScript course such as this JavaScript tutorial before moving onto something specific for game creation like the PhoneGap, which can also be found on our Courses section.

If your knowledge after completing this course doesn’t suffice, you should continue learning. After completing the course you check out the Intermediate JavaScript course to expand your knowledge even more.

Java is the most popular programming language for creating Android games. When combined with the Android Studio, Java can be used to create games that are fully customized with respects to looks and behavior. Games built on Java are fast, efficient, and very easy to personalize.

If you’re serious about learning how to make a video game for an Android device, the first thing that you need to do is learn how to code in Java. Luckily, Java is quite a simple language to learn. I would recommend starting with the extensive Java course.

Swift

Swift is a relatively new programming language that has been designed for use on the iOS operating system. It was created to make iOS app and game development easier than it used to be, and it has quickly become a favorite among programmers learning how to make a game for the first time.

If you would like to learn how to make a video game for iOS devices, I would recommend learning how to write code with Swift. Sure, it’s possible to create an iOS game or app without any coding knowledge at all but programming your own game gives you a lot more freedom and flexibility when it comes to customization.

If you would like to find out more about Swift and how you can use it to make your iOS apps have a look at the Beginner Friendly Swift Tutorial.

The C languages

However, these are very complex and difficult to learn. I wouldn’t recommend starting with them unless you’re extremely serious about learning how to make a video game and turning this into a career.

If you would like to learn how to build a game with the C languages, I would suggest having a look at the How to Make a Game in Unity course. This course teaches the basics of C# with a special focus on game development.

What Other Skills Do I Need To Learn?

If you’re serious about learning how to code a game, you will need to learn more than just a programming language. You will need to learn how to use various types of software, frameworks, and code libraries to build even the simplest games.

Below are just a few of the most important skills to learn to get you started.

As always, remember that different types of games require different skills and knowledge.

How To Use Different Types Of Software

As I’ve already noted, the software is the key element of how to make a video game. This is especially true if you’re hoping to create a console game.

If you would like to learn more about using Unity to build your first game, have a look at the How To Make A Game In Unity tutorial.

Alternatively, head over to the Unity website and have a look around. Do some research regarding the type of game you want to create, and learn what sort of software you need to be familiar with according to your findings.

How to make games to

2. Collision Shapes and
Object Settings

Although, we’re not going to start building levels until part 3 of the ‘Make Your Own Game’ series, everything that you’ll learn in this video will give you a good basic knowledge of level design. Understanding the components necessary to make a game app flow correctly will ultimately make the process much easier when you’re actually building out levels in your game.

In this course we’ll explain what are collision shapes and how they affect your game’s gameplay. You’ll learn how to use the options available in the collision shape editor to resize, add points, and reset an image.

You’ll learn how to change object properties to get an enemy to behave how you want them to within your game. We’ll also reveal how to make a game more fun by designing it in a way that let’s players experience those exciting ‘close-call moments’ without ever feeling cheated.

3. Build Your First Levels

As discussed in the previous lesson, we’re going to take a closer look at world settings and how they affect your game. In this video we’ll show you how to customize and edit your world settings to make your levels interesting. You’ll learn how to play around with various properties to adjust the gravity, time warp, bounce settings and more within your game.

We’ll also further explain the different character gameplay settings, the art of layering and how to test out your levels in the debug mode.

In this hands-on tutorial, you’ll get to watch and follow along with the instructor as you build the first game level in ‘GLTCH’ together. There’s a bonus time-lapse segment that plays immediately after of 10 more levels being built. Pay attention and watch closely to learn how to effectively build out levels.

4. Making it Unique

Our goal in this course is to help you create a game that could potentially be featured by Apple or reach the top the charts. To accomplish this, you have to make your game unique. There are hundreds of games released on a regular basis across every single platform. This makes originality crucial for not only visibility in the App Store but overall player engagement.

In this fourth video of the ‘Make Your Own Game’ series, you’ll learn how to make a game app that’s truly unique. We’ll go beyond graphics and explore game characters and the way they interact. Watch and learn as we add a new gameplay element to ‘GLTCH’ to set our game apart enough to make it memorable and fun.

You’ll learn how to add a barrier obstacle into your gameplay and a new way to add a fun twist to the element. We’ll also show you how to easily create a ‘taking damage’ animation in Buildbox.

5. Actions Effects and Logic

In this fifth video tutorial, we’ll cover actions, effects and logic pieces in-depth. You’ll learn how to add actions like coins, invincibility, power-up magnets and action animations.

Creating an in-game economy with coins and other actions such as power-ups is an excellent way to give your players goals and reward them. When you make your own game with this in mind your overall gameplay experience and player retention will be much higher. The option to collect coins also empowers users to unlock characters and other special items you decide to include, which can lead up to an in-app purchase generating real money.

