How To Become a Game Developer

Want to design your own game and make it a huge success? That’s a great idea! And don’t worry if you know nothing about game development yet — everyone starts somewhere. In this article, we’ll help you figure out how to become a game developer and work on big and fun projects! And trust us, it’s not an issue if you don’t have and are not planning to get a game development degree. This article is for those who want to follow a less traditional path. So let’s get straight into it: 

Become a Game Developer Without a Degree 

What does one need to become a great freelance game developer? Well, although having a degree wouldn’t harm, it’s definitely not among the most indispensable things you need for kickstarting your game development career. Below, we’ll list some of the steps that can help you become a computer game developer without struggling for 4 years to obtain a BA. 

Become a successful game developer

• Start learning programming

The first and most obvious step to start with is to start learning coding! To create a game, you’ll need to code, so it’s good to start figuring out how to do it, right? Here are some of the common programming languages used in game development you might want to consider:

• JavaScript
• Java 
• CSS
• C#
• Ruby, and so on

Along with these languages, you need to know how to use a variety of software, like Photoshop, 3D Studio Max, Unreal, and Maya. Yes, that’s a lot of work to do! So you better start skimming through Udemy courses already.

• Play games!

Now this is the fun part: as a game developer, it is actually your professional duty to play and analyze as many games as possible. It’s in a way a part of your research, and definitely the most fun part! But keep in mind that once you start developing games, the experience of playing games will, sadly, never be the same again. You’ll start thinking about how every aspect of the game was developed, and your mind will be too focused on figuring out how the game was built to actually be able to fully enjoy it.

• Follow famous game blogs and forums

Here is a list of some famous game blogs that will be helpful to follow as a starter game developer:

1. Unity Blog

Unity is one of the best real-time development platforms in the world. So you can be confident that their blogs on game development will be written by experts and really useful for your project. Our suggestion is to check out their 10 game design tips for new developers blog post, as it really helps to understand which elements to use in your game design.

2. Buildbox Blog

Another giant in the industry is Buildbox, a platform for 2D and 3D game development. If you’re into video game development, then make sure you check out their blog page. Our favorite article of theirs is 19 ways to come up with game ideas for those of you who are currently having a creative crisis.

3. GitHub forums

This list wouldn’t be complete without GitHub. It’s basically the number one place to go for all the developers out there, including game developers. So make sure you check Github’s game development forum if you want to stay updated with the latest trends and technologies.

• Create a portfolio

Finally, once you start developing your first projects, remember to keep the best ones of those in your portfolio. This is one of the few things that matter when you apply for a game developer vacancy. If you have a strong portfolio, no one cares about the degree, or even your previous experience. All that matters instead is the quality of your work, which your employers assess from the projects of your portfolio.

These were all the steps required for becoming a game developer. But what if you want to become a mobile game developer? Well you basically need to follow all the same steps, and only add a couple of additional ones: 

Become a Mobile Game Developer

Here’s a quick summary of how to become a mobile game developer:

• Choose between Android and iOS
• Choose your preferred game development platform
• Practice as much as you can
• Build a portfolio
• Apply for vacancies!

That was it for this article — we hope it was helpful. Good luck on becoming the best game developer out there!