Unity Potluck – October 11th, 2015 Meetup

Meetings, Presentations

Reminders and Announcements:

Important Update!  The Tuesday Open Game labs have been canceled. The Open Game lab on the 3rd Sunday of the month still takes place from 2PM – 5PM – no change.  These labs are unstructured time for anyone to come to the space, hang out and work on their game.  If you are just starting out this is also a great time to come ask questions!

Call for Topics! If you’ve been to a meetup you know that the group is very informal and you do not need a well timed and polished presentation.  A presentation can simply be discussing a topic while showing a demo on a laptop.  If you are interested in presenting or have a request for a topic you would like to see covered please contact Michael at michael.neel@gmail.com

Facebook and Twitter: You can also stay up to date with members of the group on Facebook.  The group is closed, so you’ll need request access and it make take a day or two to get approved.  If you don’t get approved in a few days, send me an email at the address above.  There is also a twitter list maintained by Levi.  For info on joining the twitter list, contact Levi @gatechgrad.

Next Game Jam: The next game jam will be held December 11-14th, 2015 – mark your calendars now!

All this too much to keep up with? The Knox Game Design website has a calendar!

This Month’s Topic: Unity Potluck

Put your Unity tips in a crockpot and bring them down to TechCo (that’s a metaphor, don’t actually do that).  Since many of us use Unity as our main game engine, this meeting will be a chance to share tips and features we’ve found useful.  As an example, I’ll be showing how to import models from Blender with multiple materials and texture them with substance file for some really nice looking objects for little effort.  I’ll also show how to bring in Make Human models with a Unity Mecanim compatible rig for animating and IK.

Location and Time

The meetup will be held at the Technology Cooperative located at 13 Emory Place, Knoxville TN.  Parking is available in front of the Technology Cooperative.  We start at 2PM and open with some roundtable discussion and a Show ‘n Tell where everyone can show a bit of their in progress game, favorite tool, mechanic they love in another game, or anything they find helpful and want to share with the group.

Game Design Open Discussion – August 9th, 2015

Meetings

Reminders and Announcements:

Open Game Labs:   The group hosts an Open Game Lab every Tuesday 5:30PM – 8PM and on the 3rd Sunday of the month 2PM – 5PM.  These labs are unstructured time for anyone to come to the space, hang out and work on their game.  If you are just starting out this is also a great time to come ask questions!

Next Game Jam – August 21st – 24th!  The date of the next game jam has been set; mark your calendars!

Call for Topics! If you’ve been to a meetup you know that the group is very informal and you do not need a well timed and polished presentation.  A presentation can simply be discussing a topic while showing a demo on a laptop.  If you are interested in presenting or have a request for a topic you would like to see covered please contact Michael at michael.neel@gmail.com

Facebook and Twitter: You can also stay up to date with members of the group on Facebook.  The group is closed, so you’ll need request access and it make take a day or two to get approved.  If you don’t get approved in a few days, send me an email at the address above.  There is also a twitter list maintained by Levi.  For info on joining the twitter list, contact Levi @gatechgrad.

All this too much to keep up with? The Knox Game Design website has a calendar!

This Month’s Topic: Open Discussion

This month come ready to ask any and all your game design related questions and we’ll try to answer them or at least direct you onward in the quest for information.  It is also a good time to share current projects and tools you use without having to prepare enough content for a full monthly meetup.

If you’ve never been to one of the open discussion meetups and worry that the content might be light: don’t!  If the past is any guide the open discussions meetup are more dense with information that presentations and are an excellent way to get to know everyone in the group.

Location and Time

The meetup will be held at the Technology Cooperative located at 13 Emory Place, Knoxville TN.  Parking is available in front of the Technology Cooperative.  We start at 2PM and open with some roundtable discussion and a Show ‘n Tell where everyone can show a bit of their in progress game, favorite tool, mechanic they love in another game, or anything they find helpful and want to share with the group.

