Average customer rating:
- A Very Helpful Book
- Haven't Used it just yet...
- If you want to know how to make a MOD or GAME... Get This...
- Very good book
- Top Notch Book!
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Mastering Unreal Technology: The Art of Level Design
Jason Busby ,
Zak Parrish , and
Joel VanEenwyk
Manufacturer: Sams
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ASIN: 0672326922 |
Book Description
Let your imagination run wild in the world of Unreal Technology. Mastering Unreal Technology: The Art of Level Design knows no boundaries as it shows you how to build custom mods, maps and levels with the Unreal engine. Its tutorial format will give you immediate results through the tips and demos provided from the industry's top level designers. Learn to create your own characters, weapons and gaming environments, as well as how to go beyond the Unreal environment and export custom elements from 3D modeling applications. A CD that contains the Unreal Engine, graphics, examples and code is also included, giving you everything you need to create custom levels in Unreal or build your own games and virtual environments. Mastering Unreal Technology will help put you on the cutting-edge of gaming technology.
Customer Reviews:
A Very Helpful Book.......2007-09-21
I am a Game Art Development student, and this book has been indespensible in aiding in my understanding of the Unreal Editor. Without this book, I'm sure that it would've taken me waaaaayyy longer to get things done than the limited time that I had. Even though the book is more expensive than the game itself, it is a must have for any aspiring modder or game creator.
Haven't Used it just yet..........2007-08-04
I just bought this book, and although It seems like it's going to be great, my major problem is finding either Maya PLE 5.0's registration number, or Maya 7.0 PLE and its registration number.
the Autodesk site only has Maya PLE 8.5 to download and there are only plug-ins for Unreal for Maya 5.0 PLE and Maya 7.0 PLE (note: there is no version for the regular Maya)
So it kind of leaves you stuck with nothing to use. There is also nothing on the net about it either.
If you want to know how to make a MOD or GAME... Get This..........2007-05-12
Wow, it Big, It heavy and yes my Friends it is a red Brick, But it well worth ever cent and every page. Packed full of Useful Information and Helpful Tutorials it writen with the Lamen in mind. and take you into the Skills needed to make almost a full game. The one thing it lacks is the swcripting language section. But this is forgivable as it would make the book way bigger and much more complex to read if you a new guy trying to make a few little Deathmatch levels.
Very good book.......2007-04-10
This book is very complete and very easy to follow. Get the videos from 3dbuzz and the planetunreal tutorials and you'll be making great levels in no time.
Also great is the coverage static meshes and character production in maya and export to unrealed.
Top Notch Book!.......2007-03-09
Anyone who wants to learn how to use the Unreal Engine should buy this bible, yes it is a bible, because without this book you would be lost, the second cd to the Unreal game which is all videos really isn't enough, this book will cover everything about the Unreal!
Definitely a good buy!
Book Description
Extreme NXT: Extending the LEGO MIDSTORMS NXT to the Next Level is for intermediate-level users of NXT who would like to advance their capabilities by learning some of the basics of electronics. Plenty of examples are provided, and easy-to-follow instructions are included for building over 15 different sensors.
This makes a great reference for the NXT hardware interfaces. Examples even come complete with multiple, alternative NXT languages. The book is also abundant with illustrations.
Customer Reviews:
One of the Best Available!.......2007-07-06
Reviewer J. Doubek, said it best - "I bought this book to get a better idea of how to safely interface my own circuits to the Lego Mindstorms NXT. In my opinion, you can't find a better book for this purpose."
And that is very true! I cannot add much more to his review... This book is the 'Make' book for the NXT. The authors have explained everything so any builder of any age or skill level can understand the processes. It teaches several techniques that can be developed into viable career skills. Including soldering, electronics knowledge and usage, and handy-tech projects that will also get one's mind flowing with other ideas. If you are a 'Maker' or tinkerer or would like to learn some inside knowledge of the NXT and how to build outside of the box you will find no better starter book.
Grab it, read it, and use it to expand your NXT knowledge!
Chris
MDP, MCP
USA - NASA
Excellent!.......2007-05-07
I bought this book to get a better idea of how to safely interface my own circuits to the Lego Mindstorms NXT. In my opinion, you can't find a better book for this purpose. "Extreme NXT" contains the pinouts and proper usage of the NXT motor and sensor ports. It also provides a large number of the most useful homebrew sensor implementations, right down to parts lists containing part numbers for common component suppliers like Digikey and Radio Shack.
