Games Books

There are a million expensive plugins out there, and each does only one thing. You can buy each of them, or you can invest in your ability to learn Max's subtleties. This guy has apparently been doing great work since before there was a big plugin market, so buy his book, and you'll save all kinds of money. Plus you'll have a FAR better understanding of the various methods that can be used to perform relatively complex and difficult tasks. It's an exciting read for the right kind of 3D geek. You will probably find yourself thinking "I didn't know you could do THAT with THIS!"

Pete Draper knows his stuff! The tutorials are in color and quite easy to follow, except for the complex materials, but Pete explains what each one does in detail.

The author makes use of the Particles Systems a lot which you will be very good at by the end of the book. I own a bunch of books on Max, and this is by far, hands down, bar none the best book currently available.

Be warned this book does not cover everything in Max(such as Mental Ray), but after you finish this book you will have an arsenal of things you can do.

I recommend this book to beginners and experts alike, both will walk away with a lot of new ideas and knowledge about 3DS Max.

If you want to learn particle flow this is the book for you. Pete does things I never thought 3DS Max was capable of. The tuts in the book are great and there are a couple of bonus video tuts on the accompanying DVD. Buy this book!

This book has EXCELLENT tutorials, very descriptive and in-depth, the only complaint I have is it needs more tutorials on water, such as a running faucet tutorial, would've been helpful for my 3d animation class.

If you want to know how to use 3ds Max's Particle Flow...this is the book you should buy. One word of caution...make sure you brush up on your PFlow basics before digging in. The book definitely assumes that you know what you're doing when wiring up PFlow's Operators and Tests. There's screen shots to help you along, start and completed scene files, and a real nice handful of cool effects covered. More for the Intermediate and Advanced user.

Mr. Bartle's writing is precise and his facts carefully researched, even the ones he experienced himself. This is a huge, superbly constructed history of the tools and philosophies developed over the years in experimental and commercial development of online virtual worlds. Because of Mr. Bartle's personal knowledge as a long-time designer and his sharp memory for the significance of trends and details, this book will raise anyone's appreciation of whatever virtual worlds one comes across on line or on disk, whether they be famous commercial ones or those developed by enthusiasts for their own pleasure. I would think it would be a must read for gaming students. What a grand, satisfying, fascinating book! And when one considers that this exciting history is only the beginning of VW development... Wow!

This book taught me the theory behind Virtual worlds and I beleive nearly everything I read in this book.

I didn't simply believe everything because it was a published book, I beleived it because Richard used examples from real games. With all the experiance Richard has you would expect him to have learnt everything the hard way, he has but he's also smart enough to realise that sometimes you can learn from others mistakes instead of making them yourself.

The book is aimed at the 'Dungeons and Dragons' (and most of his examples are) type of game but there is no reason the information cannot be used in other genres.

The most amusing part is how right he can be.
Richard states that 'you cannot allow players to carry items over from the Beta testing to the online game, even though your players will try to convince you otherwise'; something I didn't really think and didn't really agree with.
My family and I were all about to join 'Pirates of the Caribbean' when it started; when the announcement was made that players form the Beta test would be allowed to keep items my daughters asked what a Beta test was, I explained and now they don't want to play as they consider that to be cheating. We have all decided not to play.

Learn from others (like Richard) or pay the price.

James

Covers all the aspects of virtual worlds from a psycological perspective; the intentions, the types of virtual worlds.
Doesn't include indepth technology and the development issues related to designing virtual worlds
Good primer on virtual worlds.

You're getting it straight from the horse's mouth since this book is written by the grandfather of the modern MMORPG.
Rest assured - if you are a game designer, developer, or just love reading about game theory, this book is worth every penny.

I have read many other books on the subject and not one of them are packed with as much depth, knowledge, and wisdom. Bartle covers every avenue that a designer needs to consider in order to be successful. This book will help you and your team create an active, emergent virtual world.

As a game developer, I learned many valuable lessons on what made other games lose subscribers, or worse -- catastrophically fail.


Richard Bartle's writing style is very creative and detailed, and like his games, it gives you the 'just one more page' syndrome. For example, in this book it mentions how often a player must be rewarded in order to retain interest. He uses this same technique for writing by giving you something insightful to read atleast every 10 pages.


