Are you looking for the perfect gift to give to a game developer this holiday season?
Whether it’s Christmas gift, a birthday gift, or something just to remind your game
developer friend that you care, we have you covered.
In today’s video we’ll be going over gifts, both digital and physical, that we think game
developers would be happy to have.
Please note, this is not a sponsored video!
These are things we truly like, have used, or would want!
We are Ask Gamedev and these are 10 Gift Ideas for a Game Developer.
Welcome back!
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Let’s begin!
Number 10.
A Design Book.
Let’s start off with the books that we mentioned in our video “How to Become a Game Designer”.
If you want to get a book for someone interested in game design, check out these titles:
A Theory of Fun by Raph Koster The Design of Everyday Things by Don Norman
The Laws of Simplicity by John Maeda And A Book of Lenses by Jesse Schell
In addition to those books, you can also check out:
Game Feel by Steve Swink And Level Up by Scott Rogers
While these books are for design, they can still be appreciated by developers of other
disciplines.
These books are available in both physical, and e-book editions.
We’ll leave links in the description for each one.
Number 9: A Nice Notebook
Whether it’s at a talk, during a brainstorming session, or just sitting down at their desk,
every developer takes a lot of notes - copious amounts!
That’s why recommend getting a dev a nice, premium-feeling, notebook.
Moleskine makes some really nice notebooks, in an array sizes and colours, and they’ve
even done collabs featuring Pac-man, Pokemon, and more.
Here is an awesome option that includes some classic Nintendo nostalgia.
This Super Mario Land one might be our favourite.
Another great option would be the Leuchtturm 1917 book.
These books, made in Germany, have a premium feel and also come in an array of colours.
Number 8: A subscription to Adobe Creative Cloud
Whether your dev needs to make a trailer, or make a website, create some art, do some
UX design, or anything in between, Creative Cloud will have you covered.
It includes 20+ apps and services including PhotoShop, Illustrator, Premiere, InDesign,
AfterEffects, Animate, Muse and more!
We personally use Illustrator, PhotoShop, After Effects, and Premiere to create content
for Ask Gamedev.
In terms of pricing, Single app subscriptions range from US $9.99 a month to $20.99 a month,
with the full suite of 20+ apps going for US $52.99 a month!
If you’re gifting this to a student or teacher, they have a preferred rate of US $19.99 a
month for the full suite!
Number 7: A Humble Bundle Gift
Everyone knows about Humble Bundle because of their game bundles, where you can buy a
slew of fantastic games at a fraction of the retail price, while supporting charity.
They regularly put out great themed bundles, and they’ve also got the popular Humble
Choice program.
Obviously game devs love games, but why would we single out Humble, and not just say get
them a gift card to Steam, or Epic, or Nintendo’s eShop, etc.
Well, aside from game bundles, Humble does a really great job at creating bundles around
other types of content.
They have book bundles, comic bundles, and… game development bundles.
That’s right, every now and then, Humble will release a bundle targeted towards game
developers.
Sometimes the bundle is focused around an engine or software, sometimes it’s assets
packs, and sometimes it’s about learning.
Past gamedev-related bundles include:
The Humble Learn Game Development Bundle: The Humble Unreal Engine Game Development
Bundle And the Humble Book Bundle: Developing Your
Own Games by Springer Bundles do run for a limited time, so you’ll
have to buy and gift the bundle while it’s still available.
Number 6: A Subscription to SkillShare Premium.
If you’d like to give the gift of learning, SkillShare is a great place to start!
They even have a gifting page that makes this option super convenient.
If you haven’t heard of SkillShare, it’s an online learning community where experts
share their craft, in lesson format.
A premium subscription will get you access to more than 21,000 classes on topics including
design, illustration, business, entrepreneurship, and more.
Some cool classes that we’ve found include: Jeff Staple’s “The Staples of Branding”
Kurzgesagt’s Motion Graphics with Kurzgesagt
And Matheus Dix’s “Pixel Art Fundamentals”
All of the game development principles are also covered.
Whether it’s learning Godot, or Unity, or Blender, or learning art or Game Design, there
is a course for it.
Number 5: A Masterclass
Perhaps you’d like to give your developer friend just one class - Masterclass might
be the platform for you.
Like Skillshare, Masterclass is an online learning platform.
The difference here is that the teachers are some of the world’s most famous people.
A sampling of masterclasses offered include: Martin Scorsese teaches filmmaking
Natalie Portman teaching acting Gordon Ramsay teaching cooking
And Penn and Teller teach the Art of Magic Magic of Art
For Game Design and Theory, Masterclass has a class taught by the one and only, Will Wright
- creator of The Sims.
Will’s 21 part course covers everything from generating concepts, to iteration and
scoping, to playtesting, to leadership and collaboration.
Masterclass offers the option to purchase a single class individually, and also has
an “All-Access Pass” that provides access to all of MasterClass
Number 4: A Graphics Tablet Our first and only piece of hardware on the
list, is a graphics tablet!
We recommend Wacom tablets because they’re high-quality and they provide a wide range
of options in terms of feature set and price.
The One by Wacom is a great place to start, and depending on your price range and features
needed, you can go as high as the Wacom Cintiq Pro series, or the standalone Wacom MobileStudio
Pro series.
Just make sure the gamedev on your wish list has an interest in making their own art - cause
if so this would make a great gift.
Number 3: A Game Engine License
As you know, from all the videos that we’ve done, there are a lot of free game engines!
That said, if your gamedev friend uses or wants to use a paid engine, why not get them
a license, or extend their current license.
Some paid game engines include: Construct 3
GameMaker RPG Maker
And Clickteam Fusion
The benefit of the latter three is that you can buy them on Steam!
Of course, before you make a purchase, you’ll want to find out what engine they use or would
want to use first.
Number 2: Tickets to GDC
For the dev that has everything, why not gift them an experience!
Get them tickets to the event that all game developers should check out - GDC or Game
Developers Conference, happening March 16-20, 2020, in San Francisco, California.
Tickets come in several options ranging from a basic expo pass, all the way to an All Access
pass.
There are even specialty passes for students!
For pricing and more info, check out their website.
Number 1: A book about Game Development
For number 1 on our list, we recommend getting a game developer, not how-to book on game
development, but a book featuring game development stories.
There are some many great ones to choose from!
If they’re a fan of Nintendo, Game Over: How Nintendo Conquered The World by David
Sheff is a must-read!
Console Wars: Sega, Nintendo, and the Battle that Defined a Generation by Black J. Harris
is also up there.
There’s also Boss Fight Books, a book company dedicated to documenting the making of some
of history’s greatest games!
There are 21 books total right now, including books on some of our favourite games: Spelunky,
NBA Jam, EarthBound, and Megaman 3.
You can even buy the 21 book set!
If we had to recommend only 1 book though, we would go with Blood, Sweat, and Pixels:
The Triumphant, Turbulent Stories Behind How Video Games Are Made by Kotaku News Editor,
Jason Schreier.
With someone who as much access to videogame studios around the world as Jason, the book
had high expectations when announced.
We don’t want to spoil anything, but Jason knocked it out of the park.
We can’t wait until Book Two!
Thanks for watching!
For More Ask Gamedev watch this video on the cost of making video games, or the sequel,
the cost of making video games part 2!