FPS Game Design First Person Shooter (FPS) is the starting class for any of our FPS students. You must have taken this class this summer or in previous years to take the customization or scripting classes.

• Understanding of game design techniques
• Building a sound and working first level to their game
• Learn techniques that make games fun and addicting
• Students will beta test each other’s levels and learn how to take and apply criticism about their game
• Debugging skills and understanding the concept “less is more”
• Package their level and take it home at the end of the week to show off to family and friends

Note: This class involves students creating a game where the player shoots enemies and blood is displayed.  If you do not want your camper to create a game like this, please take one of our other game design courses such as Role Playing Game (RPG), 3D Modeling or Mobile Apps.

FPS Game Design & Customization - built as a step beyond the standard FPS Game Design course. Students can design a new game or work on their previous FPS projects.

• Design, layout and customize a 3-5 level FPS game
• Modify models and segments using Photoshop CS5
• Add music, sound and effects to your game
• Add lighting and physics effects to your levels
• Create advanced event triggers
• Add basic questing options and player achievements
• Create customized start, win and game over menus
• Design and print a custom manual for your game
• Design and print a custom disk label for your game
• Take home a multi-level customized FPS game

Note: This class assumes you have already taken the standard FPS Game Design class this summer or during previous years.

FPS Game Design & Scripting - advanced FPS game design concepts and working knowledge of scripting to create advanced events and enemy artificial intelligence (AI).

• Create realistic enemy AI scripts
• Design and deploy player HUD (heads up display)
• Use scripts to create NPC to player dialogue, quests & companions
• Advanced triggers for sound, enemies, cut scenes
• Build a front end for your game to reflect a retail version
• Working knowledge of Dark Basic programming
• Taken in conjunction with the first two FPS classes, students can expect to have a polished game ready for deployment.

Note: All assets used are royalty free and games created can be distributed without limitations

Camp Katy (Main) | June 4-8, June 11-15, June 18-22,
July 9-13, July 23-27, July 30-Aug 3, Aug 13-17

Camp Sugar Land | June 25-29

Camp Clear Lake | July 2-6

Role Playing Game (RPG) 2 week Academy
Not only one of the most popular gaming genres, Role Playing Games give designers the freedom to create immersive worlds for their players to explore. Camp Katy's two week Role Playing Game Design Academy gives aspiring game designers and RPG enthusiasts a behind the scenes look at creating some of the biggest games in the industry such as Skyrim, Fallout & the Neverwinter Nights series.

• Become a master at using the toolsets designers & programmers working in the industry today are using - Neverwinter Nights 2 World Editor & Skyrim toolset
• Create a custom game with your own environments, quests, storyline, enemies ...
• Designers will build their own modules, campaigns, adventures, buildings, terrain, dialogue and items
• Learn how to script player encounters such as enemy and event spawning
• Take this course again to add to your game design, programming tool box

The average A+ game on the market takes 5 years from concept to distribution. In two weeks we offer campers a behind the scenes look at the design process, teach them the skills to create at least one immersive level and the knowledge to continue when they leave. Utilizing industry released toolset used to make some of the best RPG titles is a means to present a massive amount of information and techniques in a short period of time.

This fast paced class is geared towards students aspiring to a career in the gaming industry. The instructor assumes an intermediate to advanced computer literacy level of the campers. If a student is unable to keep up, they will receive individual attention after the break out session. We use this method in all courses at Camp Katy to cater to advanced students and make sure the other students are able to keep up. We pride ourselves in our ability to modify any course curriculum on the fly to accommodate a student's skill level and learning style.

Academy students will have individual and team projects to complete throughout the week. In order to immerse them into the "real world" of game design, we will create solution based projects with deadlines for them to work together to accomplish.

We get an incredible amount of positive feedback from both students and parents when it comes to our ability to hide learning in fun and engaging classes.

Last summer we had a parent who had been trying for years to teach their child basic C++ programming with little success. After one week, this young man not only had a grip on the language basics but was able to have an intelligent conversation with his parent about the language. They were both so suprised and it's stories like these which keeps us working hard to find new ways to make programming FUN!