Summary

Although you didn't get to wrap your hands around any example code, this lesson served as an important starting point for learning the basics of game development. The goal of this lesson was to help you direct your brain power toward the primary issues involved in designing a game at a conceptual level. You found out about the essential game design concepts required to get started down the path to creating your own games . You also learned about object-oriented programming (OOP), and why it is important for game development. The lesson concluded by introducing you to the different kinds of development tools commonly found in the arsenal of the game programmer.

Hour 2, "A Windows Game Programming Primer," introduces you to Windows programming with a slant toward games. You learn the basics of the Windows API, and what it has to offer for the game developer. More importantly, you develop a skeletal Windows application that will form the basis of games you create throughout the remainder of the book.