Any Teams/Schools Have A "Game Development" Club?

[davidthefat]

So do you guys have a club that you make games? Like the robotics club, there is different "department" like the Music, Art, Programming, and Developer. I was thinking of doing this to help fund raise for the robotics club. Anyone think that will work/be beneficial? Honestly if we are dedicated, but how much do you think a highschool club be profiting from this? I have made the announcement to the club in our most recent meeting, but I think the topic of Autonomous Or This actually caught on with most of the group members, but only the "core" group

Platforms:
Android
iPhone/iPod/iPad
XNA
PC (Win/Mac/Linux)

Pros:
GREAT Experience
$$$
More Bonding Time

Cons:
Takes time away from the off season conditioning
Takes time away from me, Track, Football, Robotics, Now this? Thats a lot of stuff being added onto homework

[Zach O]

I wish we did. I'm sure if you had a dedicated amount of people, it'd be tons of fun, and you'd see some really cool projects!

I don't believe we have such a club at Grand Blanc High School, but I know in all the programming classes they offer, the midterm/final is to make some sort of game (depending on the difficulty of the class your in, your expected to build a more complex game. Ex: Visual Basic does easy board game like games, while my friend in AP Java is doing a pokemon like game). Now that you mention it though, I think it'd be a cool club/project to start.

I don't know what kind of profit you'd end up making, depending on the type/quality of game you make and how much you sell it for.

[davidthefat]

Originally Posted by Zach O

I wish we did. I'm sure if you had a dedicated amount of people, it'd be tons of fun, and you'd see some really cool projects!

I don't believe we have such a club at Grand Blanc High School, but I know in all the programming classes they offer, the midterm/final is to make some sort of game (depending on the difficulty of the class your in, your expected to build a more complex game. Ex: Visual Basic does easy board game like games, while my friend in AP Java is doing a pokemon like game). Now that you mention it though, I think it'd be a cool club/project to start.

Yes my class has the final project, but that is totally different from having a Game Dev team and actually publishing it, you have to focus on fixing bugs, even the smallest one and advertising, and making it actually fun... The past final projects I played were buggy as hell and boring as hell

[Chris is me]

RPI has a Game Simulation Arts Sciences major and a Game Development club. If you're REALLY serious about it, I would check them out. CMU and Case Western have similar CS - meets - art programs.

[davidalln]

Originally Posted by davidthefat

I was thinking of doing this to help fund raise for the robotics club. Anyone think that will work/be beneficial? Honestly if we are dedicated, but how much do you think a highschool club be profiting from this?

Pros:
GREAT Experience
$$$
More Bonding Time

I really hate to be that guy, but you shouldn't be starting a Game Development club with sights set on profits and money (even if it is for a good cause). It's unrealistic and worrying about marketing and money before you even sit down and write a line of code or draw a single polygon.

Another suggestion would be to focus on one thing. Android, iPhone, and XNA are vastly different. And even though the fundamentals are the same, Windows, Mac, and Linux should all be broken up into separate categories.

As a fellow high schooler with big dreams in the computer science biz, tread lightly and start small. It sounds like you're trying to make a big production out of little to no resources. That's admirable, but silly.

Get a couple friends together and make an Asteroids clone. Focus on one platform and perfect the hell out of it. You don't need art and music direction with focus in computers (which is going to be extremely hard to find... at least it is in my high school), and you'll learn tons more about programming than you will attempting and most likely failing to get a club off the ground.

[Radical Pi]

I wish we had one. There's been some talks about making an HL2 mod with some of my friends, but my response is always "Show me good concept art and I'll do the programming".

Anyways, a game is pure software. You know what that means if something goes wrong? "BURN THE PROGRAMMERS!!!"

[davidthefat]

Originally Posted by davidalln

I really hate to be that guy, but you shouldn't be starting a Game Development club with sights set on profits and money (even if it is for a good cause). It's unrealistic and worrying about marketing and money before you even sit down and write a line of code or draw a single polygon.

Another suggestion would be to focus on one thing. Android, iPhone, and XNA are vastly different. And even though the fundamentals are the same, Windows, Mac, and Linux should all be broken up into separate categories.

As a fellow high schooler with big dreams in the computer science biz, tread lightly and start small. It sounds like you're trying to make a big production out of little to no resources. That's admirable, but silly.

Get a couple friends together and make an Asteroids clone. Focus on one platform and perfect the hell out of it. You don't need art and music direction with focus in computers (which is going to be extremely hard to find... at least it is in my high school), and you'll learn tons more about programming than you will attempting and most likely failing to get a club off the ground.

OpenGL and SDL are multi platform and if I specifically use only OpenGL and SDL without any platform specific libs, it should all be good. Also the only major obstacle with me was dedication, I would start on a game and then never get much done with it or I change libraries... LOL then I lose all motivation and then it never gets any progress...

I am aware of the differences in Android (Java) iPhone(Objective-C) and XNA (C#) but honestly I was not going to do it on all platforms, Android had the priority

[davidalln]

Originally Posted by davidthefat

OpenGL and SDL are multi platform and if I specifically use only OpenGL and SDL without any platform specific libs, it should all be good.

Dicey. Sure, you could use GLUT and SDL and it would technically be multi-platform (if by multi-platform you mean across Mac/Linux/Win; it's a different story if you want to be on the iPhone). But you'll be sacrificing speed and risking unnecessary bugs.

Also, graphics is just one part of the puzzle. You still need the actual engine code: controlling the characters, physics, audio, etc.

I would really suggest focusing on one platform. The experience you get fighting your way through WGL or learning Objective-C or... God knows on Linux will be much more useful later in life. Why limit yourself?

