Universitat Internacional de Catalunya
Workshop: Video Game Design
Other languages of instruction: English, Spanish,
Introduction
The course Workshop: Video Game Design provides a practice-oriented introduction to video game development, examining who creates video games, how they are conceived, the skills required, and the different stages of their design, production, and commercialisation from the perspectives of both the developer and the player. The course introduces students to the field of game design and to the logic of interactive storytelling in video games, understood as multi-layered narrative structures based on player choice and real-time interactivity.
Pre-course requirements
Successful completion of the courses Design and Graphic Design.
Objectives
- To understand and develop the personal skills required to conceive a video game.
- To understand the different stages of video game development, from the initial concept to commercialisation.
- To understand and use basic programming tools for video game design.
- To develop engaging digital narratives with multiple branching possibilities based on player choices.
- To understand the video game industry and its leading companies, studios, and creators.
- To analyse and refine the gameplay of a video game.
- To understand and use audiovisual editing software to create and animate digital objects, control lighting, and apply graphical effects.
- To understand and use software for capturing, storing, and processing player inputs.
Syllabus
- To understand the concept of the video game, the entertainment industry and the global market, including key data, current trends, social impact, and the ethical and regulatory framework (PEGI).
- To examine the origins and historical development of video games, gaming devices and platforms, and the evolution of graphics and sound.
- To analyse major historical video game titles and game genres.
- To understand connectivity and online gaming.
- To understand the structure of video game companies and the roles of development teams.
- To understand video games as software projects, from creativity and game design to the development of a playable product.
- To learn the fundamentals of C++ programming.
- To understand production and implementation processes, software architecture, and gameplay balancing.
- To understand computer graphics generation, including transformations, lighting models, textures, simulation, and animation.
- To examine the application of artificial intelligence in video games.
Bibliography and resources
Caillois, R. (2015). Los juegos y los hombres: La máscara y el vértigo
Horton, J. (2024). Beginning C++ game programming: Learn C++ from scratch by building fun games (3rd ed.). Packt Publishing
Kohler, C. (2016). Power-Up: How Japanese video games gave the world an extra life. Dover Publications
Woodcock, J. (2019). Coding games in Scratch: A step-by-step visual guide to building your own computer games (ISBN 9781465477330). DK Children