My background is in engineering, with an emphasis in control systems. The first book I read in the field of hobbiest robotics was "Mobile Robots: Inspiration to Implementation" (Jones and Flynn). In those days, the 6811's were king for these sorts of projects. I spent many a happy day with my MIT Handyboard (a simple 6811 robot controller board). Things have come a long way. Nowadays NXT is available, and this book is the modern day equivalent to that excellent text for those who want to dig in and find out what the NXT is capable of. The book is written in a format that is easy to understand for the novice, but also supplies plenty of content to allow the more advanced user to be able to push the NXT envelope. The organization is superb, commonly used charts and tables are easily found. I have been finding myself referring most often to the pinout tables for the NXT connectors, and these are very conveniently found towards the front of the book.
Chapters are broke down into sensor and output types, starting with the more basic and easily contructed passive sensors up to more advanced and expandable I2C sensors. Motor control, h-bridges, etc are also covered in detail. Both the construction of the circuits, and the NXT code to run them, are covered. Code is provided in it's most basic form first, NXT-G, which every NXT user will be familiar with. Examples proceed to more complex compilers, such as NBC, for sensors or circuits that are better suited to those implementations.
The appendix provides complete source code listings, useful websites and links categorized by chapter. There is also a great tutorial on prototyping with breadboards and perfboard for the uninitiated. With this book, any skill level in electronics should be enough to do some cool things with the NXT kit.
This book will become a very useful addition to any hobby robotics library. For me, it will be the goto book for designing circuits to safely interface to the Lego NXT. Highly recommended!
Customer Reviews:
Keep sharp!.......2007-05-14
Working these puzzles is a great way to keep mentally fit, and this collection provides varying levels of challenge and types of brain-builders. Enjoy!
only for crossword lovers.......2007-02-25
this is a great book. you must be an extreme crossword lover. i give it a three because all the puzzles are just too hard for me, not including the find the word. a little unfair rating, but it just wasn't what i expected. i wanted to see at least one suduko puzzle.
Everything..even goof ups!!.......2006-07-31
Not a bad puzzle book really, maybe not as good as some others but Ok nonetheless. However, they skimped on proofing I think, as the easy crossword puzzles are listed as the medium and vice-versa. A little discombobulating!
Puzzles for dad.......2006-07-15
I actually bought this book for my dad - an older gentleman who needs to keep the ol' brain pleasantly occupied. I coupled it with a (ubiquitous) sudoku set, too. He told me last week that he's been rationing them out so he won't finish the book too soon. Great stuff.
Perfect Gift for Those Serving Time.......2006-03-14
I you have a loved one doing some unfortunate incaraceration time, this is a great gift. It helps pass the time, promotes humorous conversation with other cellis, and it stimulates the mind. It will last some time and it is an acceptable gift if you order it and have it shipped from Amazon. It will not be concidered contraband unless they decide to wet it and make a sculpture or something. Everyone enjoyed it.
Book Description
Legends Begin Here
Songs are sung and tales are told of heroes who have advanced beyond most adventuring careers. They confront mightier enemies and face deadlier challenges, using powers and abilities that rival even the gods.
This supplement for the
D&D game provides everything you need to transcend the first twenty levels of experience and advance characters to virtually unlimited levels of play. Along with epic magic items, epic monsters, and advice on running an epic campaign, the Epic Level Handbook also features epic NPCs from the Forgotten Realms and
Greyhawk campaign settings.
To use this supplement, a Dungeon Master also needs the Player's Handbook, the
Dungeon Master's Guide, and the Monster Manual. A player needs only the Player's Handbook.
Customer Reviews:
A must for an epic campaign.......2007-08-19
If you are planning on taking your party into epic, this is an absolute must have. That said, some things about it were good, others bad:
The bad:
-Easily unbalanced. CR are often way off the mark (ie: CR 30 Demilich that can kill you by looking at you and heal itself completely every round. There is a lot more to it than this, but suffice to say, unless you tone down its abilities a lot, or are playing with a munchkinesque party, it will slaughter them. Furthermore, the epic spells provided are weak as hell, but the ones you can potentially make can get incredibly overpowered (thus, DM approval required). Many of the magic items are way underpriced (ie: cloak of epic SR, which costs about 200,000, if I remember correctly, and gives you SR of about, what was it? 40?), and some are really overpriced (the jump from a +5 to a +6 weapon, for example).
