What s in This Book?

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What's in This Book?

This book is written for programmers of all skill levels. Some readers will want to jump immediately to a specific section, while others will want to read the book in a linear fashion. To make it easy, each language section starts with a chapter of introduction that covers the basics of syntax and style and then follows up with chapters in which I'll go into more depth. Each language is presented in a similar way, so that it is easy to skip around and hit the sections in the book that interest you most.

Part One is an introduction to high-level languages. It outlines the features of high-level languages, summarizes their history, and touches on game shops and projects that use them. This part also covers specific similarities of Python, Lua, and Ruby syntax and discusses features like common functions, string handling, data types, comments, and arrays and lists.

Parts Two, Three, and Four jump into the languages themselves , first with a speedy overview and quick tour, then with specific multimedia libraries, common commands, and the scripting of a few games . The parts wrap up with a discussion of a few of the popular game engines, projects, and industry examples. Part Two belongs to Python, Part Three is Lua's, and Part Four covers Ruby.

Part Five focuses on extending game programming into even more languagesa powerful ability each of these languages shareand then wraps up the book with how high-level languages fit into the development cycle.

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