Quickstart Guide to Game Design
A practical beginner’s guide to game design, focusing on small projects and core principles.
Understand the core principles of game design.
BOOKS FOR A DAY OF YOUR OWN
A window, a warm drink, and somewhere else to go. Settle into the catalogue and find a book for a little time indoors.
Book information. Reader perspectives. Direct retailer links.
A GOOD NEXT STEP
Start with something you want to understand.
02 / COMPAREChoose with confidence.Use the synopsis, book facts, and your own question.
03 / READMake room on the shelf.Find a title and follow its retailer link.
A NOTE FOR YOUR NEXT CHAPTER
Put your phone out of reach, mark a comfortable stopping point, and give a book a little uninterrupted time. Stop when you need to. The invitation matters more than the streak.
Explore this reading approachTHE BOOKS
A practical beginner’s guide to game design, focusing on small projects and core principles.
Understand the core principles of game design.
Learn generative AI through 101 focused projects using cutting-edge models like ChatGPT, Stable Diffusion, and transformers.
Master generative AI using step-by-step hands-on projects.
A fun, beginner‑friendly guide to building retro arcade games and boosting your creative confidence.
Learn the basics of building retro‑style arcade games.
Learn Neural Networks and Deep Learning with WebGPU and Compute Shaders provides a fresh and engaging entry point into one of the most dynamic a…
Master practical coding skills.
Data Mining and Machine Learning Essentials provides a fresh and engaging entry point into one of the most dynamic areas of modern tech.
Master practical coding skills.
Generative AI in 20 Minutes: (Coffee Break Series) provides a fresh and engaging entry point into one of the most dynamic areas of modern tech.
Master practical coding skills.
ANOTHER PERSPECTIVE
A superb guide. The examples are small but complete.
I came to this book already familiar with the basics, and it still had plenty to offer. Some of the diagrams are dense and I had to reread a few sections, though that may just be me. A couple of chapters felt like they could have been merged, but that is a minor complaint. The index and cross-references are surprisingly good, which matters for a book I will come back to. I have already recommended it to two colleagues and will recommend it to more.
Good value. Not perfect, but I would buy another book from this author.
This is the third book I have read on artificial intelligence this year, and it is comfortably the best of them. The author avoids over-explaining, which keeps the pace up but means you need to pay attention. I appreciated the honesty about what the book does not cover — it saved me from expecting things that were not there. The author is unusually honest about where the simplifications break down, which I appreciated. Worth picking up if you already have the basics. Set realistic expectations and you will get a lot out of it.
Worth every page. I have already recommended it to two colleagues.
I read this over a couple of weekends alongside a small side project, which turned out to be the ideal way to approach it. The chapters on game development are the strongest — the examples are stripped down but complete, and I could follow along without constant guessing. I found myself making notes in the margins, which is always a good sign. If you have the prerequisites, this is an easy recommendation. I will be keeping it on my desk rather than the shelf.
BEYOND THE BOOKSHELF
The proposed class action alleges Meta illegally harvested people’s Facebook and Instagram photos to train its AI image-generation models and to build its unreleased “NameTag” face recognition feature.
Read at www.wired.comSome dangerous biology looks much like legitimate research, complicating AI safeguards.
Read at feeds.arstechnica.com"Think not you can direct the course of love, for love, if it finds you worthy, directs your course."
Read at www.themarginalian.orgChoose something you want to settle into, without setting a finishing deadline.