Bartle has covered all the bases. Designing Virtual Worlds is a great book, very entertaining. I give it 5 out of 5 stars - a must read.

More than 700 well-written pages packed with valuable insights, and it still leaves you begging for more.

To begin with, this book is not a programming book. There is no code, no discussion of VRML, MPEG-4, or X3D. Instead, this book stands back and takes a "big picture" look at the design of a virtual world from the viewpoint of systems engineering, social engineering, philosophy, history, and psychology. Ethical considerations are even tossed in for good measure.
The book starts out with chapters on the history of virtual worlds and the cultural influences that affected their characteristics. Next, there is a fly-over view of the "production line" of building a virtual world. Bartle then turns his attention to the players - who they are, what they want, and how a virtual world can meet their needs. World design is examined from the standpoint of virtual geography, virtual world citizens, and finally the physics required to implement your world. Chapter 5 is about the specific sociology and physiology of the virtual world - skill levels, individual characteristics, how virtual inhabitants divide themselves into groups, combat, and even the meaning of death in the virtual world. The final three chapters are very philisophical in nature. Chapter 6 is basically a liberal arts syllabus through the prism of virtual world design. The last chapter, on ethical considerations, talks about censorship, and also looks at the player as a person and how game playing in virtual worlds can hurt more than help some kinds of people, particularly those prone to addiction.
Bartle's social commentaries may be a bit long-winded for some people, although I found them interesting. Some readers may also be somewhat frustrated by the fact that the book talks more about what can go wrong in the design of a virtual world - overly complex and static story arcs, characters that players do not get invested in, characters in which players get too invested, etc - than what can go right. I really enjoyed the book, mainly because it moves the focus of the potential virtual world designer from the artistic and technical viewpoint to the player's viewpoint - why they plays games, and why a player would pick your game versus someone else's game.

Richard Sparks' "Diary of a Mad Poker Player" is a wonderful read. It reaches out to the reader on so many levels.

It's the quest of a dedicated amateur poker player to win his way in to the World Series of Poker through a combination of online satellite tournaments and satellites held in brick and mortar casinos. Richard Sparks is an extremely witty man and a great teller of tales, and along the way he interviews everyone from legends of the game such as Doyle Brunson, Chris Moneymaker, and Sammy Farha, to unknown players who are hoping for glory after winning their way into the World Series of Poker through an online satellite.

I'm not sure there's another writer out there who could combine his quest for winning a seat in poker's richest event with the make and model number banjo played by Earl Scruggs, classic Monte Python sketches, and a few quotes that William Shakespeare might have authored, had the bard been born a few centuries later, instead of in his own, unfortunate time, before poker was invented. Not only does he combine all this irreverence, but somehow it works in masterstrokes of wit and wordsmithing.

Sparks also tells the story of how online poker came to prominence and how it led to the incredible growth in tournament poker in general and the World Series of Poker in particular. After all, at the turn of the century, the World Series of Poker was happy to have slightly more than 300 entrants pony up $10,000 each to play in its main event. In 2006, nearly 8,000 played, a number no one would have dared to imagine just a few short years ago.

He delves deeply into the legal status of online poker, as well as its safety. So just while you're having fun with Sparks' madcap romp through poker's highly textured landscape, you find yourself on a knowledgeable ride through the underpinnings of contemporary poker.

There's even some good poker advice tucked into its pages. Though it's not an instructional book by any means, the advice that bubbles up to the surface is sound and solid.

There's actually nothing about "Diary of a Mad Poker Player" not to like. It's authoritative, informative, insightful, wildly funny, incredibly witty, and a book you can go back to time and again. If Richard Sparks represents everyman in his quest to play at the WSOP, this is everyman at his best, and funniest. I highly recommend it.

"Diary" is terrific for learning the inside game of poker and laughing. There are very entertaining characters behind those reflector glasses and grain feed caps. I discovered important plays and strategies while enjoying the author's Monty Python-esque humor. Finally, my knowledge of "tells" has exceeded waiting for a gasp, heave or howl. I don't think amateurs or experts will be disappointed.

This is a sad poker book. (I have not read the Stu Ungar bio which must be even more poignant.) He gives a lot of the gritty details of his poker play. Don't get me wrong: the tone isn't sad, but the game play is.

