Customer Reviews

The Game Maker's Apprentice: Game Development for Beginners (Book & CD)

5 star:		(53)
4 star:		(11)
3 star:		(2)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(2)

 

 

My 12 year old son got interested in how computers work and especially how computer games get written. Being a software developer myself, I however could not explain him well these topics in a language that would be easily understood by a kid. And I am not a game programming expert, so I simply don't know how this stuff is written.

When I first saw this book, I was not sure if it would be suitable for a kid. But I decided to take a risk, since the book had a lot of illustrations and language did not seem to be very technical. I gave it to my son two days ago, and I can see alredy now that this was an excellent gift: he used all weekend on reading chapters from the book, trying making his first games, calling his parents all the time to show us his achievement. He even found a forum for game development, asked questions, received answers and made improvements in his first programs based on discussion results! And by the way - English is a foreign language for him.

I wish all books for beginners was written in a such entertaining way.

The title should be The Game Maker's Master Teacher! This book is very well written with clear, step by step instructions and visual images for reference. After completing a section, the authors provide a graphic of what your computer screen should look like if you followed directions correctly. My son, 9, and I worked through the first chapter over a 2 day period (about 3 hours total) and created our first game. He was thrilled! He immediately had ideas on how to "tweak" the game to make it even better. The great thing with this book and accompanying software is that you have the freedom to do so! The disc provides many images to use in game development or you can create your own. Each chapter adds new skills and details to make more interesting and complex games. However, even the first game is fun!

I would highly reccommend this book to anyone interested in creating your own video games. It is extremely user friendly and perfect for the beginner. My son is able to read through and understand it on his own, but it's more fun to work on it together. (Also, he was more apt to use the visuals to take him through the process but not read the supporting information along the way!) By the end of the first chapter he understood the process fairly well and was able to remember (more than me!) most of the steps as he started creating his own new game. The only improvement I could see is having a "quick reference" page outlining the major steps. With it's user-friendly format, however, it has been pretty easy to flip back through the chapter for reference.

The Game Maker's Apprentice has to be one of my most eagerly awaited Computer Book purchases for quite sometime. The fabulous presentation and great use of terminology, really makes it a joy to read. Each chapter guides you through gently, in order to achieve more confidence into creating your own game or project. Each page is colourful and the beautiful illustrations brings things to life.

The book is accompanied by a great CD with all of the examples, resources and Game Maker itself, which is really easy to get into. Within no time at all, you'll get used to it's interface and workings. The tutorials start you off with the basics and progressively bring you to the wonderfully powerful Game Maker Language (GML). So not only can you create games using a Drag 'n' Drop interface, you can also use a powerful programming language as well. All of this is included in the unregistered version, but by paying an ever so reasonable registration fee, you unlock the full potential of Game Maker.

I used Game Maker to create my first ever PC game, Bugsy. The Game Maker Forum helped me out when I came across a problem or a bug I couldn't resolve. There a lots of games and projects created with this wonderful program. You will also find many other sites across the Internet that provide helpful advice and tutorials. Not forgetting the official Game Maker site run and hosted by Mark Overmars.

The books co-writer, Jacob Habgood, has made a marvellous job along side Mark, to make this a very interesting book indeed.

You might also be interested to know, that another book covering the Game Maker theme, Basic Game Design and Creation by Namu Swamy is available as well. This also brings you to the Game Maker stable to learn some very easy steps into the basics of game design without it appearing too boring or tiresome.

Your gaming ideas and projects start here !

I downloaded Game Maker 7.0 and read its manual prior to purchasing this book.

My hope was that it would fill in the "holes" not explained by the program manual.

First, the good.

The book gives an excellent explanation of program logic and keeps things simple and effective for any experience level.

I also liked the fact that you could read the book and see examples without actually completing the tutorials.

I especially liked the way the book would demonstrate a particular game tutorial with an easy-to-read flow chart.

So if you didn't understand the Game Maker's manual this book IS for you.

Here is where my 3.5 star rating comes in.

I paid about $25 for the book to go beyond the program manual.

The book had a couple of the tutorials that were listed on Yo-Yo games web site. I don't like the idea of paying for something that is provided for free. However, it gave a better explanation of Game Maker's interface.