Also, if you're having trouble with dedication, then it's usually a biting more than you can chew issue. As romantic an idea as it is, you will not be able to sit down and churn out the next Half-Life, or even the next Braid or Sam & Max. I have a feeling this is your style considering your very popular thread. Slow down friend!

[davidthefat]

Originally Posted by davidalln

Dicey. Sure, you could use GLUT and SDL and it would technically be multi-platform (if by multi-platform you mean across Mac/Linux/Win; it's a different story if you want to be on the iPhone). But you'll be sacrificing speed and risking unnecessary bugs.

Also, graphics is just one part of the puzzle. You still need the actual engine code: controlling the characters, physics, audio, etc.

I would really suggest focusing on one platform. The experience you get fighting your way through WGL or learning Objective-C or... God knows on Linux will be much more useful later in life. Why limit yourself?

Also, if you're having trouble with dedication, then it's usually a biting more than you can chew issue. As romantic an idea as it is, you will not be able to sit down and churn out the next Half-Life, or even the next Braid or Sam & Max. I have a feeling this is your style considering your very popular thread. Slow down friend!

I guess that is true, but its better than having low expectations and just half assing it, don't you agree? BTW I am not ready to venture into 3d programming yet, I failed miserably before trying... There are games that are quite simple from a programmer's POV, but they are so addicting, that is what I am trying to reach, not the next Final Fantasy Series or God Of War... I always say why aim for Community college while you can aim for MIT and CalTech? Never underestimate yourself

[davidalln]

Originally Posted by davidthefat

I guess that is true, but its better than having low expectations and just half assing it, don't you agree?

I disagree. I love the thrill I get of drawing a ship to the screen using a professionally-used API like OpenGL and watching it move across the screen. Sure, it's not too exciting, but it's there! It's something that I made!

Where do I go from there? Well, I have to make that ship shoot bullets next. And then make enemy ships, and those enemy ships have to move around with AI. And then we need to see if the bullets hit the ship. And increase the score if they do. And save the score to a high score table. And then, just for fun, set up a database online, connect to it, and make a global high score table!

See how quickly things can evolve? Don't focus on the final product: the final product isn't guaranteed. But you should be able to draw a sprite and move it across the screen; from there so much can come out of the knowledge you gained from that first step.

You ARE shooting for MIT right here, but you're working your way up. Most mortals like us have to learn step by step, gaining more and more with each tiptoe taken. You don't take a forth grader and ask her to take the derivative a logarithmic function and calculate the area under the curve. You give her years of education and experience, and then throw her in a Calculus class. Then she can apply for MIT and get in smoothly with a full ride

[davidthefat]

Originally Posted by davidalln

I disagree. I love the thrill I get of drawing a ship to the screen using a professionally-used API like OpenGL and watching it move across the screen. Sure, it's not too exciting, but it's there! It's something that I made!

Where do I go from there? Well, I have to make that ship shoot bullets next. And then make enemy ships, and those enemy ships have to move around with AI. And then we need to see if the bullets hit the ship. And increase the score if they do. And save the score to a high score table. And then, just for fun, set up a database online, connect to it, and make a global high score table!

See how quickly things can evolve? Don't focus on the final product: the final product isn't guaranteed. But you should be able to draw a sprite and move it across the screen; from there so much can come out of the knowledge you gained from that first step.

You ARE shooting for MIT right here, but you're working your way up. Most mortals like us have to learn step by step, gaining more and more with each tiptoe taken. You don't take a forth grader and ask her to take the derivative a logarithmic function and calculate the area under the curve. You give her years of education and experience, and then throw her in a Calculus class. Then she can apply for MIT and get in smoothly with a full ride

I see what you mean, baby steps, but I go for get the big picture, like lets say lets get the league championship, but we have to take it game by game, even play by play. I want to keep the big picture in mind, but break it up into baby steps. Thats what I think the pseudo coding period should be, plan everything out like the game theme, storyline and the code. What the audience wants, not what you want. Put it down all on paper, then have like a step by step check list that you go by. I think thats the way it should be programmed, I programmed the way you described, kind of spontaneously, I never really got that far that way, I just kept going into road blocks and had to refactor my code several times, then I would lose interest... I like working top down.

[Slix]

I wish my high school had a game development club.. That would be great fun!

[Jogo]

If you are hoping to profit, I highly recommend working in Flash. It is definitely accessible for high school students, and the casual game market is doing well. Even simple puzzle games can go for upwards of $1000 if they are addicting, and with a large enough group can be a 1 or 2 week project. Actionscript 2.0 and up is a full-fledged object oriented programming language not much different than Java or C++, and it is pretty easy to work with.

Sponsorships can be achieved by contacting sites directly, or using flashgamelicense.com.

[hipsterjr]

342 started something like this in 2009. It is called Summer Pygames. Students use Python to develop educational games for the XO laptops.
http://www.chiefdelphi.com/forums/sh...light=team+342

[MattSr]

Originally Posted by Jogo

If you are hoping to profit, I highly recommend working in Flash. It is definitely accessible for high school students, and the casual game market is doing well. Even simple puzzle games can go for upwards of $1000 if they are addicting, and with a large enough group can be a 1 or 2 week project. Actionscript 2.0 and up is a full-fledged object oriented programming language not much different than Java or C++, and it is pretty easy to work with.

Sponsorships can be achieved by contacting sites directly, or using flashgamelicense.com.

I have programmed in a number of languages but surprising to even myself I have never wandered into Flash, any chance that there is some free software out there that is decent to learn on?