Teaching Game Development To Fine Arts Students? 172
jkavalier writes "I've been asked to prepare a short course (50 hours) of video game development to Fine Arts students. That means people with little-to-no technical skills, and hopefully, highly creative individuals. By the end of it, I would like to have finished 1-3 very basic minigames. I'm considering Unity 3D, Processing, and even Scratch. How would you approach teaching such a course? What do you think is the best tool/engine/environment for such a task?"
How about "Alice"? (Score:4, Interesting)
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What is this obsession with 3D? It's an enormously complicating factor when trying to learn the basics of movement and computer graphics. Use something 2D (pygame?) and make a platformer or a top-down RPG.
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Because as "fine arts" students, their future efforts in creating games will be crating segmented 3D models and wrapping textures around them. Programming the game will be up to the geeks.
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Actually Alice has the capability, but implementing it is far beyond their skill level. When my brother took an intro to programming class he used Alice. So I decided to download Alice and see what I could come up with. I am a developer by trade, so it was not too difficult to get some basic AI running, but my brother spent the semester basically creating a story.
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Re:How about "Alice"? (Score:4, Interesting)
I'd also check out GameSalad [gamesalad.com], which offers a GUI for attaching artwork to objects, then setting properties/events across objects to build a game out of it. It's really easy to create a basic platformer or simple touch game mechanics, and you can focus on how the artwork contributes to the game.
You can also generate web, Mac, PC, and iOS output (the latter which can be submitted to the App Store, which might be a fun reward for your students.)
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I would stick to alice and or flash. A lot of art guys already know how to make movies in flash (which is a valuable skill unto itself for them), making a game is different, but a text like Foundation Game Design with Flash by Rex Van der spuy works well. Alice is too simple for programming students but not bad for arts ones.
I would emphasize the distinction between "design' and "development'. They should get an overview of the whole process and the content pipeline, and a light introduction to programmi
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Why do most slashdot geeks always think "3D" when thinking game development these days? Most of the fun casual games available today are in 2d.
It's not just "slashdot geeks", in general the world of game development is focused on 3d, even when doing 2d it is often just 3d with the camera looking at everything from a specific angle with orthographic projection.
On a side note, as someone who actually took a few art courses targeting game development in college, just teaching the most basic concepts of how to create interaction isn't very useful. A lot of what the "artsy" types should be learning (IMO) is using the right tools with the right workflow
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As with so many courses (Score:4, Insightful)
and nobody seems to understand it - you shouldn't teach programs, you should teach techniques and principals to be applied in lab sessions. I don't know what arts students are doing in game development. If anything, the only thing they should be developing is artwork.
You can use anything to teach them how to design something, I would suggest Blender (since it's free and they are ART students) or if they are technically adept enough (which they aren't), you can let them use the Sauerbraten engine and I believe you can get the Unreal engine free as an educational institution. If you have to get really simplistic and only teach them how their art works out in games, use HTML5 or *shudder* Flash, for something bigger you can use the Doom engine (very simple to design for) and let them make some artwork for it.
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I don't think there's much reason to be teaching game development to fine arts students. Teach game development to CS students, and game design to fine arts students. You could even have them work together on projects in the same class. Just don't spend too much time trying to teach English majors how to program.
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You don't think a game designer should know something about how interactive systems, procedures, dialog trees, preconditions, etc. work? I mean, you can't design a good interactive experience without at least having a vague idea about interaction and computation, even if it's mainly at a pseudocode level.
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In fact, if they are really good at arts, they should do only arts, with a tools like 3D Studio Max, Maya, etc. Again, arts only, no programming.
This is pretty narrow pigeon-holing. There is no reason why an artist who may one day work with those tools shouldn't also know game-design principles (especially if they will one day be a key member on a game project).
Should I as a software engineer not touch Apache configuration because I am best at writing code? What about database scripts?
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You are completely off-base in assuming that someone who is good at art would be unqualified to do programming and should be discouraged from trying it. I have a Bachelor of Fine Arts degree in Illustration and Bachelor of Science degree in Computer Science that say otherwise.
