Pre-Production Of Game Development

Summer Bates

Games Design L3

Pre-production. What do I need before I start to produce a game?!

Hardware

Computers

Windows computer – used to develop games (Most common). Linux and Macs are also used. You need a PC or Dev kit to be able to test these developed games to search for any problems it may have.

A Mac costs roughly around £899, A good Windows PC would cost around £500, A Linux would also cost around £500. These prices vary A LOT!

Peripherals

If you are wanting to produce a game for IOS, then you are going to need every IOS product in order to be able to test it on each device to make sure there are no bugs and no crashes. You may also need to purchase certain gaming controllers if you want to test them on a Dev Kit.

Dev Kits

A Dev kit is a system that allows you to test your game to see if there are any bugs or to see if it crashes at certain points of the game, these NEED to be used before it gets published on the official store.

Dev kits for Xbox tend to be free but you have to go through a long process in order to obtain one. PSN charge around $2,500 for a Dev                                                        kit, but they also give away free Dev kits to certain developers.

< XBOX ONE DEV KIT: This allows you to test your games that you develop!

Software - Game Development

UDK – Unreal Development Kit (Unreal Engine). 

Games like Bioshock were created using UDK!

Windows 7 64-bit or Mac OS X 10.9.2 or later Quad-core Intel or AMD processor, 2.5 GHz or faster NVIDIA GeForce 470 GTX or AMD Radeon 6870 HD series card or higher 8 GB RAM

UDK IS A FREE SOFTWARE!

Unity. Popular games like Angry Birds and Kerbal Space Programme were created using Unity!

For development: Windows XP SP2+, 7 SP1+, 8, 10; Mac OS X 10.8+. Graphics card with DX9 (shader model 2.0) capabilities. Anything made since 2004 should work.

For playing Unity games: OS: Windows XP+, Mac OS X 10.7+, Ubuntu 12.04+, SteamOS+. Graphics card: DX9 (shader model 2.0) capabilities; generally everything made since 2004 should work.

UNITY IS A FREE SOFTWARE!

Game Maker. This is used by people who are NEW to game developing, some games that were created via this software have been available on Steam! Costs $155.

Windows XP or above, 512MB RAM, 128MB graphics, Screen resolution of 1024×60, Internet connection for some features.

Maya. This is used to create characters and other 3D objects that you would find in the world that you are creating!

64-bit Intel® or AMD® multi-core processor, Graphics Hardware - RAM: 4 GB of RAM (8GB recommended), Disk Space: 4GB of free disk space for install, Pointing Device: Three-button mouse, Microsoft® Windows® 7 (SP1), Windows® 8 and Windows® 8.1 Professional operating system, Apple® Mac OS® X 10.8.5 and 10.9.x operating system, Red Hat® Enterprise Linux® 6.2 WS operating system, Fedora™ 14 Linux operating system, CentOS 6.2 Linux operating system.

MAYA COSTS £97 PER MONTH!

Publishing - Every game developer wants their work out there! They all want to make money! But you have to spend some to earn some.

Steam Greenlight

In order to publish a game to Steam (Greenlight) you have to pay a fee of $100 (£70). 

http://store.steampowered.com/app/219820 <- Pay the fee to publish!

ID@Xbox

An indie game costs around $5000 to publish to Xbox One, and in order to publish a bigger game you will need to contact Microsoft and write a game proposal and if they agree with it they will consider putting it on the store for a reasonable fee.

PSN

To publish to PSN you need to contact them directly, you have to have a company as they do not accept games that have been made by one individual. After you have contacted them about your game, they then decide whether or not it should be put on the PlayStation console or the PlayStation Vita. You have to pay a fee that they set. Sometimes, if they like the game, they will help out with the marketing costs and put a post on their Twitter/Facebook page in order to advertise your game.