Although you can make a fully functioning game without programming, I was hoping for more guidance on Game Maker Language (GML), which you will need in fine tuning games created with Game Maker.

I was also hoping for more variety in the tutorials. Not everyone may want to make an action oriented game. For example, I wanted to make a little board game, but that isn't discussed in the book. Hopefully, it will be covered in the next edition or another book.

I still recommend the book, but make sure you are getting it for the right reasons. Review the PDF file and sample text carefully looking at the table of contents and index. You might be able to accomplish your goals by reading Game Maker's manual and looking through the forums.

There is no question this is the best book available to teach a beginner how to write a computer game. There is not even a close second place. Within minutes, a beginner can start working on writing a game, within hours he will have learned enough to write his own great looking game and within days he can create programs that have a polished look and feel.

Congratuations to the author. This book and the included program have hooked my kids and opened up the world of computer programming to them.

If I ran a school, a computer course would be offered using this as its textbook.

I use this book as a textbook on Game Maker, which is one of the modules in my Advanced Technology class for Middle School Students. It is absolutely perfect for this age group. The CD provides all the necessary support resources so we don't lose time and interest having to build sprites, objects, and rooms. Before I taught the whole class, I gave the book to one of the brighter students. He was able to build the Evil Clutches game working completely independent of the class, having only the book. This confirmed to me that the book can be used by beginners. The book is so well done that all I have to do is facilitate the class and provide help to students who have questions. It also provides the completed games that I show to those students who need to see the completed product to understand the concepts.

This book is an excellent resource for learning the fundamentals of game programming and the logic necessary to be successful at it. The book is well written, easy to follow and understand. The tutorials are fun and the games you create, while relatively simple, are quite enjoyable. The 3 or so chapters on game development are also sound and offer some excellent insight into making a good game. The Game Maker software included with the book, with it's built in programming language, is surprisingly powerful and intuitive. Additionally, Game Maker has a very strong on-line presence and has an extremely active forum for asking questions that aren't covered, or are beyond the scope of the book. (And it's all free too!!)

I really can't say enough good things about this book\CD package. The book is well done and the Game Maker software really makes it fun to learn programming, which is soemthing you won't hear often about other "learn-how-to-program" books.

I started using Game Maker and then five days later got this book -- what a help. My high school students are going to love learning to build their own games. Along the way, they will master most of the principles of object oriented programming without even knowing it. If this book (and software) had been available when I was their age, I might seriously have considered a career in programming or game design. This book makes it easy for students to rapidly add a series of successful projects to their portfolio -- AND they will be ready to move into an object-oriented programming language by the end.

I bought this book mainly to relearn the basics in Game Maker, and work my way into more advanced levels of GM programming, like AI and Multiplayer. I was quite pleased with the colorful graphics and easy reading of this book.

Bottom Line - If you own Game Maker, I suggest you buy this book along with the registered version of Game Maker, which is ad free and lets you perform the more complicated functions by unlocking them (multiplayer, particles, 3D, etc.) However, the book is compatable with the free version too! If you dont own Game Maker, this book still has many good sections about proper game design; quite helpful in laying out your games!

You wont be Disappointed!

As a teacher of game making to high school students, I cannot commend this book highly enough. Game making is a rapidly expanding area included in most forward thinking school curricula, enabling students to engage with learning in new and exciting ways. Through game making students can learn critical thinking skills, problem solving, logic & mathematical reasoning and much more. This book supports the teaching of game making and should be included in the toolbox for all teachers wanting students who are excited about their learning.
The Game Maker's Apprentice contains step by step instructions, presented in a clear and attractive way, to create 9 great games using the freely available Game Maker software. My students are so desperate to get hold of my copy that I have had to order five more, so that they can get started at the earliest possible opportunity. The book leads the learner in a clear but gentle way to develop all the foundation skills necessary to begin designing and making their own games. Game design theory is developed alongside the example games. An added bonus is the included CD containing the Game Maker software, resources needed to build the games and examples completed to a number of different stages.
The Game Maker's Apprentice is a quality presentation, printed on good quality paper with excellent graphics, making it highly attractive to use. Although there is an electronic version available, the print version is so attractive it is worth getting. A must for every classroom!