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Hey, the opposite has been done for years. I had a HELL of a time enrolling in music courses because I was a CS major and they were open only to B.Mus students. Turnabout is fair play!
OTOH if they want to teach game development to fine arts students, the answer is simple - make CS 101 or whatever a prerequisite.
A game *design* course that is pure-arts would also be pretty awesome. Especially if it was limited enrollment and you could partner them up with some game development grad students or something.
Ac
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I think what is more important are limitations with games. As creative people they invasion far more then we can technically handle. Also you need to remember that people need to use your art too so a good ui may trump good art
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Huh? Last I tried both of them (admittedly, several years ago) Sauerbraten was dead simple and Blender was next to a nightmare.
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Sauerbraten is a gaming engine which is dead simple for game programmers. Giving a non-programmer any type of programming language is very, very difficult even if it's BASIC or Logo. It also wouldn't teach them how to model an animation or how drawing something reflects in a game. Blender is a 3D creation tool which also has some type of rendering engine and which you could create games in but it's geared towards creating content which is what arts student will have to learn and use whether it's Blender, Ma
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I never used Sauerbraten in the context of development, just level design. The stuff it has for level modelling in game is incredibly straightforward.
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That's retarded. Why shouldn't art students take classes in other subjects? Steve Jobs spoke about a typography class and how it shaped aspects of the Mac OS later.
I see a huge problem when there is such a disconnect between programmers and artists in a game development team. Even if they get just a taste of "development", classes like this can be VERY beneficial to artists, if for nothing else than gaining an appreciation for developers and the development process. I would say the same about programmers le
Unreal or Steam (Score:3, Informative)
Flash (Score:1)
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For such an illiterate students
How's that Flash workin' out for 'ya?
WTF (Score:3, Insightful)
...ugh, I think maybe you shouldn't be teaching them?
Blender (Score:5, Informative)
The Blender Game Engine is actually quite suitable for an introductory game design course, and it has two completely free books written for learning it, plus a huge number of example games and scripts. Almost all of the logic can be scripted with 'logic bricks' (a minor amount of simple python scripts are needed for some typical behaviours).
http://download.blender.org/documentation/gamekit2/ [blender.org]
http://download.blender.org/documentation/gamekit1/ [blender.org]
Also see Yo Frankie - which shows what a team can accomplish in a short time
http://www.yofrankie.org/ [yofrankie.org]
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c7RRaEvWqJc [youtube.com]
Blender itself is now quite easy to create game assets in, and works well as a level editor.
The Game Engine is not exactly cutting edge, but then cutting edge isn't of much benefit for learning game design.
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That is genuinely the first time I've seen "Blender" and "easy" in the same sentence.
Fine-arts + programming = ? (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Fine-arts + programming = ? (Score:5, Interesting)
Another game design class that worked with created two games based on Arduino hardware and Max/MSP. One game incorporated RFID scanners and custom built MP3 players to take players on an audio scavenger hunt. That game received funding from the city arts council and was installed in local mall and again later as part of a city-wide arts festival, the other used video tracking to track players in a physical game arena and has been shown at several Maker Faires and art exhibitions here in LA and Europe.
Many artists I've met are more than capable programmers, and many of them make their art exclusively in coding environments. I would assume that artists taking a game development class would at least be technically minded. The point is that it's probably a mistake to assume that "fine arts" students can't or shouldn't handle more technical work.
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Surely by that reasoning you should be hesitant to throw "fine-arts" students into story development, gameplay and the like since those are best suited for design and literature students.
fining art students? (Score:1)
who else read the headline and thought the game development community was imposing punitive penalties on art students?
Your target audience (Score:2)
So your target audience here isn't graphic designers, nor is it developers. I think you have to cater to them by breaking down the basics: code, graphic design, level design. Kind of give an overall impression.
I think another comment in this article says how you shouldn't try to teach them development, and I agree with that to a point. I think you should try to stay higher up, but (personally) I find it really hard to relate if I don't see some hard evidence of how to do it. As such, you should definitely m
Roguelikes! (Score:2)
Team up with a programming school/ course. (Score:1)
"Technical" (Score:3, Insightful)
To be fair, many of them may have highly developed technical skills. But their tools may be paint brushes, pianos, or their own bodies.
