Customer Reviews

3D Game Engine Programming (Game Development Series)

5 star:		(10)
4 star:		(3)
3 star:		(3)
2 star:		(2)
1 star:		(3)

 

 

Stefan Zerbst's 3D Game Engine Programming is a 850-paged guide to constructing a modular, functional video game engine. This reference was one of the biggest reasons I became confident that I could complete a project of my own and has helped me tremendously in the design and building of an engine based upon the fundamentals of the ZFX Engine.

Even though the book does not go into detail and provide the code to all the bells and whistles of a commerical engine, it certainly outlines the basics and even provides code for testing. (I personally liked not having everything provided so that I could add my own features with a more personalized touch). Have no fear: all the basics are there to build off of!

In particular, the text guides the reader through the concepts and code needed to construct an engine that has the ability to support both DirectX and OpenGL (though DirectX is the main focus in the text), Vertex and Pixel Shaders (which is a big plus in upcoming game graphics!), and networkable players. In addition, the book brought extra possibilities such as Non-Player Characters, AI, and other various effects to the table for the reader to take note of where they could be added on to the engine. More importantly, he did do an excellent job of keeping these options (and more!) open without forcing his more ambitious readers to reprogram half the engine.

A very important thing I felt was the key to why I liked it some much was the fact that I understood how the components of the engine worked individually and as a whole to construct a functional game when I had finished the book. So many times have I read a programming book cover to cover and then still be lost on how everything fits together outside of the demos provided in the text-- but this book was NOT like that at all. The concepts were presented clearly as well as explicitly outlined within the code.

However, I will note: this book is not for the faint of heart or for the inexperienced programmer. (Hopefully the size scares the aforementioned away in a direction to seek some more practice before coming back to this fantastic reference.) There is a LOT of code and while the text does take care of the graphics, DLL loading, and algorithmic aspects to a FPS game, the book does treat the reader as a programmer and not a novice.

One last, important feature is the Level Editor that is developed along side the engine (that's right! you build a level editor too!). This chapter (14) is certainly one of the most useful parts of the text and is where a lot of key concepts come together.

So, if you are looking for a book that hits the ground running, providing a complete archive of source code and demos in an effort to construct a comprehensive game engine: this book is for you!

Yes, the book's CD had some issues. Yes, the code on the CD and the code on the book are sometimes different. That being said, show me a programming book that

1) Publishes every line of code
2) Every published line matches that on the CD
3) The code on the CD contains no errors

and I will show you a GREAT book. (BTW, this book does not exist.)

Criticizing the author for not publishing all source code is ludicrous as half the book would have had to be cut to make room, and then everyone would be complaining about not having enough content. All source code is provided and this book is NOT for beginners, so having to look at source code that was not published is not a problem.

Stefan does an excellent job of presenting a workable engine that could be used to create a modern game that could fit about any genre. He also presents methods to allow for upgrading the engine without requiring all games that use it to be recompiled. He covers many issues in the space he has and provides a workable game in the final chapter. He also shows how to implement an editor for the game (albeit a simple one), which is something I had not seen in other books.

If you are looking for a book that shows how to step into game engine programming and ALREADY know about game programming itself, then this is a good book.

If you are new to programming this book is not for (and is not intended for) you, so please do not read it and then complain when you do not understand.

The book does provide a basis for understanding a 3d game engine but it leaves out pieces in its tutorials, which would fine execpt that the book is written in "step-by-step tutorial" style. If you actually follow the book as a tutorial and code along, nothing will compile. If you use your head a little, though, you can figure out the missing features on your own, either by reviewing the material on the cd or by googleing. All in all, I found the book to be OK but i am still looking for someting better.

The book is unique in that it does exactly what it says it will do. Be warned however that as the book states it is not for beginner programmers who are new to Direct3D or new to C/C++ programming. However if you are familiar with the language and the API but never quite grasped the concept of fitting together all the components neccasary to make a 3D game engine then this really is the right book for you. There is not another book around as of this review that tells you bit by bit how to build a game engine and not only any game engine but a game industry standard engine the way the professionals build them.

There are a few version issues with the code on the DVD-ROM supplied. However this is always an issue if you are an intermediate programmer and familiar with C/C++ and a popular IDE then to be honest the minor issues should not be too much of a problem for you. Plus the author has even got a support website and he answers emails.

Well worth the money !!

Like the reviewer from below, I'm trying to develop a 3d engine. I expected with patience this book, hoping that I'll get a nice engine with it from which to learn. Probably I'm reviewing this too soon, since I didn't finish reading it. The code from this book doesn't compile! I know that Mr. Zerbst is a very apreciated lecturer in Gameversity and he definitely knows a lot about 3d graphics, but this book was not ready for publication. I have the feeling that the code was written in a hurry, and thrown on the CD. I just wonder how do you think you can make money in this way? And is there anybody from the COURSE TECHNOLOGY who actually reviewed the code? After a day of work, I managed to modify/download and install things in order to make it work. The famous DeathMatch (Pandoras Legacy) crashes when launched! I debuged it and it's doing strange things with those vectors...
This book in my opinion it's like one of those bad written games. I mean a serious book has compiled binaries, nice organized file structure with sample code, and separate files for the engine.
If you are serious about making a 3d engine, jus't DON'T BUY IT! It doesn't worth a penny... You can find more serious open source things for free where to learn from!

