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DIMEA2008 Tutorial Proposal

Developing a videogame: from concept to your TV

Kostas AnagnostouDepartment of Computer Science

Ionio Universityemail : kostasan@ionio.gr

Abstract

This tutorial provides a general introduction to the videogames development process in twosessions. In the first session, a brief background to the videogame industry, the history, thecurrent state, the value of videogames and the profile of the game player is provided. Thestate-of-the-art in videogame platforms and hardware as well as gameplay, effects andphysics simulation is presented. Development costs and ways to minimize them aresurveyed, and the pursuit for massmarket acceptance of videogames is discussed. In thesecond session, based on this background knowledge, the tutorial outlines the developmentprocess of a videogame, from concept, prototyping and funding to managing a development

team. The art pipeline is explained and software technology and tools used duringdevelopment are presented. Later stages of game development such as testing, localizationand publishing are discussed as well.

Tutorial Outline

Session 1 Background

A brief history of the videogame industry: How did it all start, the rise of the personalcomputer and the console as home entertainment systems, the influence of the Internet, themajor events that shaped the industry.

The current state of videogame industry: What is the state of videogames industry today,

the wide acceptance as an entertainment medium, the large publishing houses, themultimillion dollar budgets, the huge development teams.

The profile of the videogame player: Who plays videogames nowadays and why. Is thevideogames-only-for-boys myth actually true? The power of the female player. Whatgames/games platform prove to be more popular to each gender/age group. The types ofplayer (hardcore, casual) and the games they prefer to play.

The value of videogames: Videogames are not just for entertainment. They can educate,train, and recruit. A presentation of the emerging uses of videogames.

Developing costs, cost minimization and IP licensing: The larger game assets that thenext generation games require much larger development teams which in turn leads to greaterdeveloping costs and greater risks. The development houses/publisher try to minimize the

financial risk by reusing popular Intellectual Property (IP) such as Mario, Lara Croft, licensemovie characters and produce sequels of popular sports games. How does licensing ofgraphics engines help drive the costs further down and what is the impact they have tovideogame development.

State-of-the-art in hardware and videogame platforms: Nowadays videogamedevelopment houses have a large choice of game platforms to develop a game for. Apresentation of each platform, their hardware capabilities, their popularity. What are theirdifferences and which platform is easier to develop for. State-of the-art dedicated graphicshardware (GPUs) and physics acceleration hardware.

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State-of-the-art in graphics and physics simulation: A presentation of the state-of-the-artin rendering. What visual effects can we achieve today and how far we are from achievingphotorealism and totally realistic human and facial animation.

How can the new generation videogame platforms improve gameplay: Faster CPUs andGPUs, large memories, large hard drives, internet connectivity. How does the next generationof video game platform change the way we design (and play) games.

The hunt for mass acceptance of videogames: Console manufacturers aided bydevelopment houses and publishers increase hardware capabilities, monitor resolution, inventnew interfaces (Nintendo Wii), expand the game worlds in an attempt to attract themassmarket. Microsoft, Sony and Nintendo fight to place a console under every TV andplatforms to distribute digital content (movies, music, games, web content).

Independent developers: XNA, WiiWare, Personal Computers, the Internet. The way wedevelop and sell games changes, it is now possible for small teams to develop a game anddistribute it to the massmarket directly. The independent developer is on the rise again, apresentation of the opportunities that arise.

The future of videogames: What does the future hold for videogames. How will gameplayand the way we interact with a game change. How might game look in 10 years time. Will theway we develop games change in the future?

Session 2 The development process

It starts with an idea: Several concepts will be put to the table. The most promising will getthe go-ahead for prototyping. What makes a game idea appealing and choosing the targetaudience.

Prototyping your game: A prototype is a demonstration of the game concept in playableform. How is the prototype developed and what should it demonstrate.

Getting your game funded: A successful prototype may sell the game to the publishers.Which points should you pay attention to when pitching your game idea.

Putting together a development team - roles and responsibilities: What roles comprise adevelopment team, the hierarchy and their interaction. Managing a game development teamefficiently.

Choosing and getting to know your game platform - hardware strengths andweaknesses : Which game platform to choose? The game platform dictates several elementsof the game l ike graphics complexity, game interface and gameplay. Deep knowledge of thehardware intricacies is essential to efficiently utilise the power of the platform.

Creating game assets: Game assets include everything that will appear in a game (models,backgrounds, textures, sounds, music, animations). How do artists create the game assets,popular tools used.

Developing the game technology (rendering engine, physics engine, audio engine) :The various layers of software used for game development. Should the team write the gameframework from scratch or should they license one of the various middleware softwaresolutions? What is the available licensed technology and the advantages/disadvantages overin-house software solutions.

Game development tools for artists and programmers: Which programming tools doprogrammers use to develop the game/graphics engine? Which tools do the artists use tocreate the game assets? Which tools the game designers use to design the game?

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Digital asset management: Game assets for next generation games are huge. Efficient toolsare required to maintain the asset database efficiently and to allow fast updates and buildingof the assets to be used in the game. In house asset management technology versuscommercial tools.

The Art pipeline and the artist-developer interaction: The artists create the game assets(models, backgrounds, textures, sounds, music) using specialized tools. A large framework

exists to export the assets to game specific format and integrate them into the game.

Localizing the game the international market: It is a requirement from most publishersthat games should be localized to at least 8-9 common languages. This includes text, speech,audio and in-game graphics. Pitfalls that should be avoided during distribution of the game tointernational markets.

Testing: Testing of the game is one of the most crucial tasks that will happen during thedevelopment lifecycle. The types of testing that exist.

Publishing and post publishing game support: Getting your game published is not the endof the road. Frequently patches should be developed to fix bugs, and additional content maybe developed for the user to download.

Potential audience

The tutorial is an introduction to the videogame industry/development process for all. Noprevious knowledge of the field is required.

Authors resume

Kostas Anagnostou has a BSc in Computer Engineering and Informatics from the Universityof Patras, an MSc in Information Systems Engineering from UMIST (UK) and a PhD inComputer Science (Computer graphics and Image processing) from the University of Warwick(UK).

He has been a member of the Research and Development team at Microsoft Game Studios(UK) developing game technology for next generation consoles such as Xbox and Xbox360.He has a deep knowledge of game engine development, shading & lighting algorithms, GPUprogramming and efficient multicore CPU programming. He has worked on Conker: Live andReloadedvideogame for Xbox and Kameo: Elements of Fire, Perfect Dark Zeroand Forza 2videogames for Xbox360.

Currently he teaches the Computer Graphics, Virtual Reality, Digital Image Processing, andDigital Speech Processing courses at the Department of Computer Science, Ionio University.