Computer Games Development (Summer 2023/2024)

Contents

The course gives a complex overview of computer games development. It covers programming (middleware for games, scripting languages, etc.), game design, project management, game marketing and also briefly touches basics of computer graphics for non-programmers. This is a joint course for students from multiple faculties and universities. In the course, the students create their own small game in small teams of 3-4 students. Every team is given own exclusive mentor who is a professional game developer. Many lectures are led by game development professionals and a mini game development conference is organized as part of the course. The lectures will likely be given in English.

Main parts of the course are led by Otakar Nieder (Virtuos)Martin Klíma (Warhorse Studios)Vojtěch Černý, Lukáš Kolek and Cyril Brom (CUNI).

The course is open for MFF UK students as well as (a limited number of) students from FF UK, ČVUT, FAMU, ZČU Plzeň and VŠUP Praha.


News

Follow the appropriate channel at Gamedev Discord!
https://discord.gg/FaZAAAdCbe


ORGANIZATION

  1. First of all, be sure to have fun!
  2. The Fun starts at 2024/Feb/23 at 9:00 AM in S5 + Discord (channel AUDITORIUM). Mark this in your calendar. YOU MUST ATTEND THIS INTRODUCTORY LECTURE. We are going to tell you EXTREMELY IMPORTANT organization information, which WILL NOT BE REPEATED AGAIN.
  3. Read about the Grading (the scoring system), Team rules and Mini-grant applications at the second half of this (not so short) page.
  4. Subscribe to the Gamedev Matfyz Discord (Deadline: the day of the first lecture!) .
  5. If you have Facebook, stay connected with our FB page.
  6. Attend networking events that are organized during evenings (see schedule below).
  7. Decide on a game you want to make, find or form a team and as a team give a pitch presentation about your idea.
  8. Mind the Team rules at the bottom of this page. Deadline for forming the team comes quite quick (see below). Fill in your bio into this shared spreadsheet, which serves both us and you to track who is part of this course and especially who does not have a team yet.
  9. Meet all deadlines, attend all mandatory events.
  10. Create a magnificent game prototype!
  11. Present your game prototype during the Presentation day (see deadline below).
  12. The grade is given by the points you accumulate (see below). The biggest part (up to 50 points) is given based on the final quality of your game and its presentation, assessed by the committee consisting of academia representatives and industry professionals. 


SCHEDULE

Note that end-times can vary!

