Our Planet Kodu course will turn you into a Kodu Game Lab guru!

While what we plan to do week to week may be shuffled a little in the lead up to our course start date March 1st, this outline remains a good indication of the contents of the Kodu course.

If you haven’t done so already, register as a member on the Planet Kodu site and sign up. It’s free, and open to everyone!

Week 1         Getting Started with Kodu – Aquire the skills

Week one we’ll give you the skills to start building your Kodu games straight away! We’ll explore Kodu Game Lab together, introduce the concepts of design and navigation, and look how the best Kodu games are structured.

Week 2         How to build a prototype – fast!

Week two we explore the more formal elements of game design. We’ll take a look at how to find ideas, brainstorm game concepts and identify some of the risks when building your game.

Week 3         Game Mechanics – Designing challenging, engaging games

Week three we look at pushing your games to the next level. We’ll talk about how to determine powerful rules for your game, and use game actions and secrets effectively.

Week 4         The Game Experience – Theme and Story

Week four we take a look at the Kodu game space in more detail. We’ll explore the Kodu characters and the world they live in more closely.

We’ll look at how to build atmosphere in your game, and introduce rewards. Finally, we’ll talk about how to playtest your Kodu games and what you can learn from the process.

Week 5         Pushing the Boundaries – puzzles and probability

In our final week with Kodu Game Lab, we’ll explore how to implement games with an element of skill and chance. We’ll also look at different approaches to game design, with a comparison of game styles in our Head, Hands and Co-operation approach.