Course Information

Fall 2002 Carnegie Mellon University - James Kuffner


The results of the final class project game competition voting have been announced. Here are the winners:
Overall Best Game Technical Excellence Original Game Design
1. Wobble! 1. QuakeClone 1. Spheres
2. The Quarks 2. Sword Fighter 2. ChessTF
3. Spheres 3. Tempest 3. The Quarks

See the final student project screenshots!

Essentials

Class meetings: Tuesdays and Thursdays, 9:00-10:20, in Porter A18C
Class e-mail list: gamedev-list@gs06.isri.cmu.edu (view the list's archive)
Course calendar: Schedule of classes and related events, including topics, assignments, readings, and due dates
Course mechanics: Administrative matters such as assignments and grading policy
Textbook: Game Programming Gems Mark DeLoura (Editor)

Instructors

Please use to contact all course instructors. Individual instructor contact information is given below.

Who Email Phone
James Kuffner (412)268-8818
Tim Halloran (TA) (412)268-8187
Quarup Barreirinhas (TA) (412)862-2696
Albert Reed (Adjunct Lecturer)

Office Hours

Instructors will hold regularly scheduled office hours, in addition to spending time in the lab to help with problems or answer questions.
Who Location Hours
James NSH 4228A MW 11am-Noon
Tim Wean 3719 F 10am-Noon
Quarup Wean 5336 (Lab) T 4pm-6pm
Al Wean 5336 (Lab) TBA

Course description

This course will cover tools and techniques for programming interactive games and virtual reality simulations. The course will focus primarily on programming aspects, including event loops and execution threads, rendering and animation in 3D, terrain/background representation, polygonal models, texturing, collision detection and physically-based modeling, game AI, and multi-user games and networking. Although this course has a heavy programming focus, other topics briefly covered will include the history of computer/video game technology, game genres and design principles, and the social impact of games.

Objectives and Approach

The primary goal of this course is to equip students with practical knowledge about 3D game programming. The focus will not be on teaching all of the details of programming under specific platforms, but rather on providing both a high-level understanding and practical implementation experience of reusable algorithms and coding techniques that apply to the development of games across different platforms and genres. All programming will be done in C/C++ using open-source, cross-platform libraries such as OpenGL and GLUT. Students will design and program their own games or virtual reality simulations as part of their class projects. There will also be several smaller programming labs designed to provide students with experience implementing common components of game engines. Detailed information regarding assignments and grading can be found on the course administration page.
Page last updated on $Date: 2002/12/16 20:05:06 $.
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