In short, it will be necessary to double check EVERYTHING to run a balanced game, simply because epic levels were not sufficiently test run.
The good:
-An incredible amount of resources (this is a VERY big book).
-Monsters all across the epic spectrum (I ran a campaign up to level 30 and there were still monsters in the book that could have annihilated the party, and others that the party could have stepped on without noticing).
-Lots of interesting new magic items, and instructions for creating new epic level magic items/distinguishing between epic and non-epic items, etc.
-Some new artifacts, which make good additions to the game (ie: Hextor's gauntlet)
-Adventure ideas in the back, though I didn't use them myself.
-Table of epic level adventure hooks, which was quite useful.
-New, epic level prestige classes
-Of course, an epic level experience table and other little DM tools
-Information for progressing in epic levels in the core classes, as well as the prestige classes from the DM's guide. Also includes sample information for progressing any other 10 level prestige class.
-All sorts of awesome epic feats (an enormous section) for all classes.
-Great artwork (sorry, Mialee is still ugly as sin)
I'm sure there's a lot more that I'm missing, but here's an overall summary:
Great book. Definitely a must for an epic campaign. Well worth the money. Parts are unbalanced, but this can be mostly/entirely negated by a skilled DM. Lots of resources. Currently priced at $6 ($10 with shipping). If you don't have it, and intend to run an epic campaign, I would highly recommend picking it up before copies become inaccessible.
D & D .......2007-01-03
Got this to give as a gift, and it was very well received !
The Best Book!!!.......2006-09-17
OK, it covers just about everything, has cool pictures, and monsters that actually challenge 21+ characters! Also, the new epic prestiege classes and magic items really work into a campaign well!
To arms! The unholy ones are near!.......2006-03-22
Great book full of delightfully useful info. Unfortunately for some its in version 3.0 but with a little work can be converted to 3.5.
Been a DM for decades........2006-02-12
My brother first introduced me to the world of D&D back in the 80's. Loved it then and love it now. This handbook is another in a long line of handbooks which prove useful for what they're intended. Most of every handbook, each of us won't use, we'll trudge on with what we know and love. But once in a while you just want to add something new. This book lets you do that.
For the old curmudgeons out there(I'm one) it won't hurt to adapt or maybe pick and choose different approaches.
I like to play, but I like to read about it too. Found a book, new one called The Unsuspecting Mage by Brian S. Pratt. It's about a lad who reads a lot and plays D&D. He gets sent to a world where he uses his knowledge to survive and thrive. Epic Fantasy at it's best.
Book Description
Get ready to conquer the basics of building a strong level or mod for your games. "Beginning Game Level Design" covers everything from putting your ideas down on paper, to creating spaces and architecture, through placing units and scripting their behavior. You'll cover each important area of expertise that goes into creating a great level. As you cover each new topic, use the end-of-chapter projects to test your newfound skills. "Beginning Game Level Design" gives you a step-by-step look into the tasks a successful designer goes through in order to create levels that keep players coming back for more.
Customer Reviews:
good but could have been great.......2007-09-15
This book makes the same mistake most every other book does having to do with game design in that the author assumes the reader has never played a video game before and spends the first few chapters explaining "game design concepts" that are beyond obvious and would only benefit someone who has lived in a cave for the last 10 years. When the authors finally get around to explaining how to do game levels, they dont give any particular button pushing instructions, its all "we did this, and then we did this.....". Despite these shortcomings this book is quite a bit better than the other books on game level design that are out there.
Every page is full of precious information.......2007-01-08
This is the 3rd book I got about the subject and I can say that this one in my favourite. Is short but covers everything very well. Also, the authors really show a lot of experience and very good writing skills. A really hope they write and intermediate book covering more stuff and using a RPG Toolkit like NWN2 one. You can't go wrong with this book. GRAB IT !
Great book! Good for aspiring devs and everyone else........2006-10-06
This book does an excellent job of teaching you all the different elements in game design. It also includes some of the tricks pro developers use as well! A nice bonus. The book is written in "simple to follow" English so as to not discourage anyone from following the lessons. I highly recommend this to all the gamers out there that want to get into game or level design!
FYI: Important tidbit of info not covered in description.......2005-05-06
I ran across this book at a bookstore last night and whenever the author goes into step by step building, he is using the Crytek editor that comes with the game FarCry. An excellent and *powerful* editor. A lot of other information is also covered in the book and it looks very nice after browsing thru it at the store.