In fact, he admits he never does very well at the tables, and I can't tell if that's due to bad beats or his own bad play.

Instead, try the Moneymaker book which at least has an upbeat poker ending or Aces and Kings, about several well-known players.

Or read Positively Fifth Street by James McManus about his adventures in the WSOP Main Event. It's not just upbeat; you can tell he understands the game.

P.S. Sparks has a new book out, Getting Lucky: the Education of a Mad Poker Player. In it, the author admits his game needed help when wrote this book. (As he was coached by Tom McEvoy before he wrote his new book, I'm sure his game has become much better!) For those who think I was too harsh with Mr. Sparks, I did buy his new book.

Great book! Sparks uses each chapter to capture different aspects of poker today. The book is very fast moving and hard to put down. I would definately recc it to anyone interested in either big time or online poker today.

This is an extremely novel book as it is a first hand account of a journalist's obsession with poker and of his online attempts to procure a seat for the 2004 World Series. The narrator, Richard Sparks, spends the first half of the diary talking about the game in general and providing us with accounts of his own efforts to gain a seat. Sparks is a good writer and possesses a creative mind. One would never describe him as boring. Overall, it's an average+ book, although it could have been a better. Sparks pastes in too many conversations from online poker chat boxes, and does not devote enough pages to the 2004 WSOP event itself. There is, however, one section in which Diary transcends, and that is where we are made privy to the transcript of the interview he had with Sammy Farha. It's absolutely excellent. We learn more about the man in those few short pages than we do over the course of all his ESPN human interest moments. There are other titles to buy ahead of this one, but it's still enjoyable.

I have been reading numerous gardening books. This is my favorite! The other books are usually good but assumed the reader new the basics. This book is an easy read, and it includes so much practical information in a conversational tone that I couldn't put it down. That is saying a lot for a non-fiction book. My other great find is Apprentice to a Garden.

This book is fabulous!! It is an entertaining book as well as extemely informative. This is a must-have book for the beginning gardener - but easily appeals to the expert as well. My copy is very well worn around all the edges!!

I don't even remember how I found out about this book. I bought a used copy on Amazon about a year ago and am today ordering another copy as mine is falling apart and diry from being used outside. I couldn't garden without it in my Zone 7 shady garden with horrible clay soil. Along with the basics on gardening it is a personal, opinionated account of creating a garden. I may not ever grow the exotic tropicals Ms. Benson loves(I am too lazy to dig them up for the winter) but there is so much information in this book on what to grow, how to do it and what to combine it with you are sure to find something you love. Be aware that there are no lush color photographs, just some black and whites and line drawings. Love it, Love it, Love it!

I love to read books about gardening, and the best ones are also autobiographical.Dianne Benson Has imagination ,guts and grit!!I was hoping by now that she has written a new one because I read this one every year in the spring.She is inspiring about what to plant and how to plant and does her homework about the latest stuff out there.She is funny,personal and very, very sharp. More books Dianne , More Please!!!

As the ower of a fixer-upper, I was immediately drawn into the book by Diane's description of her own property and house at first view. "The house was awful. Sort of '50s and not even gracious enough to be called ranch style. But the property was so raw and beautiful and overgrown....." I can relate!

This book is delightful and informative down to the details of what you should expect to pay and who has the best selection. Who would have guessed that a fashion maven like Diane B. would comparison shop so astutely. I love this book and very happy that it's been re-printed since I'm now telling all my friends about this delightful tomb.

This is by far the most detailed resource book ever about drow that I have found besides just reading the novels. It is very enjoyable to read if you are a drow fan or a underdark DM, or simply wish to have a basis on how to rp your drow. I use it as a bible when it comes to my players bickering on how drow are and what this book says is final as far as I am concerned. If you do not give this book 5 stars I suggest you look at yourself and ask how anal you really are. If you can find a better resource book please let me know. So far this is the winner in my opinion.

This is the best D&D rules supplement I have ever purchased. It contains so much information about the drow (dark) elves. It talks about their religion, their language, and a sect of drow that are good aligned. If you have any interest in ever including drow in your campaign this is the book for you. I use the drow- english dictionary in it all the time. It makes interesting puzzles for my PCs. Even when I am not playing D&D I use this book; it has some cool drow names that I like to use as names for some of my MUD characters. Without a doubt this is the most useful D&D book I own short of the Monsters Manual.