Quest For Fun – July 12th, 2015

Meetings, Presentations

Reminders and Announcements:

Open Game Labs:   The group hosts an Open Game Lab every Tuesday 5:30PM – 8PM and on the 3rd Sunday of the month 2PM – 5PM.  These labs are unstructured time for anyone to come to the space, hang out and work on their game.  If you are just starting out this is also a great time to come ask questions!

Next Game Jam – August 21st – 24th!  The date of the next game jam has been set; mark your calendars!

Call for Topics! If you’ve been to a meetup you know that the group is very informal and you do not need a well timed and polished presentation.  A presentation can simply be discussing a topic while showing a demo on a laptop.  If you are interested in presenting or have a request for a topic you would like to see covered please contact Michael at michael.neel@gmail.com

Facebook and Twitter: You can also stay up to date with members of the group on Facebook.  The group is closed, so you’ll need request access and it make take a day or two to get approved.  If you don’t get approved in a few days, send me an email at the address above.  There is also a twitter list maintained by Levi.  For info on joining the twitter list, contact Levi @gatechgrad.

All this too much to keep up with? The Knox Game Design website has a calendar!

This Month’s Topic: Quest For Fun!

This month’s topic will be led by Mike giving his take on game design and understanding the player:

What is fun? What makes an activity exciting and enjoyable? Can fun be planned? Can you design fun the same way an architect designs a building? These are more than abstract thoughts, but but questions that kept me awake at night.  As a game designer I want to know if I’m creating something fun long before the game is in beta test and years of development were wasted.

This session represents the years of research I spent answering the question, and the questions that followed.  We will cover why people play games, expectations of the design, decoding feedback, and most importantly the preferences of the player and how they relate to our own.

Ultimately this is a talk about how to be a better developer through the lens of game design, so even if you are not interested in creating games you will come away enlightened!

Location and Time

The meetup will be held at the Technology Cooperative located at 13 Emory Place, Knoxville TN.  Parking is available in front of the Technology Cooperative.  We start at 2PM and open with some roundtable discussion and a Show ‘n Tell where everyone can show a bit of their in progress game, favorite tool, mechanic they love in another game, or anything they find helpful and want to share with the group.

Promoting Your Game with Social Media – June 14th, 2015

Meetings, Presentations

Reminders and Announcements:

Open Game Labs:   The group hosts an Open Game Lab every Tuesday 5:30PM – 8PM and on the 3rd Sunday of the month 2PM – 5PM.  These labs are unstructured time for anyone to come to the space, hang out and work on their game.  If you are just starting out this is also a great time to come ask questions!  Special note this month – no Open Game Lab on Sunday April 19th due to the game jam.

Call for Topics! If you’ve been to a meetup you know that the group is very informal and you do not need a well timed and polished presentation.  A presentation can simply be discussing a topic while showing a demo on a laptop.  If you are interested in presenting or have a request for a topic you would like to see covered please contact Michael at michael.neel@gmail.com

Facebook and Twitter: You can also stay up to date with members of the group on Facebook.  The group is closed, so you’ll need request access and it make take a day or two to get approved.  If you don’t get approved in a few days, send me an email at the address above.  There is also a twitter list maintained by Levi.  For info on joining the twitter list, contact Levi @gatechgrad.

All this too much to keep up with? The Knox Game Design website has a calendar!

This Month’s Topic: Promoting Your Game with Social Media

This month’s topic will be led by Levi and cover how to leverage social media for your game:

In this presentation, we will cover how to use various social media outlets to promote a game to reach your customer base.  Topics covered include Twitter, YouTube, WordPress, Yoast SEO plugin, Reddit, Social Media Cards, Google Alerts, Google Analytics, Google Webmaster Tools and more!

Location and Time

The meetup will be held at the Technology Cooperative located at 13 Emory Place, Knoxville TN.  Parking is available in front of the Technology Cooperative.  We start at 2PM and open with some roundtable discussion and a Show ‘n Tell where everyone can show a bit of their in progress game, favorite tool, mechanic they love in another game, or anything they find helpful and want to share with the group.

