Video Game Design/Developers

There has been a lot of talk in the Introductions thread about choosing Game engines and I want to ensure these discussions are easily found in the future. Lets continue these discussions here. 

You have all had excellent points. Please continue the discussions here.

So far discussions and choices have been discussed regarding:

Unity
Unreal
GoDot
Yahaha

If you have any thoughts or additions to this list please feel free to add them here.

There has been a lot of talk in the Introductions thread about choosing Game engines and I want to ensure these discussions are easily found in the future. Lets continue these discussions here. 

You have all had excellent points. Please continue the discussions here.

So far discussions and choices have been discussed regarding:

Unity
Unreal
GoDot
Yahaha

If you have any thoughts or additions to this list please feel free to add them here.

There has been a lot of talk in the Introductions thread about choosing Game engines and I want to ensure these discussions are easily found in the future. Lets continue these discussions here. 

You have all had excellent points. Please continue the discussions here.

So far discussions and choices have been discussed regarding:

Unity
Unreal
GoDot
Yahaha

If you have any thoughts or additions to this list please feel free to add them here.

------------------------------
Melanie Honeycutt k12teacher
Lompoc CA
------------------------------

There has been a lot of talk in the Introductions thread about choosing Game engines and I want to ensure these discussions are easily found in the future. Lets continue these discussions here. 

You have all had excellent points. Please continue the discussions here.

So far discussions and choices have been discussed regarding:

Unity
Unreal
GoDot
Yahaha

If you have any thoughts or additions to this list please feel free to add them here.

------------------------------
Melanie Honeycutt k12teacher
Lompoc CA
------------------------------

I'm going to use something higher level like Unity or possibly UnReal for my upper level high school kids.

If you are looking into something fun for your junior high or freshmen, one fun program is BLOXELS.  I plan on using it with my freshmen next year in an "Foundations of Computing" class to get them introduced to game design.
While there is not really any coding at all, the app (web based or tablet) allows students to design either side scrolling or top down levels based on pre made sprites and game elements.  The students can do a ton of customization and can even make their hero or new monsters pixel by pixel to function in the game.
Attributes of heros and enemies as well as power-ups are also part of the game.
Again, nothing really hard about the program, but can be a lot of fun.  Especially when they share within their class or to the arcade and their classmates play their levels. The only downside is that is costs for licenses, but those licenses can be managed and moved to different classes. 

------------------------------
John Hadenfeldt k12teacher
Cairo NE

Original Message:
Sent: 04-21-2023 11:09
From: Melanie Honeycutt
Subject: Choosing a Game Engine

There has been a lot of talk in the Introductions thread about choosing Game engines and I want to ensure these discussions are easily found in the future. Lets continue these discussions here. 

You have all had excellent points. Please continue the discussions here.

So far discussions and choices have been discussed regarding:

Unity
Unreal
GoDot
Yahaha

If you have any thoughts or additions to this list please feel free to add them here.

------------------------------
Melanie Honeycutt k12teacher
Lompoc CA
------------------------------

I am a pretty big proponent of separating programming from your intro game design class, I feel like it is just too many abstract concepts to throw at teenagers at once. At least if your pathway is explicitly game development and not computer science.

I'm going to use something higher level like Unity or possibly UnReal for my upper level high school kids.

If you are looking into something fun for your junior high or freshmen, one fun program is BLOXELS.  I plan on using it with my freshmen next year in an "Foundations of Computing" class to get them introduced to game design.
While there is not really any coding at all, the app (web based or tablet) allows students to design either side scrolling or top down levels based on pre made sprites and game elements.  The students can do a ton of customization and can even make their hero or new monsters pixel by pixel to function in the game.
Attributes of heros and enemies as well as power-ups are also part of the game.
Again, nothing really hard about the program, but can be a lot of fun.  Especially when they share within their class or to the arcade and their classmates play their levels. The only downside is that is costs for licenses, but those licenses can be managed and moved to different classes. 

------------------------------
John Hadenfeldt k12teacher
Cairo NE

Original Message:
Sent: 04-21-2023 11:09
From: Melanie Honeycutt
Subject: Choosing a Game Engine

There has been a lot of talk in the Introductions thread about choosing Game engines and I want to ensure these discussions are easily found in the future. Lets continue these discussions here. 

You have all had excellent points. Please continue the discussions here.

So far discussions and choices have been discussed regarding:

Unity
Unreal
GoDot
Yahaha

If you have any thoughts or additions to this list please feel free to add them here.

------------------------------
Melanie Honeycutt k12teacher
Lompoc CA
------------------------------

I am a pretty big proponent of separating programming from your intro game design class, I feel like it is just too many abstract concepts to throw at teenagers at once. At least if your pathway is explicitly game development and not computer science.