AN EXCELLENT BOOK THAT GIVES SOMEONE THAT IS NEW A VERY GOOD UNDERSTANDING AND BACK GROUND OF THE DROW UNDERWORLD

A detailed journey through the drow world. The Drow of the Underdark is perhaps the only book which will give you precise details and also a lot of aid in creating a drow PC or NPC. Going through everything from drow history to magical items, the Drow of the Underdark is a must for all players. It's adaptability is unmatched yet, and is useable by all players.

Better yet, it has a cover unlike many of the other Forgotten Realms expansions. A black paperback cover inlaid with gold.

This book is very very cool. It has gods, and stats, and expanded information of Drows (underdark elves) if you wish to play a drow, this is a 200% must buy!

Well it covers everything you need in the game, and not just the basic walkthrough of each mission. It gives some really good tips on jobs and skills, some combinations I haven't used before that are really good.
Also it covers all the secret missions and how to beat them and also how to get all the secret characters, and it's no big secret Balthier from FF XII is one of the guys you get.

The book gives an in depth chart on all the missions, all the maps, all the items/weapons/armour you can get. And also guide for the Deep Dungeon (one for the hardcore with time to spare) to tackle.

Aside from it being a great guide... you will be happy to know the artwork is great too. Not like some guidebooks that are so fnctional I may as well read it from gamefaqs.com... this one is lovely. As you can see from the cover, you get a few bits of eye candy. And on a small note, the pages aren't fragile thin as they are plastic coated/filmed.

I played this game quite a while ago, and when it came out again on PSP, I decided to grab this strategy guide for the second time around. With in-depth how-to and covering all the side quests and jobs, I clocked in 70+ hours of game play, as compared to my original 40 hours when I played without the game. This guide gives out no spoilers, but shows you how to get the most out of FFT. This really helped me get all side characters & showed how to get my characters up to speed with "job placement". Bradygames never lets me down, and in this instance it really improved the game. I'm passing this on to my other gamer friends and would recommend these strategy guides to any Final Fantasy fan.

I recently purchased FFT: the war of the lions for my PSP, and decided to get the guide to have the set.

The guide has everything you need to get going, and keeps it up to the end, even helping you out on the new Ad Hoc additions to the game. I'd like to point out that i do own the original PS1 version, and it's guide, also, and there is no doubt the SE and Bradygames have decided to keep up the top notch work for this title and guide.

The ONLY glaring difference is the PS1 guide had a star method of suggesting the best job abilities. The PSP guide only suggest what works best for each job. Not a big difference, imho, because after playing a while, you should be able to discern which abilities help the most.

All in all, an enjoyable guide to have if you need a nudge in the right direction.

I really like this book, because it contains all of the details, of course, not only the walkthrough. But, more importantly, it also tells us the invisible factors in the calculation of achieving something, for example, to achieve rare item after the melee mode. Other than that, it's standard; details walkthrough, nice printed, easily-to-look format, and great paper quality (if this counts,lol).

Only one thing is bad, after my great great experiences purchasing items at Amazon, I received this book in a defective condition. It's torn (I don't want to return it since i couldn't wait to receive and use this book right away, yet another book). I don't know if it's because UPS or from Amazon. But, it's no big deal. The shipment is a very lightning fast shipment (This is what i like from Amazon). Anyway, great book.

It has everything from pictures to guidelines. Everything a "strategy guide" needs. Well organized and easy to follow.

This book is terrific! Tons of color, detailed pictures. I am a collector, and use this book to help identify which tiny accessories I need to find or identify. Invaluable! The focus is on toys from 1964-1990 ONLY, so if you collect from other periods this isn't the book you need. If you collect Little People (pre-1988), you need this book! I hope the authors will update it, with the "new" Little People included in a future edition.

THIS BOOK HAS MANY COLORFUL PICTURES AND ACCUARTE DESCRIPTION OF EACH. I TOO HAVE JUST STARTED COLLECTING FISHER PRICE TOYS AND I FIND THIS MAKES MY SEARCHING MORE ENJOYABLE. THIS IS A MUST HAVE FOR THE OVERALL TOY COLLECTOR AND THE FISHER PICE COLLECTOR.

