The Arcade Games of the Future

Course Description

Build exciting real time video games by going back to the future of fun! Games don't need to be complicated to be fun to play, and back when computers had less resources to work with game designers had to lean hard into that truth by creating games that focused on just one thing: good game play. Learn from the old masters of game design as we use basic techniques to create replicas of the old classics, using the modern game engine Godot to build games in the style of space invaders, breakout, and classic side scrolling platformers. But we won't stop there: unlike the original creators of those games, we aren't limited to the capabilities of the earliest computers, so we can start adding our own unique twists and visual wow factor to the games once the basics are working. You will need a computer that can run Godot to take part in the course, but don't worry - you don't need a super powerful gaming computer to run it. You don't need previous experience of coding to take part, but we will be writing actual code for a full game engine, so you will need to be comfortable doing some typing. It would also be helpful to have a good understanding of how 2D coordinates work (i. e. using x, y pairs to position things). If you have taken my 2D art assets course or otherwise know how to make sprites, there will also be the opportunity to customise the look of your own versions of each game- but starter art will be provided to let us get going quickly. How many games can you make in a five day course? Why not join us for a week and find out. The Arcade Games of the Future will run 3rd-7th August at 16:00 UK time, and each session will last for one hour. You'll get the most out of the course if you carry on pushing the games forward in between sessions and come to the next session with any questions or stumbling blocks you hit, but there's no 'homework' as such.