Game-Making Resources
Making a game is hard. Below are some resources to help you get started, collected from a variety of sites. Be sure to follow any licensing requirements the sources have:
Tools
- Ludum Dare tools list: the Ludum Dare game making community list of tools
- PROCJAM resources: the resources from PROCJAM (the procedural content generation game), great for any effort to make a procedural game
- Palette generator and Sprite-based tile generator: example results from PROCJAM
- as3fxr and bfxr: sound effect synthesizers
- Twine and Inform7: tools for text-based games - why not make killer text-based AI?
- Procedural Toolkit: general toolkit for making procedural generation systems
- libtcod: a dedicated rogue-like library and its Python tutorial
- T-Engine: a Lua rogue-like game engine
- rot.js: a Javascript rogue-like toolkit
Tutorials
- youcanmakevideogames: great tips and pointers to additional resources for putting together a game
- Procedural Content Generation tutorial: the getting started guide from PROCJAM
- Unity3D 2D roguelike tutorial: how can AI mix up the rogue-like?
Assets
- OpenGameArt.org: open art collection including sprites, models, sounds, and more
- Glitch Art Assets: public domain art assets from the canceled Glitch game
- Oryx's sprite sets: sprite sets for a small cost that allow commercial use
- freesound: free sound effects
- incompetech: tons of free music
- Sonniss's free game audio: free sound effects
Example Games
- Contrabot: play as a smuggler trying to secretly label boxes to communicate with a contact on the other side of a customs checkpoint; example of simple machine learning as core mechanic
- Infinite Refraction: procedural generation of game level sequences; example of logic checking as main game system
- Prom Week: shape the lives of a group of highschool students in the most dramatic week of their highschool career; example of social simulation
- Facade: play a longtime friend of a married couple as you become entangled in the high-conflict dissolution of their marriage; example of AI social agents
- Warning Forever: 2D shoot-'em-up about an endless stream of bosses, each one resisting how you slew the last; example of adaptation as a core mechanic
Unity3D Libraries
- Finite State Machine infrastructure: basic architecture to implement a finite state machine (e.g. as used for Pacman ghost AI); courtesy Sebastian Monroy
- Timer class: useful for controlling coroutines and state machine transitions; courtesy AJ Kolenc
- Touchscreen Input Library (courtesy Sebastian Monroy) and Unity input manager: managing basic Unity3D input
- Convex Polygonal Mesh Generator: useful for not having to bother creating basic shapes for your prototypes; courtesy AJ Kolenc
- Craft (Constrained RAndom FloaTs): useful in procedural content generation for getting random numbers limited by constraints; courtesy Dr. Ian Horswill
AI Implementations
- Finite State Machine infrastructure: basic architecture to implement a finite state machine (e.g. as used for Pacman ghost AI); courtesy Sebastian Monroy
- Timer class: useful for controlling coroutines and state machine transitions; courtesy AJ Kolenc
- Flocking: elegant movement behavior for flocks of creatures
- Mendel (Genetic Algorithms): optimize discrete content to a given function; useful in procedural content generation to optimize for something like 'quality'
- C# HTN planner: set up agent (or drama manager or ...) behavior as made of subtasks that it tries to solve; more info