Setting Up Your Game Studio


Before we can make anything, we need to have the proper equipment. And while it may sound expensive, setting up a game development studio doesn’t have to be. With Moore’s Law (this basically predicts that the processing power of computers will double every 18 months) continuing to hold true, the cost of computers continues to plummet. There are great deals for relatively powerful computers everywhere you look.

To go along with the cheap computers and low-cost hardware, there recently has been a movement toward software that lends itself to a small game developer. In the past couple of years, this trend has continued, offering game development tools that can be used without any programming. When you are setting up your game studio, there are several factors that will contribute to the type of equipment you need to have. Fortunately, you may already have the essentials of a game studio—a computer and this book—however, we will look closer at how to determine if what you have is enough and the best way to determine what more you may need.

There is a wide range of computers available from which an aspiring game developer can choose. Trying to determine which system you need can be a daunting task. One way to look at this problem is to compare it to the purchase of other items, such as an automobile. For instance, if you were driving six kids to school, driving in a road race, or driving into combat, what vehicle would you choose? Computers are similar to vehicles in this respect. While a minivan, a racecar, and a jeep all have four wheels, they are all designed for very different purposes. So the big question for you is, what will you be doing with your computer? You may not be able to answer this question adequately until you have worked through this book and tried the different types of things you will have to do on your computer as a game developer. Once you have worked a bit in the various applications and learned their specific needs, as well as your needs as a user, you will know what kind of a system you will need to buy.

One thing to consider while working on your currently available system is the system requirements for the applications you will be using or intend to use. These requirements are usually clearly stated on the box, in ads, and on the home pages of the product. Usually the system requirements are broken down into minimum and recommended.

Usually the minimum system requirements are just that—the bare minimum to run the application. The minimum system will usually not be the most comfortable or even the most useable system to run the application and does not take into account other applications that you may be running at the same time. Let’s say that the minimum RAM requirement for your art application is 16 MB, but you plan on running other applications at the same time (and you will as a game developer), such as a level editor, game engine, word processor, and 3D application. Your system will be severely taxed and may run poorly, if at all. And the minimum system does not usually take into account the files you will be working with. If you have experience with image editing applications such as Photoshop or Paint Shop Pro, you know that files can range from a few hundred kilobytes to over 50 megabytes, depending on what you are working on. While you can open and close applications that are not in use, this takes time (especially with slow, RAM-deficient machines) and will severely cut into your productivity and workflow.

Another area you should watch is the recommended hard drive space that the application needs for installation. This does not take into account anything you make with the application, only the application itself, so you need to take this into consideration as well. The processor speed is another variable that you should look at, which again includes only the speed to run the application and does not take into account larger files.




Awesome 3d Game Development(c) No Programming Required
Awesome 3d Game Development: No Programming Required (Charles River Media Game Development)
ISBN: 1584503254
EAN: 2147483647
Year: 2006
Pages: 168

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