Game Jam Results – May 10th, 2015

Meetings

Reminders and Announcements:

Open Game Labs:   The group hosts an Open Game Lab every Tuesday 5:30PM – 8PM and on the 3rd Sunday of the month 2PM – 5PM.  These labs are unstructured time for anyone to come to the space, hang out and work on their game.  If you are just starting out this is also a great time to come ask questions!  Special note this month – no Open Game Lab on Sunday April 19th due to the game jam.

Call for Topics! If you’ve been to a meetup you know that the group is very informal and you do not need a well timed and polished presentation.  A presentation can simply be discussing a topic while showing a demo on a laptop.  If you are interested in presenting or have a request for a topic you would like to see covered please contact Michael at michael.neel@gmail.com

Facebook and Twitter: You can also stay up to date with members of the group on Facebook.  The group is closed, so you’ll need request access and it make take a day or two to get approved.  If you don’t get approved in a few days, send me an email at the address above.  There is also a twitter list maintained by Levi.  For info on joining the twitter list, contact Levi @gatechgrad.

All this too much to keep up with? The Knox Game Design website has a calendar!

This Month’s Topic: Game Jam Results

Several members of the group entered games this past month in the game jam.  This month we’ll look at the entries and share the behind the scene tales of each.  The entries below may not be the full list, so if I missed your game please send me an email and let me know!

Location and Time

The meetup will be held at the Technology Cooperative located at 13 Emory Place, Knoxville TN.  Parking is available in front of the Technology Cooperative.  We start at 2PM and open with some roundtable discussion and a Show ‘n Tell where everyone can show a bit of their in progress game, favorite tool, mechanic they love in another game, or anything they find helpful and want to share with the group.

GameDev Open Discussion – April 12th, 2015

Meetings

Reminders and Announcements:

April Game Jam Fast Approaching!  The next game jam is scheduled for April 17th.  Now is the time to block out that weekend on your calendars to make sure you have the time set aside.  If you are curious what happens during a game jam and how to get ready, check out the post announcing April’s jam.

Open Game Labs:   The group hosts an Open Game Lab every Tuesday 5:30PM – 8PM and on the 3rd Sunday of the month 2PM – 5PM.  These labs are unstructured time for anyone to come to the space, hang out and work on their game.  If you are just starting out this is also a great time to come ask questions!  Special note this month – no Open Game Lab on Sunday April 19th due to the game jam.

Call for Topics – April’s Meetup is Open! If you’ve been to a meetup you know that the group is very informal and you do not need a well timed and polished presentation.  A presentation can simply be discussing a topic while showing a demo on a laptop.  If you are interested in presenting or have a request for a topic you would like to see covered please contact Michael at michael.neel@gmail.com

Facebook and Twitter: You can also stay up to date with members of the group on Facebook.  The group is closed, so you’ll need request access and it make take a day or two to get approved.  If you don’t get approved in a few days, send me an email at the address above.  There is also a twitter list maintained by Levi.  For info on joining the twitter list, contact Levi @gatechgrad.

All this too much to keep up with? The Knox Game Design website now has a calendar!

This Month’s Topic: Open Discussion

It’s been a while since we’ve held an open discussion.  This month come ready to ask any and all your game design related questions and we’ll try to answer them or at least direct you onward in the quest for information.  It is also a good time to share current projects and tools you use without having to prepare enough content for a full monthly meetup.

So that you don’t have to come completely on faith there will be interesting stuff to talk about, Levi will be discussing some of his recent games and experience working with Unreal for the first time.

Location and Time

The meetup will be held at the Technology Cooperative located at 13 Emory Place, Knoxville TN.  Parking is available in front of the Technology Cooperative.  We start at 2PM and open with some roundtable discussion and a Show ‘n Tell where everyone can show a bit of their in progress game, favorite tool, mechanic they love in another game, or anything they find helpful and want to share with the group.