We’ll cover how to import coins for players to collect, how to add a coin tracker to your game’s UI, invincibility power-ups and the use of path logic pieces.

You’ll also learn how to add beautiful light effects and particle effects in creative ways to make your game look really professional.

6. Animated Menus and
Game Sounds

No game is complete without music or sound effects. Music and sound are principal elements in gaming. Good background music sets the atmosphere and tone. It can help users connect emotionally with the game as well. Sound effects at crucial moments or during specific actions can inform players and give them direction on the next move to make.

In this lesson we’ll cover how to not only animate the menu sections like the game title or start button but how to load music into your game and trigger specific sound and animation effects. You’ll learn new ways to integrate sound and music throughout your game.

When you’re a game developer it’s important to get your music and sound effects in your game just right. So, included in this lesson is also some bonus material that focuses on how to add defeated sounds and animations properly to your game over menu. The secret to making a good game great is in the details, like sound and effects.

7. Making Multiple Game
Modes

Balance is crucial when you make a game app. You don’t want your game to be too easy but at the same time you don’t want to make it so hard right off the bat, that your players feel cheated. It’s important to find a balance. This can be easily managed when you implement multiple game modes.

In this lesson you’ll learn how to make a game with multiple game modes for your players to choose from. Watch and learn how to make an exciting turbo mode and a hard mode all within Buildbox.

You’ll also learn how to make multi-level menu navigation for ‘GLTCH’ that can be used to navigate players to the new game modes. We’ll show you how to add locked start buttons and share a few tips to make the entire process of adding multiple modes into your game super easy and quick.

8. Coin Shop and Multiple
Characters

Adding coin shops with unlockable characters and items can significantly improve your game’s replay value. Players are more likely to continue playing in order to earn enough coins to purchase or unlock a new cool wacky character that may have caught their eye. It’s also a great way to ease monetization options like in-app purchases into the mix.

In this video, we’re going to show you exactly how to set up and customize a coin shop. We’ll also explore what you can put in your game shop and different ways for players to buy characters.

You’ll learn how to add character purchasing features to your shop, and we’ll explain the various character settings available further as well. The lesson will also teach you how to add unlock buttons to each item or character for advanced monetization later down the line.

There’s also a really effective trick included in this lesson on creating multiple characters via duplication that will make it easy to fill up your shop with unique unlockable characters.

9. Exporting

After you make your own game it’s vital that you take the time to review and prepare it for exporting. In this lesson we’ll further explain the settings options and explore the general tab section.

You’ll learn how to get your game ready for export and all the necessary information you need to fill out to get your app up and running in your chosen platform’s marketplace.

With Buildbox you can easily export your game to any platform including Android, Windows, iOS, Mac, Steam, Apple TV and more. Our game engine also automatically adjusts button and interface positions as needed for different devices so your game will look great on any device family you choose to export it to.

In this brief tutorial you’ll learn how easy it is to fill out the necessary information, choose export target, and let Buildbox automatically export all files in code for compiling in the platform of your choice.

10. Tips Tricks and Hacks

Now that you know how to make a game app without coding, we’re going to backtrack and reveal some of the best tips and hacks to get the most out of our software. We’ll revisit some of our previous lessons and show you a few new tricks to help take your game to that next-level.

In this last video, you’ll learn a clever tip to get your collision shapes precise. We’ll show you how to give your character an exploding death, so it looks like he shatters into tiny little versions of himself.

We’ll explore some of the other notable features in Buildbox like the menu jump and event observer and show you how you can integrate timers within your gameplay. You’ll also learn a secret tip about making secret worlds unrepeatable.

After you’ve completed the tenth and final video in our course series, we encourage you to join our official forum to learn more about how to make your own game using Buildbox.

BONUS: POLISHING YOUR GAME

There’s one more aspect of creating games that we haven’t covered yet in this series. Polishing your game. Virtually every successful game is polished in one way or another. In this special bonus video we’ll teach you exactly what polish is and how to properly add it to your game.

We’ll reveal some of the late stage design decisions we made with GLTCH and provide some core tips that you can use to build your own game. We’ll cover several effective strategies to use when you’re adding the final touches to your app to make it appear more polished. You’ll also learn the steps necessary to make your game publisher ready.

Polishing your game is all about finding that perfect balance between minimal and simple but sleek. Throughout this bonus video from the Make Your Own Game series you’ll learn a faster way to make design decisions. Watch and follow along as we clean up the UI of GLTCH.

We’ll share some essential game design principles like elegance and tips that you can use to make your own game appear more minimal yet sleek. You’ll also learn the most important rule you need to follow in order to make your game publisher ready and much more.

How to Make a Game – A Guide to Making Video Games

How does one make a game?

This question comes with a bunch of other questions as well. What game engine should you use? Where is the best place to publish your game? How much programming do you need to learn before you start making your games? Do you even need to know how to code to make a game? How do you design a game?

