Youth Game Studio

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XZodia
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Youth Game Studio

Post by XZodia »

Hey guys,

As you may or may not know, I am currently starting up a business teaching young people how to develop computer games using professional software such as Unity3D.
I have just now finished branding my blog, facebook and twitter accounts, and I was hoping for some feedback.

Please DO NOT like/follow/comment etc just yet

http://youthgamestudio.blogspot.co.uk/
https://www.facebook.com/YouthGameStudio
https://twitter.com/YouthGameStudio
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JacksonCougar wrote:I find you usually have great ideas.
JacksonCougar wrote:Ah fuck. Why must you always be right? Why.
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JacksonCougar
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Re: Youth Game Studio

Post by JacksonCougar »

Preface: the following text is criticism...;

The logo is pretty good; my only complaint would be it is very simple and wide.
Moving on to the website itself I find that it is functional but very stark and a tad dark! I would try livening the space with some pixel art for the background, and indeed maybe some more colour in the page itself. Obviously this is just a beginning but your index page needs to hook and sell your clients so make sure that is your most polished facet.

...this is the end of the criticism.

Having said that this is amazing dude: I think the business idea is very sound and I suspect you will find a lot of interest of there from people of all ages. Making my own video game is something I have wanted to do—and in fact still want to do—since I was a boy. Best of luck with this and other future endeavors man.
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Re: Youth Game Studio

Post by xXF3RcHoXx »

That's pretty cool for a start dude, I hope you can find useful that PDF I sent you, Sketchup is excellent for beginners and I think those youths can get used to it real quick
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Re: Youth Game Studio

Post by XZodia »

Thanks for the suggestions, I've made some improvements based on what you said. Let me know what you think =)
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JacksonCougar wrote:I find you usually have great ideas.
JacksonCougar wrote:Ah fuck. Why must you always be right? Why.
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Re: Youth Game Studio

Post by NotZachary82 »

Can you go into detail as to what this exactly is? Regardless, best of luck, sounds like a great startup!
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XZodia
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Re: Youth Game Studio

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It's an after-school extra curricular activity for high school kids. I'll be showing them how to make games by getting them to mod templates that I make in Unity.
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JacksonCougar wrote:I find you usually have great ideas.
JacksonCougar wrote:Ah fuck. Why must you always be right? Why.
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NotZachary82
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Re: Youth Game Studio

Post by NotZachary82 »

Ah, cool stuff!
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Re: Youth Game Studio

Post by neodos »

Good stuff and very nice initiaitve too!

Not sure what sort of feedback you are looking for, but for the graphics of the web/logo, I like the choice of colors and the retro look RGB monitor like, though it could use some slightly more flashy colors and maybe some very subtle gradients, unless you want to keep the minimalistic look.

Other than that, and maybe this is just me:

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To:
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For aesthetics sake I'd say it would look better if there was only one white pixel between the blocks.
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XZodia
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Re: Youth Game Studio

Post by XZodia »

Thank neodos, I like your suggestion, however I'm not sure how best to go about changing it. It's actually a screenshot of a tiled scene I put together in Unity, and as such each tile has its own border...
As far as flashy colors and gradients are concerned, my art skills are very limited, the main reason for the retro/minimalistic look is because it was easy for me to put together...
If you want to have a go, I'd love to see what you come up with =)
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JacksonCougar wrote:I find you usually have great ideas.
JacksonCougar wrote:Ah fuck. Why must you always be right? Why.
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Re: Youth Game Studio

Post by XZodia »

Youth Games Studio has gone public!

Give us all your likes n shit...

http://www.youthgamesstudio.com/
https://www.facebook.com/YouthGamesStudio
https://twitter.com/YGS_QA
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JacksonCougar wrote:I find you usually have great ideas.
JacksonCougar wrote:Ah fuck. Why must you always be right? Why.
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Re: Youth Game Studio

Post by Click16 »

XZodia wrote:Youth Games Studio has gone public!

Give us all your likes n shit...

http://www.youthgamesstudio.com/
https://www.facebook.com/YouthGamesStudio
https://twitter.com/YGS_QA
Followed on Twitter and liked on Facebook.
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Re: Youth Game Studio

Post by CaptainPoopface »

Good going! I would also recommend poking around with enchant.is. It seems very easy to concoct a simple game in it, with sprite movement, collision, etc. ready to go quickly.
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XZodia
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Re: Youth Game Studio

Post by XZodia »

I could use some suggestions for what to teach the kids, any ideas?
It can't be too complicated and needs to fit into a 2 hour session...
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JacksonCougar wrote:I find you usually have great ideas.
JacksonCougar wrote:Ah fuck. Why must you always be right? Why.
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NotZachary82
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Re: Youth Game Studio

Post by NotZachary82 »

Is this all in Unity? What's been covered so far?
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XZodia
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Re: Youth Game Studio

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Yea, its all in unity.
I've explained the interface and I made an easy to use tile map editor to make levels, which they have done.
And I've shown them how to edit the textures for this.
I have animated stickmen, for which they have edited the textures.

This is all I have done so far and while it doesn't sound like much, trying to think up something each week is sapping my creativity =P
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JacksonCougar wrote:I find you usually have great ideas.
JacksonCougar wrote:Ah fuck. Why must you always be right? Why.
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Re: Youth Game Studio

Post by troymac1ure »

I assume you have already gone over the pre-planning stage of thinking the destination out before starting?
Basic sound maybe?
Structures/classes and inheritance.

Not super in depth, but base knowledge.
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Re: Youth Game Studio

Post by CaptainPoopface »

The game loop. How the "engine" evaluates and updates things that change on each "tick", including sprite movement, collision detection, animation, user input monitoring. How the illusion of many simultaneous actions is created by nudging each of the component pieces, possibly one by one, a little bit at a time, many times per second. I remember how it used to seem like each character or event had its own autonomous brain, when most likely everything was managed centrally by the engine. That was a key concept that made game programming much more accessible to me.
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XZodia
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Re: Youth Game Studio

Post by XZodia »

I've only managed to touch on programming so far and from what I've seen, I might be best staying away from it for a while...
They really seem to enjoy customising their characters but are less concerned about the environment...

Its really hard to teach and keep them interested so that they come back...
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JacksonCougar wrote:I find you usually have great ideas.
JacksonCougar wrote:Ah fuck. Why must you always be right? Why.
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Re: Youth Game Studio

Post by troymac1ure »

Any chance of posting the program you are getting them to work with to have a better idea of what they have to work with? I'd like to see the base you are using. (I've never looked at Unity before, so not sure where your immediate limits lie)
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Re: Youth Game Studio

Post by XZodia »

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JacksonCougar wrote:I find you usually have great ideas.
JacksonCougar wrote:Ah fuck. Why must you always be right? Why.
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