Spring ’15 Game Jam: April 17-20th 2015

Meetings

It’s 2015 and there is time for the game jam!  (that’s a Klax reference)  If you’ve been to a jam in the past, it will be very similar.  Some Notes:

Your game does not need to be complex and you don’t need to spend every hour of the jam devoted to making the game.  Simple is better, and seeing friends and family is a good break to keep you fresh.  The goal is to finish, and the reward is having completed a game!  You can enter solo or as a team and parents, this is a great activity to do together with your kids.

We will meet Friday April 17th @7PM at the Technology Cooperative – The game jam officially kicks off at 9PM when the game theme is announced.  This will be a good time for any last minute questions on the jam, software, or process you have for making your game.

From Friday until Sunday work on your game.  We won’t be keeping the Techco open the whole weekend for the jam (and there is a group that uses the space Saturday mornings), and we won’t have a Game Lab Sunday, April 19th.

We’ll share and recap our entries at the following meetup, May 10th, 2015.

What you should do before the jam:

  • Read over the rules of the game jam and decide if you’ll be doing the “compo” or “jam” version.
  • Get your development system ready to go – figure out what software you’ll be using and make sure it’s ready to go.
    A list of common tools others have used in the game jam is listed on the Tools page, and links from previous meetups can be found on our site.
  • Make an account on the game jam website
  • Make an account on Itch.io (optional, but great place to host your entry)
  • The week leading up to the Jam, check the game jam site daily to vote on topics
  • It’s common to live stream your game development – if you plan to do this then:
    • Setup a Twitch.tv account
    • Install Open Broadcaster Software – a free, open source app for live streaming
    • Test out Twitch and OBS (don’t wait to the jam to start learning about live streaming!)
  • It’s also common to make a timelapse video of your development, and there are some tools to help with this too.  Again, test this out on your system before the jam beings.

Virtual Reality is Reality – March 8th, 2015 Meetup

Meetings, Presentations

Reminders and Announcements:

Open Game Labs:   The group hosts an Open Game Lab every Tuesday 5:30PM – 8PM and on the 3rd Sunday of the month 2PM – 5PM.  These labs are unstructured time for anyone to come to the space, hang out and work on their game.  If you are just starting out this is also a great time to come ask questions!

Call for Topics – April’s Meetup is Open! If you’ve been to a meetup you know that the group is very informal and you do not need a well timed and polished presentation.  A presentation can simply be discussing a topic while showing a demo on a laptop.  If you are interested in presenting or have a request for a topic you would like to see covered please contact Michael at michael.neel@gmail.com

Next Game Jam:  The next game jam is scheduled for April 17th.  Now is the time to block out that weekend on your calendars to make sure you have the time set aside.  If you are curious what happened during a game jam and how to get ready, check out the post from December’s jam.

Facebook and Twitter: It’s been mentioned in the meetings but never sent out until now but the group has a facebook group.  The group is closed, so you’ll need request access and it make take a day or two to get approved.  If you don’t get approved in a few days, send me an email at the address above.  There is also a twitter list maintained by Levi.  For info on joining the twitter list, contact Levi @gatechgrad.

This Month’s Topic: Virtual Reality

Daniel Buchanan will be our speaker this month, discussing using Virtual Reality in games and how to make games using the Oculus Rift and Google Cardboard. He will discuss some of the unique challenges VR presents to game developers and how those challenges have been overcome in the past. Daniel will be working in Unity3D and will present development for games on the PC/Mac/Linux platform as well as the Android and iPhone mobile platform. Q&A will follow the presentation and he hopes that the discussion will make VR more attainable to the local game development scene.

About the Speaker: Daniel Buchanan is an AR/VR Experience Engineer at Agilibility. He has worked on web application development and mobile application development in the past, however his main focus lately is developing Augmented and Virtual Reality applications for the Oculus Rift and the Google Cardboard. Daniel believes that 2015 will be the year of Virtual Reality and that VR will fundamentally change the way people work and play. He started VARDNet.org, the Virtual and Augmented Reality Developers Network, which meets every fourth Tuesday at 6pm at the Knoxville Entrepreneur Center in Market Square. Daniel works in Unity3D and C#, as well as in Illustrator and Photoshop to make assets and textures for his experiences. He has two games in the Android app store, Pocket Graveyard and Cardboard Graveyard. He just published his first game in the Oculus Share store this year.

