Category: Video games

Designing Games – A well-written, comprehensive guide to video game engineering – #bookreview

by Sagecreek Productions LLC

Designing Games A Guide to Engineering Experiences Tynan Sylvester (O’Reilly – paperback, Kindle) If you design video games, if you hope to become a game creator, or if you work for a company whose lifeblood is creating and maintaining successful video games, you need to read this excellent book.  Tynan Sylvester provides a comprehensive overview … Continue reading Designing Games – A well-written, comprehensive guide to video game engineering – #bookreview

Enterprise Games – How to build a better 21st-century business with game mechanics – #business #bookreview

by Sagecreek Productions LLC

Enterprise Games: Using Game Mechanics to Build a Better Business Michael Hugos (O’Reilly, paperback – Kindle) Can 21st-century games and gamers attack and destroy the top-down, assembly-line thinking that still keeps many businesses firmly rooted in the previous century?  Michael Hugos’ compelling new book makes a solid case that they can. Game mechanics, he argues, can … Continue reading Enterprise Games – How to build a better 21st-century business with game mechanics – #business #bookreview

Practical Computer Vision with SimpleCV – ‘Seeing’ with Python – #programming #bookreview

by Sagecreek Productions LLC

Practical Computer Vision with SimpleCV Kurt Demaagd, Anthony Oliver, Nathan Oostendorp, and Katherine Scott (O’Reilly, paperback – Kindle) SimpleCV, or Simple Computer Vision, is “an easy-to-use Python framework that bundles together open source computer vision libraries and algorithms for solving problems,” according to the authors of this useful and informative how-to book. The subtitle is “Making … Continue reading Practical Computer Vision with SimpleCV – ‘Seeing’ with Python – #programming #bookreview

WebGL: Up and Running – 3D Web graphics for the beginner, with expert guidance – #bookreview

by Sagecreek Productions LLC

WebGL: Up and Running Tony Parisi (O’Reilly, paperback – Kindle) “WebGL,” Tony Parisi notes, “brings 3D to the browser, providing a JavaScript interface to the graphics hardware on your machine.” Parisi is co-creator of the VRML and X3D languages which have become ISO standards for networked 3D graphics. So he knows a bit about using … Continue reading WebGL: Up and Running – 3D Web graphics for the beginner, with expert guidance – #bookreview

Getting Started with Dwarf Fortress – How to build and fight your way into this complex game – #bookreview

by Sagecreek Productions LLC

Getting Started with Dwarf Fortress Peter Tyson (O’Reilly, paperback, list price $19.99; Kindle edition, list price $15.99) Many gamers agree with this book’s tagline, that Dwarf Fortress is “…the most complex video game ever made.” For that reason, they have avoided taking it up or have tried it, stumbled over its steep learning curve, and … Continue reading Getting Started with Dwarf Fortress – How to build and fight your way into this complex game – #bookreview

Oh, say can you C? Learning to program with Head First C – #bookreview #in #programming

by Sagecreek Productions LLC

Head First C By David Griffiths and Dawn Griffiths (O’Reilly, paperback, list price $49.99)  Long ago, in a universe now very far away, I was an ABC programmer: assembler, BASIC, and C. I learned C from a book popularly known as “K&R,” after its authors, Brian W. Kernighan and Dennis M. Ritchie. (Their classic work … Continue reading Oh, say can you C? Learning to program with Head First C – #bookreview #in #programming

Tap, Move, Shake: Turning Your Game Ideas into iPhone & iPad Apps – #bookreview

by Sagecreek Productions LLC

Tap, Move, Shake: Turning Your Game Ideas into iPhone & iPad Apps By Todd Moore (O’Reilly, paperback, list price $29.99; Kindle edition, list price $23.99) If you have some game ideas and a little coding experience, this well-focused and well-written book can show you how to get started as a developer of iPhone and iPad … Continue reading Tap, Move, Shake: Turning Your Game Ideas into iPhone & iPad Apps – #bookreview

CoffeeScript: Accelerated JavaScript Development – #bookreview #programming

by Sagecreek Productions LLC

CoffeeScript: Accelerated JavaScript Development By Trevor Burnham (Pragmatic Bookshelf, $29.00, paperback) JavaScript was thrown together in 10 days and “was never meant to be the most important programming language in the world,” says Trevor Burnham, a web developer and founder of DataBraid, a startup focused on “developing data analysis and visualization tools.” Yet, JavaScript was “understood … Continue reading CoffeeScript: Accelerated JavaScript Development – #bookreview #programming

Designed for Use: Create Usable Interfaces for Applications and the Web – #bookreview

by Sagecreek Productions LLC

Designed for Use: Create Usable Interfaces for Applications and the Web By Lukas Mathis (Pragmatic Bookshelf, $35.00 paperback) There’s no code inside this well-written book for programmers and visual designers. Instead, the focus is on usability — how people use things — and how you can make big, modest or subtle improvements to their experiences … Continue reading Designed for Use: Create Usable Interfaces for Applications and the Web – #bookreview

Windows Sysinternals Administrator’s Reference – #bookreview #software #techsupport

by Sagecreek Productions LLC

Windows Sysinternals Administrator’s Reference By Mark Russinovich and Aaron Margosis (Microsoft Press, $49.99, paperback; $39.99, Kindle) To the uninitiated, the title may sound a bit ultra-geeky and scary. Particularly the “Huh?” word “Sysinternals.” But this book may benefit you “whether you manage the systems of a large enterprise, a small business, or the PCs of your … Continue reading Windows Sysinternals Administrator’s Reference – #bookreview #software #techsupport