Book Image

Google SketchUp for Game Design: Beginner's Guide

Book Image

Google SketchUp for Game Design: Beginner's Guide

Overview of this book

Creating video game environments similar to the best 3D games on the market is now within the capability of hobbyists for the first time, with the free availability of game development software such as Unity 3D, and the ease with which groups of enthusiasts can get together to pool their skills for a game project. The sheer number of these independent game projects springing up means there is a constant need for game art, the physical 3D environment and objects that inhabit these game worlds. Now thanks to Google there is an easy, fun way to create professional game art, levels and props.Google SketchUp is the natural choice for beginners to game design. This book provides you with the workflow to quickly build realistic 3D environments, levels, and props to fill your game world. In simple steps you will model terrain, buildings, vehicles, and much more.Google SketchUp is the ideal entry level modeling tool for game design, allowing you to take digital photographs and turn them into 3D objects for quick, fun, game creation. SketchUp for Game Design takes you through the modeling of a game level with SketchUp and Unity 3D, complete with all game art, textures and props. You will learn how to create cars, buildings, terrain, tools and standard level props such as barrels, fencing and wooden pallets. You will set up your game level in Unity 3D to create a fully functional first person walk-around level to email to your friends or future employers.When you have completed the projects in this book, you will be comfortable creating 3D worlds, whether for games, visualization, or films.
Table of Contents (18 chapters)
Google SketchUp for Game Design
Credits
About the Author
About the Reviewers
www.PacktPub.com
Preface
Index

Sketching out the level


To start with, you need some idea of what your level will look like. In a game development environment, you will usually be given this "look" by your art director. As an asset artist or level designer, you will take their specifications and drawings, and turn them into a 3D reality. The level designer will already have thought about game-play, the level of difficulty, the challenges to be contained in the level, overall look and feel, and perhaps the lighting quality and sound. You will also have parameters to stick to within the whole game production:

  • Is the game set in the real world or fantasy or sci-fi?

  • What's the date?

  • Are graphics cartoony, realistic, edgy, dreamlike, happy, or dark?

  • How quickly should the graphics render: low or high detail?

As well as many more.

Your job as a game artist, level designer, or asset modeler is to stay rigidly within the parameters that you have been given and, having done that, to shine through with your incredible artistic and modeling...