In this guide, we will aim to provide a baseline understanding of as many questions as possible, both in terms of how to plan out your video game, what engines you can use, and so forth. While this guide won’t specifically cover creating your first game from scratch, it will lead you in the right direction so that you will be able to do that via the resources provided.

So, if you’re ready to learn how to make a game, let’s dive in.

Table of contents

What is the Cycle of Game Development?

In game development, there is a general cycle that many game projects follow, whether we’re talking about a huge 200 person studio or a solo indie project. We will delve into each section in-depth, but as a brief overview, the cycle is as follows when it comes to making a game:

Thinking of a Game Idea

Everyone has an idea of what their dream video game would be, but not many people can actually make that a reality. If you’re wanting to learn to make video games, it may seem tempting to just jump in and create your game with all the amazing technology that’s available. But I don’t recommend you do that. When creating a game, you need to think about scope. Ask yourself: how long will this take to make? Do I have all the skills required to make this game? Do I have an understanding of the game and how I might make it?

Understanding your game is the most vital part. You may have the story in your head, the setting, or some of the mechanics – but to understand your game, you need to know every aspect. How each of the systems interact, what the player can/can’t do, the goal, etc. This may seem like a lot of stuff to keep track of, but do remember that large games are created by large companies.

As a solo game developer, I’ve found the best way of creating a manageable game with an appropriate scope, is this method:

Let’s take Mario for example. Mario’s core mechanic is jumping. Pretty much every aspect of the game required the player to jump.

This is part of the reason why the Mario games (especially the earlier ones) were so successful. The developers focused on building the game around one core mechanic to make it as fun, polished and versatile as possible. Here’s a list of resources to help you develop a game idea and figure out a core mechanic:

Designing your Game

So you’ve got an idea and need to develop it further. If you’ve got a small game with one or two mechanics then you could probably just keep that in your head, but if it’s any larger or especially if you’re working in a team, you need to document it. A game design document is what you can use in order to layout: the idea of the game, how it works, the goal, the player, interactions, art style, theme, etc. You should be able to give a GDD (game design document) to two people and have them both develop a fairly similar game. If you’re working in a team, then this is necessary to communicate how you want to make your game. Here’s some helpful resources to do with GDDs:

Now in terms of actually designing the game – that’s up to you. Game design is one of those fields where there’s no 100% way to do something. There’s no formula for creating a unique and fun game. This doesn’t mean there’s no good practices or guidelines you should follow. Knowing game design can help you develop a game that’s engaging and easy for the player to understand. Here’s some online resources which can help you in game design:

What Type of Game Do You Want to Create?

When thinking of a game to make, you probably also know what type it’s going to be. Here’s a list of different types of games and platforms you can develop for.

Making the Game – What is a Game Engine?

With an idea in your head and a plan down on paper (hopefully), it’s time to get to the “how” in our question of how to make a game. However, there is a crucial step that will determine the entire process: which engine do you use and which coding language should you learn?

These are all questions you should ask yourself, but there is no one answer. What to learn will depend on the types of games you want to create, your current skills, and whether or not you even want to learn programming.

So what is a game engine? A game engine is a piece of software or a framework that allows you as a developer to create games. It provides a platform to structure your game, build levels, assign logic to objects and build it to your specified platform. There are a large number of game engines out there, with each of them providing different features and specialties.

Below is a list of some popular game engines, the type of games you can create with them, and the skills you’ll need to learn. We have a detailed blog post about the various different game engines of 2020 you can read here as well in case you need a bit more time to decide. You may also want to delve into what the best coding languages are for game development too.

Unity

Unity, is the most popular engine out there on the market right now, with many online learning resources to get you started. Unity prides itself on being very accessible, allowing almost any type of game to be created.

What types of games can I create? Unity is one of the most versatile engines, allowing you to create: 3D, 2D, VR, AR, and multiplayer games on a large number of platforms.

Do I need to learn a programming language? Unity uses the C# language, although there are many visual scripting plugins available to purchase, along with an integrated solution coming soon to the engine.

Links

Tutorials

Unreal Engine

Unreal Engine, is developed by Epic Games and features powerful 3D graphics. Alongside Unity as one of the most popular game engines, Unreal is also used by many AAA game studios.

What types of games can I create? Unreal is primarily a 3D engine although it does support 2D. You can also develop VR, AR and multiplayer games.

Do I need to learn a programming language? Unreal Engine features a powerful integrated visual scripter, which is ideal for beginners. The engine can also be used with C++.

Links

Tutorials

Godot

Godot, is an open-source engine which can be used to create 2D and 3D games. Since the engine is open source, there is constant fixes and features being added, along with customized versions made by developers.

What types of games can I create? Godot can be used to create 2D and 3D games, with many new upcoming features to their 3D engine.

