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submitted 9 months ago by haxor@derp.foo to c/hackernews@derp.foo

Background :

My son hasn’t really showed any interest in computers until now. He’s been spending a lot of time over the last couple of weeks designing some sort of a game (on paper) and now he wants me to help him build it, whatever it is. I don’t want to let him down but I also know how much work that goes into a game (he specifically wants it to be 3D).

I’m a decent developer, although I’ve not done game development professionally I did tons of demos on the 90’s so I feel I know the basics of 3D math but I’m pretty sure he will lose interest if I try to teach him x86 assembler :)

Joke aside, what can I do? This sounds like a great project for us to explore together and hopefully he can grow interest in software design and development.

Are there development kits I can start with (unity?)

How do I keep the project “contained” so he feels that he accomplished something but still feels we developed something close to his vision?

Thank you HN.


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[-] averyminya@beehaw.org 3 points 9 months ago

I somewhat side with the person saying the kid may not entirely want to learn to code but make a game with the parent. I remember those days, the idea of using a computer to make something was beyond me but I made plenty of games on paper.

If the type of game fits, and I think now if the interest is truly in playing the game you make and having it come to fruition, I would scale it down as much as possible, make simple assets, then plot it out in tabletop simulator before making it an actual physical board game.

this post was submitted on 18 Jan 2024
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