It's probably more accurate to say they don't have much computer technical skills.
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Don't assume that fine arts students today lack computer skills. Many do, and some just don't have the left-brains for it, but there are a lot of artists out there with an excellent understanding of computer technology. You can't get a BFA at most art schools these days without using a computer... sometimes a lot.
Walking through the art building... (Score:2)
Walking through the art building at RIT, I see a lot of what look like pretty shiny labs. Large format printers & scanners, all sorts of fancy graphics
Well, it *is* RI*T*.
That's a thing about college in general though - since you do undergrad only once, it's hard to compare your school to others
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Well, I did undergrad twice at different colleges (once for CS, once for art), and I've worked for three colleges, most recently a stand-alone art school, so I can do some comparison. :) The art school I worked at had computers all over the place and now requires all students – including the paint-or-saw types – to own and use a laptop.
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Yes, we all know that if you don't have a PhD in computer science, you're both technically AND LEGALLY unable to write a memo in a text editor.
As for the internet, well, really only a few "Professors of Internets" [i.e. self-appointed 14 year olds on slashdot] should be allowed to access something that is so obscure and difficult for mortals to understand.
I know there are a few crazy idealists who think that one day eve
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How did you get any of that out of the segment that you quoted? He never said that they didn't or shouldn't be allowed to use computers. Its just that the more you know about a subject, the more your perspective on that subject changes. What some people might consider a technical skill is something that other people might just take for granted. A network engineer or game developer probably takes typing skills or web browsing for granted and doesn't consider those "technical" compared to their own field.
Cookie Cutting-Edge (Score:1)
I think Unity3D would be a good idea. Do their platformer tutorial yourself using all their stand-in content. Modify the end result for your purposes. Break the students up into groups, where each group gets to make their own platformer game. Have them all use your code, and let them make their own story-line, models, animations, textures, levels, music, etc.
A pad of graph paper and a pencil. (Score:1)
Break them into teams assisting Open Source. (Score:1, Offtopic)
Fine Arts students are going to have a knack for the story telling portion of this project. Those musically inclined will grasp the programming concepts quickest, and there will be an artist or two in the bunch. Authors will be used to organization of time lines, so thing project managers there. Most of all, write up a survey for them early on for hints on what they're interested or already talented in.
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I was going to mod this interesting but your web site explains nothing about what this is. You have a project you want people to be interested in - it would make sense to spell out WTF the project is about on your main page.....
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NP :)
I know what it's like to get some attention for your project.
http://goldchest.sourceforge.net/ [sourceforge.net] (hint hint)
What and How to teach... (Score:1)
First of all, to really know what and how to teach on this subject I'd need to know what the course requires. For example, are you required that the course cover technical aspects such as code/script writing, or the process of figuring out the logic involved in the mechanics of the game or how the AI is going to work. If there is not technical requirements, then don't try to take them there.
The Game Design job marketplace used to require a handful of techie nerds spending long hours together making a game
Stencyl (Score:1)
Employable? (Score:1)
Teach them about the limitations of the art. (Score:1)
Game development is all about limits. Texture limits, vertex/poly limits, limits in flexibility of animation systems, limits in complexity of shaders, limits in number of light emitters, limits in number of objects, limits in drawing distances, limits in lighting and shading models, limits to how you can use transparent surfaces, etc. These limits are pushed for every generation, but they're still there.
Work with a programming class (Score:2)
It should help the understand the interactions they will face in the real
Interactivity (Score:2)
I'm not an expert by any means, but I'll attempt to make a couple of hopefully useful suggestions.
I believe there are two important lessons to take home regarding game design:
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Branching storyline design. Unlike traditional storylines, which are linear, game storylines have the potential to change based on player choices. Think choose-your-own-adventure type of storyline design.
Balance. For instance, keeping weapons and power-ups weak enough and the enemies just powerful enough so the gameplay stays challenging. Similarly, you don't want the units in a strategy game to be too powerful.