It is quite obvious the guy below me does not indeed own the book yet, as he has stated. I have to agree more with the first review. I am sure the author knows a great deal about this subject, and the design of the engine proves that. However, he fails to explain the book very well. In lectures you can ask questions and understand the subject matter fully, but in a book you can not.

The advantages to this book:

1) The book designs and implements a reusable, API independant game engine.

2) It gives you great ideas on how to implement your own engine, which will probably really be more of a modification to the engine in this book.

3) The source code is clean and seems to compile

Disadvantages:

1) The book doesn't actually teach you anything about designing an engine. It really is just a bunch of code thrown at you. You have no clue what direction the author is going next. By studying the code and reading the book you should be able to see his reasoning behind the code easily.

2) The author does not present all the neccessary code in the book. In the third chapter, the author uses an enumeration class that he never defines, along with a bunch of structs that are defined in the code on the cd, but not in the book. The author actually skips over the part about getting the device enumerations because he doesn't want to bore you.

3) The author uses features that are just pointless in developing a game engine. For instance, he creates a dialog box with a bunch of settings for the users to set every single time the application will run. Most of the users don't care about the settings, or for that matter, even know what they are. Instead he should find a default setting and allow the programmer to change the settings.

I am currently developing a game engine and I think the organization of the engine in this book will be really useful. The engine is organized in a way that makes it extremely flexible. It uses dll files and interfaces so you can update the engine without changing any of the code in the main application. For design of the engine, I would give the book 5 stars. For the implementation, only 2. I can't stand it when authors 'forget' to include some of the code that is needed.

In my opinion the most important thing to know about this book before purchasing it is that you will not learn much about game programming. This book is about building tools like a big game engine or a level creation tool. That is refreshingly different from most other books out there which only treat game programming and tie all the graphics rendering code directly into their demo programs. This book does always separate the demo projects from the graphics engine, the audio engine, and the network engine. Now I learned how to write reusable code that does not need to be changed for different projects. That is what I wanted from this book.

The broken CD-ROM is of course a bad thing. But with the online updates the problems are fixed. I'm happy with this book and learned a lot from it.

First of all - this book isn't for someone, who wants to get started with C++ the first time. You should have known, how to code a DX-Init-Routine or a basic windows application. But you won't start trying to code games, if you don't know, won't you? ;)

The book is a great source for advanced coders and easy to understand. Nearly every small detail is well explained by Mr. Zerbst.

He covers MME, SSE and Shaders, as well as Character Animation and skeletal systems.

The worst thing you could say about this book, is that the CD is crap. It seems that the publisher did not reviewed it or anything like that. But Mr. Zerbst knows about this subject and has a good update page for any problems. So you will get support :) And honestly - you want to code, or? So why do you need a CD?

But after all... it's a great book with well explained details and nice topics.

This book is for the following person: A programmer who woke up one day and said "Wow, I'd really like to make a Game Engine. Where do I start? How should I plan this thing out? What kinds of things do I have to implement? What things should I be worried about?"

The code is solid, with just a few exceptions that a good programmer should be able to catch. The author speaks German, so he'll occasionally ramble about the war and whatnot, but overall he's a good teacher. He's answered questions about the tiny problems with his code, but you'll have to check out the forums at his Gaming University website (not his German one. Unless you happen to speak German)

He doesn't go in depth into many things because his book is designed to get you started, and show you all the steps you'll have to take in your game-engine education. That being said, you WILL create a fully functioning first-person shooter engine at the end of the book.

It's written at a reasonably moderate level, so I suggest that you learn DirectX 9 and C++ ahead of time, but once you've done that you're good to go. It provides a good bird's-eye view of the game engine process, shows you how to make each little bit in a modular, reusable way, and puts together a lovely result.

One of the reviews on this page suggests the purchase of the Game Programming Gems series. Now, as nice as that series is (And it is nice), Game Programming Gems is about tiny bits of code that make a project more exciting. In fact, I'd have to say that Game Programming Gems has absolutely nothing to do with Game Engine Design. Heck, it's the polar opposite of 3D Game engine Programming. Gems are fragments- This book is about bringing everything together.

A better suggestion would be to use the Game Programming Gems series to make this book's engine more impressive.

I also agree with the others that the CD for this book is not very useful because some files are broken or contain bugs.

But apart from that the remainder of the book is well written and covers a lot of ground from building an engine and character animation to portal engines and BSP trees. Once you got the files from the CD running you can also see the complete model and 3D level editor that is completely developed in the book. I've never seen this topic explained somewhere else so I still give 4 stars.

It is also very refreshing that you don't have to read hundreds of pages about introductions to C++ or DirectX programming in general. That was very annoying in all the other Premier Press / Course books. So this book covers about 850 pages of real stuff and does also introduce into shader programming. This section is also a bit out of date because it is using assembly shaders as opposed to DirectX high level shading language. But it is a good introduction to the topic and you can easily add support for HLSL to the engine.

It is also helpful that you can reach the author on the Gameversity.com website where he is lecturing courses about DirectX. He is providing updated files for use with the latest DirectX summer update 2004 and explains how to use the code from the CD to run the demos. The book might have its problems with the code on the CD but due to the support you get I can give it 4 stars.