Game Development (Expanded Edition): Welcome!

Game Development: From Idea to Playable (Expanded Edition) 🎮

Every game you have played is a loop running sixty times a second, wrapped in design decisions, art, sound and code, and shipped by people who had to think about law, money and players. This book takes you through all of it with Godot 4, a free, open-source engine that professionals use too: what a game is made of, how experiences are designed and balanced, how art and audio communicate, how to program a playable game in GDScript, and how to publish it and build a career.

What You’ll Learn

The Anatomy of a Game

The MDA framework, the game loop and delta time, hardware to pixels, the industry and its engines, and your Godot setup.

Designing the Experience

Why people play, core loops and economies, difficulty and flow, story and world, the design document and playtesting.

Art, Sound, and Feel

Visual language, level design, animation and game feel, sound and music, interface and accessibility.

Programming the Game

Systems and state machines, GDScript, physics and collision, player controllers and enemy AI, debugging and performance.

Ship It

Intellectual property, player safety and inclusion, the business of games, publishing and marketing, careers and what comes next.

Ready to Start?

👉 Chapter 1: The Anatomy of a Game 👉 Chapter 2: Designing the Experience 👉 Chapter 3: Art, Sound, and Feel 👉 Chapter 4: Programming the Game 👉 Chapter 5: Ship It: Ethics, Business, and Careers