What this would be teaching them is the opposite of art. This is a formula for a certain type of game.
What you want to teach them is the tools they need to create games. Then they can use their imagination and artistic abilities to come up with new ideas for games and challenge the preconceived notions you've set forth.
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Thats actually not true.. what happens then is they go into game design thinking that all they have to do is reskin doom/quake/unreal/whatever engine is hot right now...
You really don't know many serious fine art students, do you? It's not about creating commercial style games.
Take advantage of the skills you know they have (Score:2)
I'm not familiar with game development tools, so I can't make specific suggestions, but as someone who straddles technology and the visual arts, I'd suggest that the more visually-oriented they are, the better. Point and click and drag and drop. A troll suggested Flash, but that's actually not a bad idea: the similarity to the UI of Photoshop (which most fine-arts students these days have at least experienced) can help them get working with it, and the ability to start doing things with very little code i
Good luck. (Score:2)
It's going to be a challenge. I thought a game design course a couple of years ago, taking over the course from a friend. The course was based in the media studies department and pretty much the entire class majored in media except for one student who was studying design.
Our platform was Flash, using Actionscript 2. I'd say this is the easiest platform available because the basics are so simple and require little coding. Artwork was done in Illustrator and Photoshop and even that required some instruction.
Paper and pencil (Score:1)
Throwing programming at people with "little-to-none technical skills" is a bad idea period. Have them develop games or game concepts and then help them apply those to programming. Or take an existing classic game and describe the challenges of making it digital (such as card shuffling).
Speaking from experience... (Score:1, Insightful)
I taught a Flash ActionScript class at an art school once.
Tell them to save their creativity for their artwork, and not their variable names.
They are going to be overwhelmed, both by the left brained and "only one right answer" discipline required to get code to run properly.
I would keep it VERY simple. More than you think is necessary.
You might just lose some students entirely. It's been said that programmers do for love what others wouldn't do for money. You will soon find out just how true this is.
At the
3D artist (Score:2, Insightful)
How about teaching them 3D modelling ? (Score:2)
I'm not sure what the students' other courses are, but I'm wondering if, instead of teaching them general programming in a very basic, very not-usable-in-any-real-job way, it wouldn't be more practical, instead, of teaching them specifically how to create content, artwork, for somebody else's game, using real-world, or close to real-world (since you need free) tools.
You're obviously not going to make them into game developers. Would it maybe be better to make them into semi-credible artwork guys ? Maybe dev
Broken Sword (Score:2)
IMHO one of the best games in terms of artwork is Broken Sword 1 [google.com]. The scenes are handpainted and the character animations are very detailed. In the meantime ScummVM [scummvm.org] was developed which is a free software game engine which is able to play the data files of Broken Sword as well [scummvm.org]. ScummVM is not recommended for developing new games though. Maybe somebody nows a more modern engine with similar capabilities?
What is your course's intent? (Score:1)
Source? (Score:1, Interesting)
Try using the source engine maybe? With Garry's Mod, you have a relative freedom of the FPS genre, and there's a huge knowledge base for it, it's still relevant, and really simple. /2cents
Or they could fix the title (Score:1)
Forget About Games - Think Levels (Score:3, Insightful)
The title pretty much says it all. People in art don't program games at all. They instead get hired to do levels and art for them. I'd just take a basic game that's well understood and have them make their own custom levels for it.
Game Development or Computer Game Programming? (Score:3, Insightful)
No clue (Score:2)
It is absolutely shocking to see how many folks do not understand the first thing about a Fine arts program here.
In answer to the question, while it's useful to get into toolkits, if your students are anything like the people I went to university with, they're going to chafe at being delivered into a constrictive set of tools. Take a sampling of the tools you've mentioned and that have been mentioned by other commenters, maybe add RPG Maker on top of it, but at the end of the day it's just as well to let
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As a professional 3d artist... (Score:2)
I started back in the dos days... and on macs, c64s, atari computers etc...
Been doing graphics for a long time from a teen, to mid 30s.