Location and Time

The meetup will be held at the Technology Cooperative located at 13 Emory Place, Knoxville TN.  Parking is available in front of the Technology Cooperative.  We start at 2PM and open with some roundtable discussion and a Show ‘n Tell where everyone can show a bit of their in progress game, favorite tool, mechanic they love in another game, or anything they find helpful and want to share with the group.

Analytics and FPS Level Design – February 8th, 2015 Meetup

Meetings, Presentations

Reminders and Announcements:

Open Game Labs:   The group hosts an Open Game Lab every Tuesday 5:30PM – 8PM and on the 3rd Sunday of the month 2PM – 5PM.  These labs are unstructured time for anyone to come to the space, hang out and work on their game.  If you are just starting out this is also a great time to come ask questions!

Call for Topics:  We need speakers!  If you’ve been to a meetup you know that the group is very informal and you do not need a well timed and polished presentation.  A presentation can simply be discussing a topic while showing a demo on a laptop.  If you are interested in presenting or have a request for a topic you would like to see covered please contact Michael at michael.neel@gmail.com

Next Game Jam:  The next game jam is scheduled for April 17th.  Now is the time to block out that weekend on your calendars to make sure you have the time set aside.  If you are curious what happened during a game jam and how to get ready, check out the post from December’s jam.

Facebook and Twitter: It’s been mentioned in the meetings but never sent out until now but the group has a facebook group.  The group is closed, so you’ll need request access and it make take a day or two to get approved.  If you don’t get approved in a few days, send me an email at the address above.  There is also a twitter list maintained by Levi.  For info on joining the twitter list, contact Levi @gatechgrad.

This Month’s Topic: Analytics and FPS Level Design

This month Michael C. Neel will be speaking on tracking your players with analytics and sharing some design tips for levels in a first person shooter (these are two separate topics, not analytics for FPSs).

For the analytics portion we’ll cover two services for analytics, the established and popular Game Analytics (any engine) and the new Unity Analytics Beta (Unity only).  Michael has been collecting stats for a few of his games and will demonstrate how to use the data to find and fix weak spots in the game’s design.

In the second topic Michael will share tips learned from researching Doom and Quake level design.  Then Michael will share some methods for making a Quake style game in Unity using Blender as a level editor.  Yes, Michael is using Blender now proving old dogs can learn new tricks and programs with horrible user experience.

Location and Time

The meetup will be held at the Technology Cooperative located at 13 Emory Place, Knoxville TN.  Parking is available in front of the Technology Cooperative.  As always we will start at 2PM and open with a Show ‘n Tell where everyone can show a bit of their in progress game, favorite tool, mechanic they love in another game, or anything they find helpful and want to share with the group.

Art App Roundup – January 11th, 2015 Meetup

Meetings, Presentations

Welcome to 2015!  I hope everyone’s new year’s resolutions include ship a game! 

Quick Reminder – Open Game Labs:   The group hosts an Open Game Lab every Tuesday 5:30PM – 8PM and on the 3rd Sunday of the month 2PM – 5PM.  These labs are unstructured time for anyone to come to the space, hang out and work on their game.  If you are just starting out this is also a great time to come ask questions!

Also, congratulations are in order for Dylan who placed in the top 100 (#97) of game jam Compo entries!

Okay, details on the next meetup.  Last month we shared a bunch of different things in a series of micro talks, but these all had a “code” feel to them, so this month we are doing it again but with an art focus.  Currently we have two speakers lined up:

If there is an art application you would like to demonstrate, send me a email and we’ll get it added to the list.

The meetup will be held at the Technology Cooperative located at 13 Emory Place, Knoxville TN.  Parking is available in front of the Technology Cooperative.  As always we will start at 2PM and open with a Show ‘n Tell where everyone can show a bit of their in progress game, favorite tool, mechanic they love in another game, or anything they find helpful and want to share with the group.