Posts Tagged ‘games’

The Art of Game Design

Tuesday, August 24th, 2010

book coverThe Art of Game Design – A Book of Lenses, Jesse Schell, Elsevier Morgan Kaufmann, 2008

Game designers will want to read this. 450 pages.

Essential ZBrush

Monday, August 16th, 2010

book coverEssential ZBrush, Wayne Robson, Wordware, 2008

This is for digital sculptors who make game creatures/aliens. 700 pages.

Horror Video Games

Tuesday, July 6th, 2010

book coverHorror Video Games – Essays on the Fusion of Fear and Play, Bernard Perron, McFarland , 2009

A collection of academic essays on the horror genre in video games. A couple of the authors are game designers. 300 pages.

Halo Encyclopedia

Tuesday, February 2nd, 2010

book coverHalo Encyclopedia : the definitive guide to the Halo universe / Tobias Buckell, Dorling Kindersley, 2009

This is a must-read for fans of the Halo Xbox360 game, with many pictures. There are descriptions of the characters, weapons, and vehicles, but nothing about the underlying technology. Oversize hardcover, 350 pages.

Casual Revolution

Thursday, January 14th, 2010

book coverA Casual Revolution : reinventing video games and their players / Jesper Juul, MIT Press, 2010

What attracts people to video games? This very readable book looks into the attraction of games, and how it is changing: the trend towards mimetic interfaces, and the trend towards downloadable casual games. Hardcover, 250 pages.

Fantasy Freaks

Monday, January 4th, 2010

book coverFantasy Freaks and gaming geeks : an epic quest for reality among role players, online gamers, and other dwellers of imaginary realms / Ethan Gilsdorf, Lyons, 2009

Here is a tour of the gaming subculture. 300 pages, hardcover.

Game Art Complete

Monday, December 14th, 2009

book coverGame Art Complete : all-in-one : learn Maya, 3ds Max, zBrush, and Photoshop winning techniques / edited by Andrew Gahan, Elsevier/Focal Press, 2009

A user manual for 3D model editing apps. 600 pages.

Good Video Games + Good Learning

Friday, December 11th, 2009

book coverGood Video Games + Good Learning : collected essays on video games, learning, and literacy / James Paul Gee, P. Lang, 2007

This little book is a very thoughtful comment on how game designers motivate kids to learn complex games, and how the public school education system can learn from them. 200 pages.

Communities of Play

Sunday, December 6th, 2009

book coverCommunities of Play : Emergent Cultures in Multiplayer Games and virtual worlds / Celia Pearce, MIT Press, 2009

An academic discussion of MMOG’s that will be useful to online game designers. It defines ‘emergent’. 300 pages, hardcover.

Game Development Essentials

Wednesday, September 30th, 2009

Game Development Essentials : an introduction / Jeannie Novak, Thomson Delmar Learning, 2005

This very dated book appears to be new to the library! Large format, nice illustrations, 400 pages, and a CD.