GSP220 Math for Game Programming:
Going into this class I wasn’t really sure what to expect. I was hoping to take out of it some of the math concepts that I would need to program games but I ended up with a lot more. I had taken up to Pre-Cal in High School so none of the concepts were really new to me, although I did need a refresher for some, but I learned a lot about how they relate to game programming. One of my favorite things was working from the first couple weeks on our Point class, then building on that for the Vector class, and finally using that along with our Matrix class to play with the shapes for the final project. I had heard the class was a lot different with other professors and I think that our class got a lot out of it that wouldn’t normally have been offered. Although this was not a C++ class and a lot of what was going on in the program we looked at was over my head, having a chance to put my hands in it and play with what’s going on was very interesting. Not to mention the things we were able to do with what we learned about matrices was just awesome.
I was very comfortable with the pacing and structure of the class, but I think that was largely due to having a basic understanding of the math and C++ coming into the class. If I had to find a flaw in the class I think it would be that some people were overwhelmed by what was going on. To improve this, the school could make a C++ class a pre- or even a co-requisite for this class. All in all though, I got a lot out of this class and had a lot of fun doing it, I’m very glad to have taken it when I did.
GSP240 Fundamentals of Game Design:
Game Design was the first class I’ve taken at DeVry that I was really excited about when I signed up for it. Having a chance to learn about the game development process was a very interesting process. In addition to all the technical terms for things that I already knew I learned a lot about what goes into making games in a professional environment and the kind of effort that needs to be put into each and every game, even though most of the games that will be pitched won’t ever be made. Professor Maynes also brought a lot to the class that had nothing to do with the book, such as the importance of pitching the game and being confident in telling stories and presenting in front of a group in a highly stressful environment. Although I did know a lot of the concepts that were explained particularly in the last chapters that were covered in class, having an actual knowledge about it is better than the general understanding I had going into this. There was also a lot that had to do with the way levels are designed and the type of information that needs to be done before any work can start on a game.
My favorite part of the class was working on our own game as well as seeing everybody else’s presentations. Working on our game and being able to play off of each other’s ideas was a lot of fun and interesting to see what we came up with. The presentation itself was also an important learning process because the Professor gave the class as a whole feedback that I had never heard in a class before. Learning about what works and what doesn’t work in a Power Point presentation was a nice bonus to the other things I learned in the class. To improve the class I would have loved to have more time to spend tweaking and refining our game, including more than one presentation to see how everyone’s game changed over time, but that isn’t going to be possible with the semester changes that DeVry is adopting.
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