Do I need to learn a programming language? Godot primarily uses their GDScript language (similar to Python), but also has support for visual scripting, C# and C++.

Links

Tutorials

Phaser

Phaser, is an open-source, 2D framework for making HTML5 games. Unlike the previously mentioned engines, Phaser does not have a user interface. Instead, it provides you with a game programming library you can use while programming.

What types of games can I create? With Phaser, you can create 2D games for desktop and mobile.

Do I need to learn a programming language? Phaser uses JavaScript.

Links

Tutorials

Testing Your Game

Testing your game is an important part of development. How do you know if something is going to be obvious to the player? Will they know where to go? What to do? For you it may seem obvious, but for someone who has never seen the game before – things might be very different. This is why it’s important to test your game all throughout development. Here’s some resources for learning more about testing your game:

Finalizing Your Game

Some game developers will say that the first 90% of your game will take 10% of the time, and the last 10% will take 90% of the time. This is a bit of an overstatement, but the idea is still the same. This is where you’re ironing out the bugs, adding in the final art style, polishing everything, and doing some final testing. Here are some resources to help you get through the final step of finishing your game:

Publishing Your Game

With your game now complete, you probably want to show some people. Luckily, we live in a time where putting your game out there is easier than ever before. There are many online platforms to publish to. Some are free and some are paid. Here’s a list of those platforms, the requirements and how you can get started:

Desktop

Mobile

Console

Virtual Reality

Here’s a list of resources which can help you deploy, publish, and market your game:

Conclusion

Game creation is hard work and takes some time. Learning these skills also won’t come to you overnight. Theory is one thing, but understanding what it takes to make a game is another thing entirely (let alone working with programming languages). Even if you are an expert programmer or artist, certain phases and skills in the cycle of game development can’t be skipped over no matter what you do.

But the best way to improve and learn how you make games is by making games.

So, start making games the first day you begin your learning journey, as I can guarantee it will excel your learning tremendously. There’s a lot of technology out there for you to use, so don’t hesitate to try different ones in order to find what serves you best. However, the skills and resources provided here will give you a great stepping stone, and part of making is a game is how you plan to make that game.

Good luck out there, and I wish you the best of luck with your game maker journey!

How to make games : 6 steps to become a game developer

So you wanna know how to make games don’t you? Here you will find all the possible tips to become a game developer. I must tell you that the road to becoming a great game developer is hard and time-consuming. So roll up your sleeves and get ready to develop great games, and hopefully, make some money.

Games are the most difficult digital products to develop. Why is that? Because games are the most expressive form of technology and art combined together. In order to succeed, you must know about everything that gravitates around game development and this is not gonna be easy.

Step one: Decide your field

If you want to know how to make games, you must understand what you have to know to make a successful game:

At the beginning, forget about making games but start learning about what you need to know to make them. Firstly, decide on the field you want to be in, and become an expert in that one. If you’re a team, each member of the team should become an expert in only one field.

I know it’s a lot of work but the trick is very simple: “Divide et impera” as the Romans said. In other words, divide your problems into smaller problems in order to solve the bigger problem, which in our case is: “How to make a game”.

Start small: How to build your game development skills:

Becoming an expert in one of the fields that we’ve listed before is gonna take a ton of time, and most of the time you don’t need to. And in case you become an expert in everything, you can become a “Game Producer”.

My suggestion is to start with what you feel you are more comfortable with. If you’re good with math or solving problems, for example, you can start to study programming and slowly build your programming skills. Same story for the other fields.

Where should I start? Some fields are important but not essential. For example, you can make games without knowing about game design or game marketing, but unless you’re very lucky, your game won’t be good at all and you won’t have any success.

If I want to start to learn to program with Unity and it’s my first time, this is what  would do:

Once you’ve learned all the basics about programming so you can start to build your first small game (max 1 month). Once it’s done you can learn something new and add complexity to your projects. Slowly, you’ll be able to add more skills to your portfolio and build better games. But don’t make the common mistake of building something big without having the skills to do so.

Resources to start to study how to make games:

If you want to learn how to make games, you need to find the best places where to study your favorite topics.

Here is a collection of the best books related to the game development industries.

Other than books, you can also use:

Don’t waste your time: Be productive

In case you want to have a look, we’ve already discussed here В how to be productive in game development. But here are some tips to try so as not to waste your time while you’re learning how to make games.

You can use Trello to build your learning board. Here is an example of one board used to measure your progress and to better organize your improvements.

Avoid the common mistake and don’t give up

The common mistake is to start with a lot of ambitions and ending up with projects bigger than yourself. Never underestimate the difficulty of a project, and as you’ll see, even things that seem small and simple to develop can become very complex.

We can take Rovio entertainment as an example. Before they became famous for the game Angry Birds, they developed 51 unknown games. They didn’t give up until they made it. Like it or not this is the world of game development now.

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