Be aware, I have not spent a lot of time with it yet, so I will give it a 4 star based upon brief inspection and not to skew future ratings.
Average customer rating:
- Great book!
- Great book for early reading
- FUNNY!
- Pirate School
- A very fun book
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Pirate School (All Aboard Reading, Level 2 (Ages 6-8))
Cathy East Dubowski
Manufacturer: Grosset & Dunlap
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Binding: Paperback
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ASIN: 0448411326 |
Customer Reviews:
Great book!.......2006-05-20
"It was a little scary, a little funny, and easy to read" said my son Toby, aged 6.5, after reading this excellent book. He also says there were only about ten words he did not know. The illustrations are good and they do not give the story away -- Toby had to read the words. Toby says "don't give up!".
Great book for early reading.......2005-08-10
This is a very enjoyable pirate story for beginning readers or for us parents to read to our kids. It is about kids of pirates that go to school every day just like toehr kids, only they go in a school bus painted row boat to a giant pirate ship/public school. The lessons they teach are backwards to our own morals and not fair, as the kids are to be greedy and not share, and worse yet to fight when they have disputes. But these rules dont work when it is treasure hunt day on the spooky island. Although each boy claims to have found the treasure first, they quickly learn tha if they are to survice, they must ingore the pirate rules and instead cooperate, share, help out, and trust each other. Wonderful story, I highly reccommend.
FUNNY!.......2004-10-03
This book entertained us all as my son went through his 4- year old Pirate phase. Really funny. Great Price!
Pirate School.......2004-04-24
My 7 year old son is obsessed with Pirates. This is his favorite book. He makes me pretend that he is Pete and his brother is Grimy and I need to substitute the names. He is autistic and learning for him is difficult, but we have taken suggestions from this book to make school fun for him as well. He learned math by using gold coins and likes to do everything the boys do in the book. It is a fantastic book which explains how important it is to share and not to fight with others. I highly recommend this book.
A very fun book.......2002-07-29
I am the mother of two boys ,ages 3 and 4 ,who both adore Pirates.This is a fun story with a great lesson. One of our favorites. A great buy.
Book Description
Master the Numbers Game That’s Taking the World by Storm
Whether you’re one of the millions of people already obsessed with the number puzzles called Sudoku (a Japanese logic game that’s like a combination of a crossword puzzle and a Rubik’s Cube) or you’re just being introduced to this addicting game, Master Sudoku has a puzzle for you. Here, the UK’s leading Sudoku expert, Carol Vorderman, offers 200 puzzles for Sudokuists at every level, ranging from easy to super difficult, with clear instructions and crucial secrets that will help you finish puzzles in record time. The faster you are, the higher your score! Engrossing, challenging, and totally addictive, Master Sudoku is chock-full of fun.
Customer Reviews:
Great Sudoku Book for All Levels.......2007-06-03
*****
This is a great sudoku book for all levels, but especially good for those who wish to increase their sudoku proficiency and MASTER sudoku. There are 200 puzzles, only one to a page, printed large enough for marking up. There are places to record your time, too, and you can accrue points based on how quickly you can do a puzzle. This is nice, because although I prefer difficult puzzles now, it's fun to go back and do an easy one faster and faster. There are different techniques involved in the different levels of puzzles and timing them makes them all continue to be challenging.
If you're a beginner, you can start out with the easy puzzles and work your way up. There are medium puzzles, too, as well as difficult and super-difficult. There is plenty of technique instruction, and there are many examples, so this could serve as a first book for adults. It was not my first sudoku book, but it is still one of my favorites, and I find myself going back to it again and again.
Highly recommended.
*****
COULD HAVE GONE FARTHER.......2007-04-11
I WAS HOPING THAT SHE WOULD HAVE GONE INTO THE SOLVING OF MORE DIFFICULT PUZZLES. HOWEVER, I THINK SHE DID A GOOD JOB IN SOLVING THE MEDIUM PUZZLE SOLUTIONS.
Good for non-experts........2007-02-22
Good basics. A good springboard, and you can go to more advanced techniques later. Her favorite epressions are "slicing and dicing." Took a while for me to figure out that all she's telling you is to look horizontally, and vertically.
GOOD INSTRUCTION AS WELL AS PUZZLES.......2007-01-12
VERY HELPFUL. SHE DOESN'T LEAVE YOU WONDERING WHAT CAN I DO, OR TRY, OR WHERE TO START. IT'S ALL THERE FOR BEGINNER OR DIFFICULT PUZZLE SOLVER. THE ONLY BOOK OF IT'S KIND OUT THERE ...I.B.E. MASS.
