Basic Video Game Development

William Kendrick, President, Linux Users' Group of Davis (www.lugod.org)

Stevenson Hall 1300
12:00 PM - 12:50 PM

First time game programmers should be careful not to delve directly into development of massively multiplayer online role playing games, but should first start with the basics: snake game, 2D mazes, and simple space shooters. Bill Kendrick, who never really got BEYOND such simple but addictive games, will discuss the very basics of game design and development. Using the popular OpenSource 'Simple DirectMedia Layer' library (www.libSDL.org), he'll construct a simple interactive action game in the C programming language. SDL's advantages include cost, simplicity, wide usage and support, numerous add-on libraries, and the ability to target many popular Operating Systems, including Linux, Windows, MacOS and OS X, BeOS, classic Amiga, and even the Sega Dreamcast video gameconsole.