Games Programming

[Azuen]

I just finished my second year studying Computer Science at university and am currently doing a work placement year as part of my course. The job is mostly IT support, so I was thinking to keep my programming skills sharp that it would be a good idea to to start doing something I've wanted to try for a while: games programming.

I was wondering if anyone had any recommendations on resources (software / books) that I should look into getting. I also took a look on Amazon and this book looked fairly interesting.

 

[Stuxnet]

The best way, IMHO, to get into game programming is to become an expert at the tools and languages that the professionals use. This partly depends on what kind of programming you want to do. Do you want to do engine development? If so, which subsystem of the engine do you want to focus on? Graphics? Sound? Networking? If you want to be a gameplay programmer, you should know the target engine's architecture and/or scripting language like the back of your hand. For instance, if you want to work with the Unreal Engine, then you should be learning UScript by creating small projects for yourself to get acquainted with it. Once you're comfortable with it, join a mod team that has professional-level members (so you know it will get finished and you'll have published work for your portfolio).

When you shoot for a job, they'll want to see your claimed abilities demonstrated in published works. This not only shows that you know your stuff, but more importantly, that you're tenacious enough to finish what you start - which is the biggest challenge in software development, especially games.

Good luck