My favorite Sudoku book.......2006-09-01
Helpful coaching in learning Sudoku at the beginning of each level. More levels of challenge. Starts easier than others books I've found. Would help people who have tried Sudoku and gotten frustrated and quit.
Book Description
Breaking 100, 90, 80 -- Take Your Game to the Next Level
Tee Shots: Hitting More Fairways
Accuracy: Dialing in Distance and Direction
Power: Hitting the Ball Farther
Fairway Shots: Advancing the Ball
Pitch Shots: Mastering the Mini-swing
Chip Shots: Getting It Close to the Hole
Putting: Developing Technique and Feel
Bunker Shots: Getting Out of the Sand
Trouble Shots: Getting the Ball Safely Back in Play
Fitness: Boosting Your Strength and Flexibility
All-star contributors:
Butch Harmon, David Leadbetter, Jim McLean, Judy Rankin, Ernie Els, Scott Davenport, Justin Leonard, Nick Price, Hank Haney, Jane Crafter, Chuck Cook, Dr. Bob Rotella, Randy Smith, Jack Lumpkin, Rick Smith, and many more.
From the editors of Golf Digest, the premiere name in golf instruction, this comprehensive, beautifully illustrated book features the teachings of the world’s greatest coaches and players, as they demonstrate how to conquer the three most sought-after scoring goals in the game.
Renowned for insightful, cutting-edge instruction by experts such as Butch Harmon, David Leadbetter, and Jim McLean, and playing greats such as Ernie Els, Nick Price, and Judy Rankin, Golf Digest has helped golfers of all abilities achieve scoring breakthroughs with its most popular section, “Breaking 100, 90, 80.” Now, for the first time, Golf Digest assembles these simple and effective tips to help you reach your golfing goals.
In chapters ranging from “Power: Hitting the Ball Farther” to “Chip Shots: Getting It Close to the Hole” to “Trouble Shots: Getting the Ball Safely Back in Play,” Breaking 100, 90, 80 expertly explains how you can conquer each scoring barrier. Interspersed with valuable lessons are colorful sidebars offering additional tips, special sections such as “My First Time,” precise photos and illustrations, and easy-to-follow descriptions from the top teachers and players themselves.
Breaking 100, 90, 80 is a complete game-improvement resource, presented by the world’s golf authority, and one of the rare books that demonstrates exactly how to take your game to the next level-–no matter what kind of player you are.
BIO
GOLF DIGEST is the most successful golf magazine in the industry, with more than six million readers each month. Instruction Editor Scott Smith, who edited Breaking 100, 90, 80, has been with the magazine for eight years and works regularly with the game’s top instructors.
www.doubleday.com
Customer Reviews:
Learning Golf Book.......2007-08-14
My wife purchased a copy this book for me last year. I have used the information to help me lower my average score 8 strokes so far this year.
My son who is also just starting to get serious about golf and also a high handicap golfer, could not put my copy down. He is bigger and stronger than I am so it was difficult to my book back! I decided it would be a perfect birthday gift for him. He and I compare notes over the phone and in peson when he is in town. If you are a mid to high handicap golfer I don't think you could go wrong with this book.im
Mmmhh.... good.......2007-01-31
This book is more a series of tips that a book that guides you through a complete "system" or "way of playing". Don't get me wrong, it contains a lot of useful tips, but they don't seem to be arranged into a logic secuence.
I find it useful if you already know what are the flaws in your game, and could provide you with some interensting exercices for improving.
Overall a fairly good book, but not the best out there...
recommend this for any golfer.......2005-10-14
great book, well written and illustrated. Breaking 100, 90, 80 will take any golfer's game to the next level!
Took me to the next level.......2005-08-29
I must say, my scores on golf have lowered!
Good tips on breaking 90 maybe.......2004-11-20
This book is good for beginners. Although some of the instruction is complex and too much at times, it can show the beginning golfer how to play better golf. However, I found the following really great for showing one how to actually be a zero handicap golfer or better. This book is called:
The Ultimate Golf Instruction Guide: Key Techniques for Becoming a Zero Handicap Golfer or Better by Patrick Leonardi
isbn 1933023090
With the help of Leonardi's book I now can shoot in the mid-seventies. Soon I will be able to break par. Leonardi shows how golf is really not that hard and can be mastered with his excellent and easy to learn techniques.
