Best way for teenager to learn to develop a game
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I'd like my 14-year old (a keen gamer) to develop a game, whilst he's off-school for the next few months. He's learnt some Python at school (which he enjoys), but that's it.
Can anyone recommend a good environment he can get into? Maybe something like Unreal Engine (first Google result). I'd like something that is quick and easy to get going ideally, as I'm having trouble inspiring him to give anything a go. As a kid, I loved writing games for my ZX Spectrum (in Basic, never got into Assembly). He's very artistic, so I'd like something that inspires him from a graphical design perspective.
Ideally, I'd love something that he could work on collaboratively online with his best mate.
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Does he like action aventure RPGs? https://www.solarus-games.org
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Depends on what sort of games and what part of development as there's several parts of game development. Coding, graphics etc
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@flaxking said in Best way for teenager to learn to develop a game:
Does he like action aventure RPGs? https://www.solarus-games.org
That's pretty cool
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Thanks, he's going to take a look at solarus. He does like 2D, he loves Terraria.
His favourite game is Dota 2. He wants to become a developer, so anything that will teach him to code is great, but he's also studying art, so anything that helps develop his art skills is also educational. I'm trying to find something that he can get in to whilst stuck at home, but will also help him educationally.
Keep the suggestions coming please.
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Check out RPGMaker, if he likes 2D classic RPGs. Like Final Fantasy. Good "starter kit" and makes good games. Thousands of games on Steam made with that.
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@scottalanmiller said in Best way for teenager to learn to develop a game:
Check out RPGMaker, if he likes 2D classic RPGs. Like Final Fantasy. Good "starter kit" and makes good games. Thousands of games on Steam made with that.
You can do a lot of dicking around on RPGMaker without learning actual skills, at least that was my experience as a youngster.
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@Carnival-Boy Sorry, but if he were really into learning how to program or work with games, not just play them, he would have done that already. Not wild horses could have kept him away. I bet you had the same level of interest when you were a kid.
Perhaps help him develop his artistic side instead, if that is what interests him.
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@flaxking said in Best way for teenager to learn to develop a game:
@scottalanmiller said in Best way for teenager to learn to develop a game:
Check out RPGMaker, if he likes 2D classic RPGs. Like Final Fantasy. Good "starter kit" and makes good games. Thousands of games on Steam made with that.
You can do a lot of dicking around on RPGMaker without learning actual skills, at least that was my experience as a youngster.
That's true, but also true of most anything.
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@Pete-S said in Best way for teenager to learn to develop a game:
@Carnival-Boy Sorry, but if he were really into learning how to program or work with games, not just play them, he would have done that already. Not wild horses could have kept him away. I bet you had the same level of interest when you were a kid.
Perhaps help him develop his artistic side instead, if that is what interests him.
This is, sadly, probably true. Programming isn't something you generally desire because of liking games. The two are so wildly unrelated. Lots of gamers like to program, lots of programmers like to game, but the love of one doesn't relate to the other.
Like lots of basketball players like food. Lots of food eaters like to play basketball. They overlap a lot, but aren't related.
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Like I said above, he likes programming Python, nothing to do with gaming.
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@Carnival-Boy said in Best way for teenager to learn to develop a game:
Like I said above, he likes programming Python, nothing to do with gaming.
Well, keep him on that track then. Maybe a raspberry pi and some cool hardware connected to it like LED matrices or robotics or something.
It's fun to program when you can watch something happen in the real world as well. Not just moving values from a spreadsheet to a database.
There are tons of resources online for Python projects on the RPI since that is the "official" language of the RPI.
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@Carnival-Boy said in Best way for teenager to learn to develop a game:
Like I said above, he likes programming Python, nothing to do with gaming.
Good deal, then. Then Python game programming is likely the place to start. Leverage what he likes.
