Want to know how to make a game? Here's the entire process in about six minutes...

You've probably thought about designing your own game.You may have already dreamed up exactly whatyourbigger-than-Tetris gamewould look like and how it would work. Youmay have told your friends that it would be"like ICO and Gears of War combined," and then told their stupid,skeptical faces,"Whatever, you'd probablyjust have to play it to get it."

We have. And then wetinkered around forjust long enough to findout that the whole thing is really, really hard. But, of course,not everyone gives up so easily- we wouldn't have any games if it weren't for thatsuper-motivated 1%always makingus look bad. (Jerks.)

They're the kind of people who participate in competitions likeLudum Dare, which challenges creatives to design and produce complete games in only48 hours. The events are held every four months, and require entrants todesign, code, and illustratesimple games based on pre-set themes.Several of the daring programmershave recorded their entire processes and compressedthem into time-lapsedtours of madness. Look, everything you need to know about game design!Yeah, it looks really, really hard:

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The game in this video, created byMarkus Persson,is naturally simplistic, but it's actually pretty fun if you give it a chance. And you can, becauseit's playable right here. And if you want to see more, there are plenty of other timelapse videoson YouTube. It's pretty mesmerizing...

...But we're still not planningto browse community college programming classes any time soon. Damn that looks hard and stuff. But if you are feeling the motivation, and lack experience, weput together a guidea while back which offersa bunchof greatresources for aspiring designers. Get started now and who knows? Maybe you'll be the next [insert your favorite game designer here].

Aug 30, 2010