Average customer rating:
- Useful but disorganized
- Not enough explanation
- Much more than the fundamentals of SVG
- Excellent SVG book for all skill levels
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Fundamentals SVG Programming (Graphics Series)
Campesato
Manufacturer: Charles River Media
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ASIN: 1584502983 |
Book Description
Fundamentals of SVG Programming: Concepts to Source Code is a comprehensive guide to the core concepts of SVG programming, including the coordinate systems, color gradients, grid patterns, Bezier curves, transforms, charts, graphs, and more. Written for those new to SVG, this book does an excellent job of "marrying" SVG to mathematics, showing how simple equations can be used to create and manipulate SVG graphics. It presents the information in "bite-size" pieces, teaching users how to create a plethora of standard graphics, and includes a CD-ROM with over 20,000 ready-to-use code samples derived from geometric objects. These samples can be implemented as is or customized for specific projects.
Customer Reviews:
Useful but disorganized.......2006-11-10
I agree wholeheartedly with the other reviewer who found this book lacking in explanations. What this book (and the accompanying CD) has is lots and lots of svg files. For getting a 'feel' for svg and what it can do all of this code is useful. As a tutorial and guide for learning svg, however, this book is sorely lacking. First, it lacks any sort of 'overview' of the svg language. It would be nice if this book had a quick reference listing of all of the svg elements and the attributes allowed for each and a page number referencing where that element/attribute is discussed. What the book does instead is jump right into code examples, seemingly wandering at random throughout the svg spec. For example, chapter 7 discusses a handful of svg filters. In the feTurbulence example the attribute "numOctaves" suddenly appears. What's that? What is the valid range of 'numOctave' parameters? Can I use it with the other filter elements? What does it *do*? Is 'numOctaves' in the index? Nope. And that's pretty much the story throughout the whole book. Another example: almost all of the code samples use the 'g' group element. It's first introduced on page 6 as 'The fifth line contains the 'g' element', followed a paragraph later with 'You can use the svg g element to enclose a group of components that are logically related and need to be treated as a single unit.' The g element is used in almost all of the code samples, sometimes with certain attributes like 'id' and sometimes without. So g must be a fairly important tag, right? Is 'g' in the index? Nope. 'Group'? Nope. Is there any page I can find that explains what attributes are available with the
tag and how and when I should use them? Nope. There are five sizeable chapters devoted to ECMAscript and svg. There is *one* entry under J in the index, and that entry is '.js'. The page it refers to talks about placing svg code in .js files to sorta protect it from being viewed. If you didn't bother to read the introduction and weren't up to date with your web mastery you'd have no clue ECMAscript is simply the 'international name' for Javascript. Jeez.
BTW, svg is still very much a 'work in progress' as far as implementation support goes. On my Gentoo Linux system I can use Apache Batik to view most of the non-animated svg code examples. I have to use the Adobe svg viewer in Firefox to see the animations. (The built-in Firefox svg viewer won't display most of the code samples because of a missing namespace declaration in the svg tags.) A lot of the code samples in this book look nice but support among the various browsers seems patchy at best.
Not enough explanation.......2006-08-11
Though this book does go through a lot of the different things you can do with SVG, I find that it doesn't give a full explanation of how certain parts of the code work. For example, when discussing the Bezier curves, the book doesn't explain much of the mathematics behind how the curves are created.
Much more than the fundamentals of SVG.......2006-05-26
The Scalable Vector Graphics (SVG) is an XML markup language for describing vector graphics, both static and animated. It is an open standard created by the World Wide Web Consortium, which is also responsible for standards like HTML and XHTML.
This book is one of the best I've found for people who want to do more than just make basic shapes and text with SVG. The book starts from the beginning, assuming nothing more than an elementary knowledge of math and a good understanding of XML. It first discusses what a minimal SVG documents consists of, the SVG coordinate system, and then uses a basic rectangle to demonstrate opacity, shadowing, the standard SVG colors, and gradients. Next the circle and ellipse constructs are introduced, as well as arc-based drawing and creating 3D effects. The SVG pattern element is introduced and is used to generate several effects in combination with drawing a checkerboard. Next the more complex topic of quadratic and cubic bezier curves is introduced. Both the mathematics and the SVG facilities required to draw them are discussed. The less known subjects of affine transformation in SVG are then covered. Included are the basic translate, rotate, scale, skew, and matrix functions. However, more complex effects are discussed in the context of these function calls when it is shown how to draw an hourglass and a cylinder in SVG. Next, the more artistic side of SVG is exposed with its various filter primitives that include Gaussian blur and turbulence effects. This is followed by discussions of text both plain and with effects, animation in SVG, and drawing various types of graphs and charts in SVG. To go further with SVG, it is shown how to use ECMAscript with SVG to provide interactivity and added mathematical sophistocation by writing your own effects. A CD is included with all of the source code, plus the code is downloadable from the book's website. I highly recommend this book as a complete guide to the use of SVG for anyone who already knows XML, some ECMAscript, and basic mathematics and matrix algebra. It is the best and most complete of its kind that I have found.
