Core Techniques and Algorithms in Game Programming is one of those rare programming books that you really can judge by the cover.
The author, Daniel Sanchez-Crespo—a regular contributor to Byte (Spain), Gamasutra and Game Developer—did
an excellent and thorough job in the 800 pages that he had to work
with. Throughout the book, even though English is not the author’s
native language, he is clear and concise with every aspect of the
technology he covers. This is actually one of the books I recommend for
students on my game programming courses at the Academy of G.E.T. in
Hollywood—confirmation, in my mind, of the book's intent of being a
textbook.
Sanchez-Crespo
begins with a brief chronology of games, moves on to the very basics of
game architecture and the process of programming, then ramps up from
there, thoroughly examining every aspect of the technology that makes a
modern game, including the oft-neglected “input/update/render” loop. He
doesn’t hang around either: he jumps feet-first into the common data
structures (lists, queues and stack) and the not so common (deques,
graphs and trees) that you will encounter, and examines what the
Standard Template Library (STL) provides off-the-shelf. Sanchez-Crespo
recognizes the power of the STL but also concedes that not all games
should trade ease of implementation for a degradation in speed.
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Title: Core Techniques and Algorithms in Game Programming
Author: Daniel Sanchez-Crespo
Publisher: New Riders
ISBN: 0131020099
Published: Sep. 11, 2003
Pages: 888
Rating (out of 5):
Pros
- Covers a lot of technical areas in-depth.
- Author explains the areas very clearly.
- The book contains a lot of information, not code dumps.
Cons
- Could use extra volumes expanding on the information already contained.
- Some sections, such as input & sound, are far too brief to be really useful.
- Lack of an accompanying CD of code and examples.
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Graphics plays a large part in the book, with several chapters dedicated to 2D
and 3D rendering, along with the effects achievable in each area. 3D
is a large subject and suitable for an entire volume all to itself, and
Sanchez-Crespo performs a stellar job keeping each chapter tightly focused
on the particular subject, introducing each technology at the proper
pace. 3D is further divided to include indoor and outdoor rendering systems
using chunked terrain rendering and portals of all types. Trailing the
generic 3D sections is a large detailed detour in to character animation
that covers skinned meshes and kinematics (both forward and inverse),
as well as proper facial and limb animation systems.
The second largest area of this book is AI. Sanchez-Crespo really knows this
subject. Outside of a dedicated book on game AI such as AI Programming Wisdom, this book offers some of the most comprehensive information on the subject
delving into single unit and multiple unit navigation and coordination,
using core AI techniques such as finite state machines and rule-based
systems. The AI section alone makes owning the book well worth the shelf
space.
Some of the shorter chapters cover networking, scripting, performance tuning,
DirectX and OpenGL and their differences, an overview of the math required
to
get to grips with modern games technology, and finally the obligatory
“further reading” section.
Just
so you don’t get the impression this book is all hardcore programming,
Sanchez-Crespo includes a chapter covering the cinematic aspects of
games—something everybody involved in 3D games should learn, though
it’s too brief for my liking. There’s even a chapter on design
patterns, what they are, and their usage, including usability patterns
(how the user interacts with the user interface)—a rare detour for a
programming book.
Because
the book is mostly API agnostic, it’s not going to suddenly go out of
fashion like many API or narrow-focus books based on a particular
technology. Any book on general game programming is going to have to be
brief in some areas simply because the domain is so broad.
Sanchez-Crespo does a good job, covering so much in such a brief space
you wonder how he got it all in. Any subject you can think of
pertaining to game programming is in this book, which is its strength
and weakness. To do the subject justice, the book needs to be longer,
and to the author’s credit he did the best job in the 800 pages
provided. It’s a strong foundation book for aspiring game developers
and there's content in there for experienced developers too. It’s also
a book you can give to a not-so-technical game designer and have them
read through it to get a good foundation in many of the techniques and
technologies that are being implemented by games programmers in studios
all over the world. This book will definitely have a long shelf life.