Schedule Legend Lectures / Blocks / Consultations / Events
(mandatory for everybody
if not stated otherwise)
Deadlines
(be sure to meet them)
Optional events
(you do not have to attend those,
but they are featured as interesting
opportunities)
Date Entry Place Notes
Fri
2024/Feb/23
(9:00-12:10)
Introductory lecture
(for everybody, mandatory)
S5 Led by Otakar Nieder, Martin Klíma and Vojtěch Černý.
Extremely important to attend.
Thu
2024/Feb/29
(19:00-24:00)
Team-Building
(for everybody, optional)
Geekárna Real-world networking over boardgames! We invite you to geekárna, to meet, chat & play board games. It is intended for people to form teams at this event, so try to mingle with as many people as you can! Teams must feature members from different schools/faculties! The team-composition shall finalize over the following two weeks, so if you can’t attend, find your team in class / over Discord.
Fri
2024/Mar/01
(9:00-12:10)
Block: Presentations
(for everybody, mandatory)
S5 Led by Vojtěch Černý and Lukáš Kolek. This block is targeted to develop your presentation skill wrt. to the upcoming evening where you have to pitch you game idea to the mentors.
Mandatory accompanying material: GDC video, Example formats of pitch presentations 1 and 2. Slides here.
Sun
2024/Mar/03
Deadline: be at Discord
(for everybody)
Sign-up to our discord!
Fill out this questionnaire about your team (non-final).
Fri
2024/Mar/08
(9:00-12:10)
Block: Design
(for everybody, mandatory)
S5 Led by Viktor Bocan. Slides from 2016, Stash of example GDDs
Wed
2024/Mar/13
Deadline: Team Registration
(for everybody)
Register formally your team by filling out this form.
Fri
2024/Mar/15
(9:00-12:10)
May change
Block: Production
(for everybody, mandatory)
S5 Led by Martin Klíma.
Thu
2024/Mar/21
(18:30-20:00)
Pitch Session
(for everybody, mandatory)
Klub FAMU Pitch Session where your team will be presenting an idea for a game you would like to make in front of your future mentors. Prepared to be asked tough questions about your game idea!
In your team, prepare a pitch presentation, max 5 minutes long! Aim for 3 minutes! (You will the most likely be nervous and talk slower than usual.)
See pitch presentation tips and example pitch presentations from 2016: Black sun, Press to play, 2017: Toasty Conquest, Tenebris, 2018: Silicomrades, Straitjacket
Thu
2024/Mar/21
(20:30-23:00)
Meet your mentors!
(for everybody, mandatory)
Klub FAMU We will all conclude the day with a glass of [fill in your favorite drink] talking with your mentors about project management and game development. In the end, each team will figure out their own Discord (or other means of communication), so you can use it later on.
Fri
2024/Mar/22
(9:00-12:10)
May change
Block: Programming
(mandatory for programmers only)
S5 Led by Otakar Nieder.
Wed
2024/Mar/27
Deadline: GDD
(for everybody)
Every team has to submit a GDD for their game. You have to follow given template. GDD examples from 2016, 2017. Submit them to (all via CC): otakar.nieder@gmail.com, cerny@gamedev.cuni.cz, lukaskolek@live.com and anatolij.dzjuba@gmail.com
Wed
2024/Mar/27
Deadline: Minigrant Applications
(for every team that is interested in getting a mini-grant)
You can ask for renting HW, such as VR headsets; this is a deadline for applications.
Fri
2024/Apr/05
(9:00-12:00, 30 minutes per team)
May change
Consultations: First round
(for everybody, mandatory, whole team must attend)
S5 Led by Otakar Nieder, Anatolij Dzjuba, Vojtěch Černý and Lukáš Kolek.
Sun
2024/May/05
Deadline: Game Prototype Alpha Submit us you game prototype alpha version.
Mainly send us binaries, you may use a release posted on github, or use a service like uschovna.czwetransfer.com share via GDrive, or do anything a sane person would do to submit your prototypes to (via CC): otakar.nieder@gmail.com, anatolij.dzjuba@gmail.com, cerny@gamedev.cuni.cz, lukaskolek@live.com
Fri
2024/May/10
(9:00-12:00, 30 minutes per team)
Consultations: Second round
(for everybody, whole team must attend)
S5 Led by Otakar Nieder, Anatolij Dzjuba, Vojtěch Černý and Lukáš Kolek
Mon
2024/Jun/5
Deadline: Game Prototype Beta
(for everybody)
Submit us your game prototype beta version. Use a service like uschovna.cz or wetransfer.com to submit your beta to all following emails: otakar.nieder@gmail.com, cerny@gamedev.cuni.cz, martin.klima@warhorsestudios.cz, lukaskolek@live.com, anatolij.dzjuba@gmail.com
2024/Jun/11
(17:00-??:??, 10 minutes per team)
May change
Final Presentations!
(for everybody, mandatory)
Cirkulární Hub of Kampus Hybernská Present the final version of your game.
Evaluated by Otakar Nieder, Martin Klíma, Anatolij Dzjuba, Petr Mácha, Vojtěch Černý and Lukáš Kolek.

Teams

Each team should have 3 – 4 people, 4 is an ideal number, 5 is a bit too many but acceptable occasionally. Members of the team must be from at least two different faculties. Every team must have at least one programmer, it is better to have two. Ideally, every team should have at least one creative guy/gal. There can be at max 1 person from FF UK in each team. (Students from FF UK should not flock together!)

Deadline for forming teams is: 2024/Mar/13 at the latest! You should start forming teams ASAP, ideally right after the first lecture.

We advise you to write your name into this spreadsheet that can be used to quickly check who still does not have a team…


Deadlines

All deadlines are here to be met!

As in game industry itself, all deadlines are strict. If not stated otherwise, deadline means the very day till 23:59:59 (CEST). If you are unable to deliver, you have to mail us in advance explaining your problems. If you mail us after the deadline, you’re doomed (well not literally, you will not receive points, but that may ultimately lead to failing the course).

Piece of advice to teams (and their leaders), make sure all your team members is committing to deadlines, otherwise they might lose motivation working on the project if they found out they will not be able to receive A…


Project

In this year, your goal will be to develop a small game that can compete with other existing games on an international level. Creating such game is a question of good game design and 15-30 days of programming and graphics making. You can check on projects from previous years 2015, 2016, 2017, 2018, 2019, 2021. We will require you to form a team, write a Game Design Document (the link contains a template with instructions) and implement the game according to it. Finally, you will have to present and defend your game during presentation day.

Student teams are interdisciplinary as gamedev teams usually are. We aim at having a distinctive person for roles: programmer, designer, artist at each team. But it is up to you to form teams. We require that all members creatively contribute to the project. No team member should be “hiree-to-do-some-dull-stuff”.