Amazon does not show the table of contents, so I do that next:
1 SVG Coordinate System, Simple Shapes, and Colors
2 Color Gradients and Style
3 Circles, Ellipses, and pathElements
4 SVG pattern, Grid Patterns, and clipPath
5 Quadratic and Cubic Bezier Curves
6 SVG Transformations
7 SVG Filters
8 Displaying Text
9 Simple SVG Animation
10 SVG for Bar Charts and Line Graphs
11 HTML, ECMAScript, and SVG DOM
12 Interactive SVG and ECMAScript
13 ECMAScript and SVG Animation
14 ECMAScript and Polar Equations
15 SVG and Pie Charts
16 ECMAScript, Recursion, and SVG
17 Generating SVG Documents
18 Supplemental Patterns
A. XSL Basics
B. Introduction to XML
C. Perl Basics
D. About the CD-ROM
Excellent SVG book for all skill levels.......2003-10-01
This is one of the best SVG books I've seen in a while. I think it is suited for all skill levels. The book makes good use of applying math to SVG. Whereas with other graphics tools you have to draw, the author shows how to use mathematical equations to create the images. Don't be intimidated--the math isn't that difficult
. The book also shows a lot of images in color--somewhat rare these days, esp. for technical books. The book comes with a CD that has tons of samples--you're sure to find something that piques your interest. If you want to get up to speed in SVG, buy this book!
Book Description
At the heart of any great computer game are expertly designed levels: the locales and stages that define gameplay. And at the core of any strong game development team are the level designers: the people who create the spaces and environments that you move through while playing the game. And because level design doesn’t require a fine arts or programming degree, it’s one of the best avenues into a career in game development. Level Design for Games: Creating Compelling Game Experiences is the definitive guide to level design, both for aspiring game developers, and for industry pros looking for practical, best-practice tips and advice.
With over ten years of experience with some of the industry’s top developers, Phil Co starts the reader at the very beginning of the
game development process, explaining the level designer’s role in the all-important preproduction phase. Co then moves into the
production phase, using a fictional level to demonstrate how to create and refine your level.
Packed with screenshots, diagrams, and real-world examples, this book gives you all the tools you need to build your own professional-grade
level, including level narratives, descriptions, diagrams, and templates. Chapter assignments help you practice what you’ve learned, and the demo of Epic’s UnrealEngine2 Editor (UnrealEd), included on the companion CD-ROM, gives you hands-on experience
with an industry-standard tool.
Phil Co has a degree in architecture from the University of Virginia but opted instead for a career in video games. Starting out as a tester at SEGA, he’s been a level designer since 1996 for some of the best-regarded game developers in the industry, including Cyclone Studios, Blizzard, and Valve Software, makers of the hugely popular âHalf-Lifeâ series. Phil lives in Seattle with his wife and son.
âAnyone interested in a level design career should read this book. Phil does an excellent job covering all
the aspects of level design across several game genres.â
âRob Pardo, Vice President of Game Design,
Blizzard Entertainment
âAn indispensable guide to the theory, process, and practice of level design.â
âRobin Walker, Designer, Valve Software
âThis book contains a wealth of valuable information for anyone
interested in Level Design. It is one of the few books I would
recommend to my gaming students.â
âTodd Robinson, Game Design Instructor,
Academy of Art University, San Francisco
Customer Reviews:
Excellent Book!.......2006-05-21
This is an excellent book. It is straightforward and delivers very useful information. This book is devoid of the fluff, generalizations and pseudo-intellectual chatter so many books in the game development/design genre contain. This author speaks from experience, which is evident from his bio, but more so from the flow and genuine voice of his writing. I am particularly cynically and harsh on books in this genre so I didn't write this review lightly.
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