Ask HN: What do I need to learn for mobile app game development?

7 points·misham··3 comments

I'm interested in developing games for mobile apps, both iOS and Android. Apart from learning iOS and Android development, what other technologies do I need to learn?

I have a CS degree and I know C, C++ and Java. What else do I need to know?

Thank you

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If you would like to develop cross-platform games, I would recommend checking out Ansca Mobile's "Corona", a Lua SDK for iOS and Android. Corona is mostly focused on game development, with libraries for things like animation, physics, and in-app purchases. The Lua is a popular scripting language in the commercial game industry (e.g. WoW extensions are written in Lua).

Unity3D seems to be a good engine, can port to web, android, iOS, XBox Live Arcade, Wii, etc.

I believe you can write in C#, Javascript, among other languages.

I'd say learning OpenGL would be a good thing. The OpenGL ES 2.0 spec is supported on both iOS and Android and you can write in C++ for both. It might be more practical use some engine, but if you want to understand what is happening under the covers then this is the best way to do it. Plus, shaders are really powerful.

Hope that helps!

Edit: Here's a tutorial that I've been going through myself recently. It's taught on a desktop but everything is applicable to mobile as well. http://duriansoftware.com/joe/An-intro-to-modern-OpenGL.-Tab...

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