There are no required books for the class. Over the course of the semester, we’ll use a few chapters from several different books (as well as other on-line readings). All of the books we will use are available on-line via Wendt libraries arrangements with the publishers. You will need to access them either from on-campus, or via a proxy server.
The actual hardcover books are also on reserve at Wendt library. Some of the chapters, we might provide scans online as well.
That said, you might want to purchase some of the books as they are quite useful.
The books we’ll use:
The Art of Game Design: A Book of Lenses.
By Jesse Schell. Morgan Kaufman Publishers, 2008. (book website) (UW library online)
This book is an interesting exploration of the ideas of game design. It’s a bit wordy and rambling, and curiously organized. However, the author has many good points. The primary readings for class may be more concise articles, but this book will often give a more complete picture.
Real-Time Rendering, 3rd Edition
By Tomas Akenine-Möller, Eric Haines, Naty Hoffman. AK Peters, 2008. (book website) (UW library online) (Madcat permalink)
This book is a bible of graphics programming for the real-time kinds of stuff games use. If you are a game graphics programmer, you look at this book a lot. It gives a pretty encyclopedic reference to the various techniques for various things you need to do. The nature of the topic causes it to seem out of date quickly, but the book can give you an idea of what the main approaches are and then you can look for what the newer tweaks are. One down side, is that the book tends to be more of an encyclopedia, telling you the main ideas of the various approaches, rather than a textbook (giving you the basic intuitions and building up) or even a guidebook (telling you how to choose between the various choices).
Because graphics will not be emphasized as much during the class, we might not use this as much.
Introduction to Game Development, 2nd Edition
By Steve Rabin (editor), Charles River 2009. (UW Library online) (Madcat permalink)
This is a huge book designed to give an overview of lots of the topics in game development. Its nice since it covers the entire range of topics (including things like intellectual property). The chapters aren’t all great, but they can be a good place to get started. They are often written by people who are experts (although, not always great teachers). The new edition of the book got rid of some of my favorite chapters, so I might have to go dig out the old edition of the book.
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