A. T. Chamillard
ABSTRACT
Many incoming college freshmen have accumulated a significant number of hours of experience playing computer games. Extending that experience to actual game creation activities can be highly motivational for these students. Most of these activities require some level of programming expertise, however, making them activities too advanced for the majority of incoming students.In this paper, we describe a freshman-level course called Problem Solving through Game Creation. Students learn to use a number of drag-and-drop game creation tools to develop both 2D and 3D games, with no programming required in the course. We also cover a variety of other topics and tools related to game development.Our experience has been that students enjoy the course, but we have more formal course goals as well. Specifically, we hope to motivate students to declare and complete the computer science major and to better prepare students for the initial required computer science courses. We describe these goals in detail and discuss the process we have initiated to continually evaluate achievement of those goals.
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Digital Library
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Index Terms
- Introductory game creation: no programming required
Recommendations
Introductory game creation: no programming required
Many incoming college freshmen have accumulated a significant number of hours of experience playing computer games. Extending that experience to actual game creation activities can be highly motivational for these students. Most of these activities ...
Engagement: gaming throughout the curriculum
SIGCSE '09: Proceedings of the 40th ACM technical symposium on Computer science educationThis paper considers how gaming has been infused into the computing curriculum of institutions in the United States. To increase motivation of students and improve retention, many programs have begun using gaming in their introductory courses, as upper ...
Engagement: gaming throughout the curriculum
SIGCSE '09This paper considers how gaming has been infused into the computing curriculum of institutions in the United States. To increase motivation of students and improve retention, many programs have begun using gaming in their introductory courses, as upper ...
Reviews
Bernice T. Glenn
Taking advantage of the fact that so many incoming freshmen are experienced game players, Chamillard and his department have developed a course called "Problem Solving through Game Creation," described here. In this freshman-level course, students learn to create two-dimensional (2D) and three-dimensional (3D) games based on drag-and-drop techniques. The department's goal is that, in the process of creating interesting games, students will be motivated to become computer science (CS) majors, and will be better prepared for CS coursework. There are four game tools used. Game Maker creates objects that can bounce off walls, along with more complex behaviors based on speed, location, and iterative if/else actions. Games Factory uses an event editor to specify particular events, and the actions that will be executed if the event occurs. Student examples based on each game tool are described. In the example using the Pie 3D Game Creation System, a player walks through the game environment to reach the goal, while escaping guards and walls that impede progress. The player has access to weapons and keys, which, when located, will open escape doors. The course syllabus includes lessons spaced between each game introduction. Topics include graphics, working with sound and music, and game implementation through Java programming.
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