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Useful Sites for Game Development |
The following are
sites that contain public domain (free) utility software or art work. Please be
extra careful and only download files that are explicitly marked as “free” or “public domain”. Remember you are responsible for the resources
contained in your games. If it contains anything illegal, you are responsible!
Portal to bunch of free resources:
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http://gamemaking.indiangames.net/index_files/FreeSpritesforGames.htm
(watch it! Not all the sites referenced here provide copyrighted materials!!)
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http://www.xnaresources.com/
Art work and Textures:
Art work:
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http://www.ausmall.com.au/freegraf/freegrfa.htm
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http://office.microsoft.com/en-us/clipart/FX101321031033.aspx?pid=CL100570201033
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Textures:
Sprites Sheet:
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http://charas-project.net/ (From Joseph Kniest, Spring 2010)
- Click on Complete Resources (to the left under Site)
- Click on Various() (under Extra)
Background Art work:
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http://www.celestial-art.net/
(From John Davis, Spring 2009, scroll to the end to see conditions of usage).
Utility programs for image editing:
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Many
of the online art work are stored in (transparent) gif format. XNACS1Lib does
not understand gif format. I used the Exorcist program to convert gif to png for textures. The Exorcist program can be downloaded
from: http://www.nigels.com/exorcist/Download.html
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Icons
are stored in .ico format. I used the IcoFX (http://icofx.ro)
to convert my photograph to icon.
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Image
editing programs:
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http://www.gimp.org/
(from Kyle Gerrodette,
Spring 2009)
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Image editing program: http://aviary.com/home
(from John Davis, Sprint 2009)
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Avatar
editing: http://myavatareditor.com
(from Shane Krolikowski and Scott McPherson, Winter 2010)
Audio and Background Music:
General:
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http://www.freesound.org/
(from Thomas Baron, Fall 2009)
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http://partnersinrhyme.com
(from Aaron Amlag
and Brendon Co, Fall 2009)
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http://incompetech.com/m/c/royalty-free/
(from Ronald Cook, Spring 2010)
Background music:
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http://www.musopen.com/
(from Mikhail Elbert, Spring 2009)
Audio effects (for audio
cue):
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http://www.a1freesoundeffects.com/
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http://simplythebest.net (from Shane
Krolikowski and Scott McPherson,
Winter 2010)
Utility programs for
audio editing:
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Audio
editor program: http://audacity.sourceforge.net/
(from Kyle Gerrodette, Spring
2009). Hints from Joshua Bell (Spring 2009) on audio file size.
General Utilities:
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Image/Video
capture:
- http://camstudio.org/
(from Kyle Carrier, Spring 2010) [Kyle’s comments: This is a great free alternative to screen capture
other than fraps or similar tools which can cost a lot. It also offers a
lot more functionality than fraps in my opinion, you can record certain
sections of your screen instead of the whole thing, and you can output
your video using various codecs to cut down on file size (though they
still need compression through windows movie maker), as well as a few
other nice tools.]
- http://fraps.com/ (from Jeff Hutchins, Spring 2009) [Jeff’s
recommendation on video capture: video file generated can be quite large,
run it through WindowsMovieMaker
with wmv
format.].
- http://wisdom-soft.com/products/screenhunter_free.htm
(I use this for static image capture, works well).
- http://www.virtualdub.org/
(from Kyle Carrier, Spring 2010)
[Kyle’s comments: This
provides screen capture capability as well as a pretty nice (and free!)
way to edit and touch up videos. It’s also really useful for compressing
videos captured with something like fraps.
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Performance
Profiling:
- http://www.red-gate.com/products/ants_performance_profiler/index.htm (from Charlie Skinner, Spring
2010). Watch out this is not a freeware, you
only have 14 days free-trail. And it costs about $400-!!
Tutorial and Engines:
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On
stencil buffer: http://blogs.msdn.com/shawnhar/archive/2007/05/17/transitions-part-three-stencil-swipes.aspx
(from Katherine Kuttler,
Spring 2009) [ed: to get
access to “device”, you would need to include/modify the library source code,
try it! It is not that scary].
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Physics
Engine: http://www.codeplex.com/FarseerPhysics
(from Katherine Kuttler,
Spring 2009 - one really neat
capability of Farseer that I discovered is that it
can convert a texture with an alpha into a list of vertices [ed: for collision purposes]).
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ParticleSystem: (from Eric Nevala, Spring
2009)
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Working with SpriteSheet: http://www.ziggyware.com/readarticle.php?article_id=138
IMPORTANT SITES FOR US:
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Sites
to get free software as UWB CSS student:
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http://msdn08.e-academy.com/uwbot_cssp
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https://www.dreamspark.com/
-- If you are interested in XNA and/or developing software for XBOX 360: refer
to help files from our fellow classmates: Ethan Crawford, or from Howard Yuen. These documents show you how to
register for XNA Creator’s club membership for free and thus allow you to
develop/download games for free to the XBOX 360 console.
Kelvin Sung | CMMR
Home | CSS
Home | UW
Bothell | UW
Seattle
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