You can use our Discord or even our Facebook page to promote yourself or propose your projects. We are going to organize informal networking events. You should also read “Teams” section above first (if you haven’t already)!

We are trying to find external mentors who have a lot of experiences with game development and team management to help you with project management and game development. Each team should get one and you will have to report to them regularly; take this opportunity to learn from them!

You will have to pitch your project to mentors first (at the Pitch Session, see above) as if they are potential investors (which they truly are, they will be investing their own time to you!).

You are also required to use Git as SCM (namely GitHub); if you do not know what that is, ask your programmers ;-). GitHub provides you with many useful stuff, namely it allows you to have a project’s front page, wiki, forum, etc.

As a part of the project we will require you to create a webpage that describes your game (example pages from 2019: Afterlife Dogs of Eden, Breach, 2018: SilicomradesOut of Sight, 2017: Trashscraper, Toasty Conquest; 2016: Spring, 2015: Swappie) and a small gameplay video (examples: BreachToasty ConquestSpring). You can setup your own webpage anywhere, but you can also use GitHub Pages, itch.io or similar services.


Grading

You final grade depends on your team performance throughout the whole semester. Points are collected both by teams and individual members. Every team member can gain up-to 111 points in total. We will be sending a link to the scoring sheet through e-mail (to MFF students who should forward it to other members of the team), if you miss it, e-mail to cerny@gamedev.cuni.cz who will resend the link to you.

Grade Point range
A (111-)91-82
B 81-72
C 71-62
Fail 61-0

You can receive points for various meetings / events / consultations / awards, 10 points == grade difference:

Opportunity Points Event / Deadline
Registering a team
Team will send us an email with team registration information.
Every member is accredited with the points if you meet the deadline.
5 2024/Mar/13
Giving a pitch presentation
Whole team will show up and at least one member will give a presentation.
Every member is accredited with the points.
5 2024/Mar/21
Award: Best pitch
GameDev professionals will decide on the best pitch presentation.
Every member is accredited with the points if you meet the deadline.
5 2024/Mar/21
Submitting GDD
Team will send us an email with GDD.
Every member is accredited with the points if you meet the deadline.
5 2024/Mar/27
Award: Best GDD
Lecturers will decide on the best GDD.
Every member of awarded team is accredited with the points.
5 2024/Mar/31
Attending first round of consultations
Whole team will attend the first round of consultations.
Every member who shows up before the consultation with their teams starts is accredited with the points.
3 2024/Apr/05
Submitting Game Prototype Alpha version
Team will submit Game Prototype Alpha version to lecturers.
Every member is accredited with the points if you meet the deadline.
5 2024/May/01
Attending second round of consultations
Whole team will attend the second round of consultations.
Every member who shows up before the consultation with their teams starts is accredited with the points.
6 2024/May/10
Submitting Game Prototype Beta version
Team will submit Game Prototype Beta version to lecturers.
Every member is accredited with the points if you meet the deadline.
10 2024/Jun/5
Game Prototype Presentation
Whole team will attend a presentation day. You will present us your game, its gameplay
and every member will point out what they have been working on during a development. You will also appoint The Most Valuable Player of the team.
Lecturers will have a time to play your game as well as ask questions.Every member is accredited with the points if you meet the deadline and give a presentation. Lecturers may decide to award each member of a team differently if they found out delivered prototype or given presentation to be lacking.
Note that you do not have to present Game Prototype Beta version you submit on 2017/01/09. You can still work on and polish your Beta after that day. Just be sure not to drag new bugs in your game, which is known to be hard.
50 TBD
mid-June
Award: Best Game Prototype
Lecturers will decide on Best game prototype.
Every member of awarded team is accredited with the points.
10 2023/Jun/30
Sum (maximum number of points you can score) 111

 

ČVUT Students

Please note that if you are ČVUT student, you have to write to Cyril Brom (zc.inuc.ffm.ivsk reverse-it morb) that you wish to attend the course.


ZČU Students

Please note that if your of age 15-26 you are eligible for getting a “Žákovské jízdné” discount from ČD on trips between Pilsen and Prague.

Step-by-step guide (kudos to Olga Tesliuk, who has punched this through!):

  1. Buy a Žákovské jízdné card for 2 CZK at train station (they should have it available both in ČD and Regiojet desks).
  2. Fill in your name, surname, birthdate and towns you going to commute between (Pilsen – Prague); of course write this in Czech 😉
  3. Go to your student affairs at ZČU and have it signed (let tem fill “date from-to” for you).
  4. Go back to the train station and have it signed by ČD (you will need that card, your identity card – občanka, and some money).
  5. PROFIT!

Another generic step-by-step guide available here (in Czech only).