I'm going to use something higher level like Unity or possibly UnReal for my upper level high school kids.

If you are looking into something fun for your junior high or freshmen, one fun program is BLOXELS.  I plan on using it with my freshmen next year in an "Foundations of Computing" class to get them introduced to game design.
While there is not really any coding at all, the app (web based or tablet) allows students to design either side scrolling or top down levels based on pre made sprites and game elements.  The students can do a ton of customization and can even make their hero or new monsters pixel by pixel to function in the game.
Attributes of heros and enemies as well as power-ups are also part of the game.
Again, nothing really hard about the program, but can be a lot of fun.  Especially when they share within their class or to the arcade and their classmates play their levels. The only downside is that is costs for licenses, but those licenses can be managed and moved to different classes. 

------------------------------
John Hadenfeldt k12teacher
Cairo NE

Original Message:
Sent: 04-21-2023 11:09
From: Melanie Honeycutt
Subject: Choosing a Game Engine

There has been a lot of talk in the Introductions thread about choosing Game engines and I want to ensure these discussions are easily found in the future. Lets continue these discussions here. 

You have all had excellent points. Please continue the discussions here.

So far discussions and choices have been discussed regarding:

Unity
Unreal
GoDot
Yahaha

If you have any thoughts or additions to this list please feel free to add them here.

------------------------------
Melanie Honeycutt k12teacher
Lompoc CA
------------------------------

Whether or not the game engine matters really depends on what you're doing. I'm a computer science teacher and I'm using game development to hook students into coding (way more fun than trying to get students interested through teaching Scratch, Python, or Java in high school, not that those are bad choices). If my goal was purely game design, you're probably right, the game engine doesn't matter (though there's something to be said about the different learning curves of game dev platforms). But with me, my end goal is to get students to join my computer science program, and some game development platforms do better at that than others. For my program, I need to find a balance between ease of use for game design, ease of use for programming, and age appropriate (as far as captivating interest). Some platforms are super easy but my high school students find dull (scratch). Some are easy on the game development side and either lacking in programming or overly complicated with programming (Unity & Unreal Engine).

With this focus, I forgo a lot of the "How do you make a game" concepts (story boarding, planning, creativity, end goal, etc.) in order to focus on teaching programming concepts (variables, conditions, loops, functions, etc.). In my class, most of our projects are "Here's the game you're going to create. You can be creative with your sprites, you can add additional features, but in the end, you need to make this game". 

I'm hoping in the future to offer a 2nd class that gives students game development freedom and focuses more on "Now that you know how to program in _______, let's learn how to come up with your own unique game dev ideas" - but this does deviate a bit from my current goal of building my CS program. I do think with the right platform you could teach game development in 1 year... Of course, more semesters/years, better end results.

I am a pretty big proponent of separating programming from your intro game design class, I feel like it is just too many abstract concepts to throw at teenagers at once. At least if your pathway is explicitly game development and not computer science.

I'm going to use something higher level like Unity or possibly UnReal for my upper level high school kids.

If you are looking into something fun for your junior high or freshmen, one fun program is BLOXELS.  I plan on using it with my freshmen next year in an "Foundations of Computing" class to get them introduced to game design.
While there is not really any coding at all, the app (web based or tablet) allows students to design either side scrolling or top down levels based on pre made sprites and game elements.  The students can do a ton of customization and can even make their hero or new monsters pixel by pixel to function in the game.
Attributes of heros and enemies as well as power-ups are also part of the game.
Again, nothing really hard about the program, but can be a lot of fun.  Especially when they share within their class or to the arcade and their classmates play their levels. The only downside is that is costs for licenses, but those licenses can be managed and moved to different classes. 

------------------------------
John Hadenfeldt k12teacher
Cairo NE

Original Message:
Sent: 04-21-2023 11:09
From: Melanie Honeycutt
Subject: Choosing a Game Engine

There has been a lot of talk in the Introductions thread about choosing Game engines and I want to ensure these discussions are easily found in the future. Lets continue these discussions here. 

You have all had excellent points. Please continue the discussions here.

So far discussions and choices have been discussed regarding:

Unity
Unreal
GoDot
Yahaha

If you have any thoughts or additions to this list please feel free to add them here.

------------------------------
Melanie Honeycutt k12teacher
Lompoc CA
------------------------------

There has been a lot of talk in the Introductions thread about choosing Game engines and I want to ensure these discussions are easily found in the future. Lets continue these discussions here. 

You have all had excellent points. Please continue the discussions here.

So far discussions and choices have been discussed regarding:

Unity
Unreal
GoDot
Yahaha

If you have any thoughts or additions to this list please feel free to add them here.