Hey everybody,

I was coding for a while a few months ago and developed some apps for my students. I want to start transforming these plain screen education apps into game formats. I am having trouble finding good resources on how to make that transition. I really liked the style of Mark Myers "A smarter way to learn" series and am wondering if anyone knows about a similar "break everything down into extremely small, applicable chunks" method to learning game development.

Also, I learned javascript, jquery, html, and css so I want to find an appropriate game engine that uses those languages. In my research so far it looks like maybe Phaser/Kiwi or Babylon might be my best choices, but I am a bit uncomfortable with having to choose either a 2d route (phaser) or 3d route (babylon). I'd prefer to pick one engine that deals with both well. However, I don't know if learning both engines would really be a considerable problem (I simply haven't worked with game engines before and don't know if learning each one separately would be a huge ordeal). It's the same feeling I get when a lot of people recommend Unity, but then I would have to learn C#.

Thanks,

Steve

Just start using either. Start somewhere. You eventually have to learn more than just knowing about javascript and jquery. There is also no shame in learning C#. Its a rather simple language and you can make/do great things with it. But

Start somewhere. Keep your goals small enough to not lose interest.

Good luck.

PS: Welcome to gamedev.net

Thanks ryleh, good advice. 

1 hour ago, Stebssbets said:

Hey everybody,

I was coding for a while a few months ago and developed some apps for my students. I want to start transforming these plain screen education apps into game formats. I am having trouble finding good resources on how to make that transition. I really liked the style of Mark Myers "A smarter way to learn" series and am wondering if anyone knows about a similar "break everything down into extremely small, applicable chunks" method to learning game development.

Also, I learned javascript, jquery, html, and css so I want to find an appropriate game engine that uses those languages. In my research so far it looks like maybe Phaser/Kiwi or Babylon might be my best choices, but I am a bit uncomfortable with having to choose either a 2d route (phaser) or 3d route (babylon). I'd prefer to pick one engine that deals with both well. However, I don't know if learning both engines would really be a considerable problem (I simply haven't worked with game engines before and don't know if learning each one separately would be a huge ordeal). It's the same feeling I get when a lot of people recommend Unity, but then I would have to learn C#.

Thanks,

Steve

While Unity is primarily a 3D game engine, it handles 2D quite well too. One of the latest versions (don't remember which one exactly) added support specifically for 2D development. Unity also has the advantage of having a huge community and very good support, so any questions you may have or stumbling blocks you might encounter can easily be addressed by looking up a YouTube video or checking out the Unity forums, or even the forums on this site. This (e.g. big community and good support) matters a LOT, because when you do get stuck on something, and you will (99% guaranteed), it makes all the difference in the world when you can easily find an answer in a few hours, as opposed to with the less widely used and more esoteric engines out there, where you hit a snag and you keep spinning your wheels for days and weeks, hoping somebody out there will take mercy on you and answer your question.

As for having to learn C#, I highly recommend doing it, especially if you, at some point in your life, are planning on working as a software developer. If you don't want to though, Unity supports JavaScript as well.

Those are definitely some good points to consider. I did a quick search for books on getting started with C#. A lot of them are titled "Learn C# in 8 hours!" or "Learn C# in one week!". Is it really that quick?

1 hour ago, Stebssbets said:

Is it really that quick?

To learn the basics? Yes. But those books tend to over-promise and under-deliver. You certainly won't be an expert in a week.

Learning C# may be fun, but it's certainly not a requirement to make games. There are a lot of great game frameworks in JavaScript too!

3 hours ago, Stebssbets said:

I am a bit uncomfortable with having to choose either a 2d route (phaser) or 3d route (babylon)

Don't be. 2D game engines are solving fundamentally different problems to 3D game engines. Software that attempts to solve both, often solve one or the other badly.

If you want to hop into 3D, you might look at aframe. They push the VR angle pretty hard, but it does regular 3D just as well, and it's a pretty quick route into game development.

These are really good points. However, I am a bit concerned with what another replier said regarding getting support when I am in a jam. One of the reasons I was able to progress as fast as I did while learning javascript, jquery, html, and css is that I was able to use the "a smarter way to learn" series and then when I ran into trouble it was easy to find help because there are so many people who know these languages. However, once the concepts get applied to using javascirpt for gaming, people's knowledge seems to be very low, like it's a way more niche approach. Am I off base on this? Are there 2d and 3d javascript engines with a healthy amount of users, forums, and support?

29 minutes ago, Stebssbets said:

However, once the concepts get applied to using javascirpt for gaming, people's knowledge seems to be very low, like it's a way more niche approach.

Game development in general is way more niche than web development. Smaller communities, less thorough learning materials. C'est la vie.

29 minutes ago, Stebssbets said:

Are there 2d and 3d javascript engines with a healthy amount of users, forums, and support?

I'm not sure there are that many game engines with healthy forum communities, Javascript or no. Once you step outside of Unity and Unreal, community size drops off quite fast, and even those two have somewhat... uneven forum quality.

1 hour ago, swiftcoder said:

Game development in general is way more niche than web development. Smaller communities, less thorough learning materials. C'est la vie.

I'm not sure there are that many game engines with healthy forum communities, Javascript or no. Once you step outside of Unity and Unreal, community size drops off quite fast, and even those two have somewhat... uneven forum quality.

Even with Unreal that tends to come up pretty constantly in my experience. People on forums and boards can often answer simple questions but when it comes to complex behavior or things that are in a project that has been worked on for longer than a day, the answers seem to drop off quickly or not be very useful.

I had a colleague quip that it was probably because all of the people with actual experience were likely busy applying it somewhere rather than discussing it on forums. He sort of has a point. Answers here fall into the other category usually, quite a few people here have experience with big projects but often can't take the time to, or don't know, the complexities and issues of one particular platform or engine.

In general it seems like game development is often a very do-it-yourself kind of learning experience, that's why experience is so valuable, you accidentally learn solutions to problems you have without even knowing that was what you were looking for.

Stebssbets (near to impossible to write without a copy paste ;-))

I'm in a similar situation, some months ago I was learnign HTML, JAvascript, CSS and python for web development. Just some weeks ago I started with game development, I spend some time looking different games, and i was tempted to user Unity with javascript. But at the End I started with Unity and C#, the language isn't really the most important. 

I did just two games with Unity one in 3d and the other in 2D (the second is in KONGREGATE). My advice is: Keep the things simple! Do one game, after that another, learn, do games at the same time you are learning, and don't be afraid to publish your games. 

Why UNITY? Because I can do 3d, 2d, VR, AV, Mobile... all in the same framework, and my time is really limited, I know that maybe isn't the best for 2d, or 3d, but by the moment, I have no Idea what kind of games i'm going to specialize if any. 

Best Regards. 

Pere Martra.