The one thing that really has become apparent is that in order to be a good artist with modern computer graphics tools, you must be a very well rounded traditional artist as well. I started out years ago as a kid fascinated with comic book art, and as a teen I tried to learn anatomy from books, but never understood what those books were fully teaching until I saw a real live
Go Analog (Score:2)
Go look at Ian Schreiber's work at http://teachingdesign.blogspot.com/ [blogspot.com] and http://gamedesignconcepts.wordpress.com/ [wordpress.com]. Especially the second one - its actually a free online course he taught last summer on game design. That should cover all the bases you need, and does
Inform 7 (Score:2)
Inform 7 [inform7.com] might be of interest. It's a tool for creating interactive fiction (otherwise known as text adventures). It uses a natural language syntax, and it's dead easy to learn the basics, making it ideal for non-techy types.
Text games might not be the kind of thing you initially had in mind, but this could be a useful way to teach topics like storytelling, characterisation, dialogue trees and so on. As an added bonus, your students can have a prototype game up and running in no time, with the accompanyi
Consider mobile- iPhone/Android games with Corona (Score:2)
Mobile computing is on the rise, and gaming is a strong component of it. There is a toolkit that will let you program in LUA (fairly common in game engines these days) and it will generate programs for both iPhone / iPad and Android at the same time. Programming is simple and the new game engine employs physics and other gizmos.
See game release: http://blog.anscamobile.com/2010/09/theyre-here-corona-sdk-and-corona-game-edition/ [anscamobile.com]
Video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0e4p_5J_bZY [youtube.com]
My daughter took a course like this... (Score:2)
She is 10 years old and took a game development course at ID Tech Camp:
http://www.internaldrive.com/ [internaldrive.com]
At the end of a week, she had a couple simple video games designed and running.
I was pleased and proud because she's a complete computer novice.
The games she created were base on Clickteam Multimedia Fusion 2 Developer with Photoshop to tweak the art.
Older and more advanced kids used more advanced tools. The tools used in all the courses are listed here:
http://www.internaldrive.com/courses-programs/tech-prod [internaldrive.com]
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Re:I would approach teaching that course... (Score:4, Informative)
There are other aspects to game development than just programming, you know. Think BioWare would be anywhere if they don't have top notch writers? What about the graphic artists, 3D modelers, texture artists, and level designers that are indispensable in any game studio?
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I have been a game developing 3d-artist for many years, and i'd rather hire a geek that became an artist than a "fine artist" that learned to do 3d.
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I can agree that you can't be a technophobe if you want to be a game artist but I've met quite a few game artists who were by no means geeks in the sense that the average slashdotter would describe a geek. Sure, they had weird hobbies and interests and slightly above-average tech know-how but their main strength was on the artistic side of things. A lot of times what is really needed is that these individuals get a solid and comprehensive education on how all the parts fit together, both in terms of the bas
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All well and good, but since they don't hire programmers to be their graphic artists, graphic artists to be their writers, and writers to be their programmers, why the HELL would you dick around teaching Art majors to code, even in toys like Alice?
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It's useful to have some knowledge of neighboring specialties, so you can talk to colleagues without them thinking you're an idiot.
For example, if you work in sales it's nice if you at least understand the fundamentals of accounting.
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Re:I would approach teaching that course... (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:I would approach teaching that course... (Score:4, Informative)
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...
What?!? You really didn't think you'd post a topic like this on Slashdot and think you were getting away unscathed, did you?!?
Bwahahahahahahahahaahahaa *cough* *cough* *cough**cough**cough*
Shit, I'm get'in too old for this shit.
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If you want to go down that route, here's a syllabus [ucsc.edu] from a course that's been taught a few times using Game Maker (also to mainly non-CS students), which might be useful to get ideas.
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I don't know that's I'd say "Don't teach 'Fine arts Students' programming", instead, why not take advantage of their presumed creative strengths and give them a toolbox to design games rather then build coding assets.
Most games that I pick up and fail to finish is because of the gameplay, not because of the artwork or quality of the coding.
Long gone is the day where a developer was expected to be expert in all roles form programming to sprite design to environments, lighting, storyline, marketing, etc... Pe