I love this book. IT is a MUST for any new and seasoned Fisher Price Collector, especially those who collect Little People. The Pictures are great and the descriptions are excellent. I love this book, and my kids enjoy looking through it as well. It brought back so many memories from toys in my past, and ensures I know what I am getting myself into if I decide to make a purchase as a collector.

this book is a real treasure. I've just begun collecting Fisher Price toys the pictures and info are of great help. Friends/family who look thru this book also get a lot of pleasure from it and will reflect back over what toys they had as kids etc...I'm real happy I made the purchase.

This is a wonderful book! I loved the vivid pictures and descriptions of the playsets. If you love and collect Fisher Price, this book is for you!!

I have to say, this book is awesome. It taught me how to build models and understand why I am doing what I am doing. I use it all the time and hopefully he will release a new version for us folks who will outgrow this one. Covers all bases and it's worth 2x what I paid for it...

this is very good because it teaches step by step and it makes sense too.

The book is a very clear, step-by-step of all the processes involved in making a game character leading up to the animation. The animation is covered but not in as much detail. Everything else is though, including the awesome rigging machine which comes with the book.

Its refreshing to see that someone wasnt limited by a publisher to keep the book size down, and he obviously was able to take his time really illusrating every step.

Its a great book.

This is my first time to write this kind of review, therefore, I don't know how to do a good one. But what I can say for this book is it is easy to follow and the method of modeling that I have learned from it is very useful. If you can follow the tutorials patiently, you can gradually build a very good foundation of your modeling skill. ^-^.. I am looking forward for the next edition.

1)This book highlights some important issues in modeling & rigging that no other books bother to emphasis.

2)The accompanying CD contains very insightful scripts (that acutally works) - goodies other books only PRETEND to give.

3)It guides beginners and ease them through relatively advanced topics in character animation.

4)If you really need to achieve something in a hurry in Maya. Yes, this is the book to get.

For a book to be called game development this book sure is lacking on the game side of things.You create one big game at the end,but other than that there is really nothing else in there I would consider a game.That's why the book is getting 4 stars not 5.With that out of the way this book is very well written and the author explains things in great detail. There are alot of good nuggets of coding techniques in this book.

I had used Flash 4 for some time. In Flash 4, if you wanted to do a certain command, like go to a different scene you went to the point and click menu and selected that.But I felt that was rather lacking in what you could do, so I wanted to get the latest and greatest version of Flash. I went out and bought it, (MX 2004) and I soon found out, that there really wasn't a point and click menu, and you needed at least some knowledge in ActionScript. I looked around, and found this book. And I am glad I did. The book is exellent. It's really easy to follow, between the detailed explantions and the demo's on the cd. I found it really easy to understand everything, and it gives you a great way to start programming.

It comes with a demo of Flash MX 2004, but I highly recommend buying it (I got it at an educational discount). Both MX and this book were well worth the money.

There are few author's that take the beginner's (dummy) route to teaching programming to the masses and this book shines brightly in that department. From start to finish, it seems that the author knows what I want to do and shows me thoroughly how to do it properly with different ways to tackle it. I highly recommend this book to anyone that wants to take FLASH MX to sky high heights and not just leave this wonderful program to websites.

This is an enthusiastic book to read because once you open it and see how easy it is to follow you'll be excited to continue to read, and learn how to use flash mx. The author shows excellence in communicating the information to his readers. I am not fimilar with programming, but interested in programming and i was able to gain a lot of information that I was able to apply(which is the most important concept of the book). I definitely recommend this book to those who may want to enhance their knowledge or one who is just curious of the field.

I'm a business man looking for a programming book to spice up my computer knowledge & some fun, something different and exciting, I came across this book, in Barns & Noble, sitting on the shelve in the actionscript section. The book is very easy to understan, comes packed with not only that but the CD comes packed with cool samples and games and comes with Flash MX 2004!!! Defenietly I recommend it.

This is the second year I have used this as my desk calendar at work. I love it. It makes me laugh all the time and it has just enough room to keep track of dinner dates or appointments.

Good desk calendar; it's fun to relive some of the classic Get Fuzzy strips.

I received the calendar within a couple of days of my placing the order. The service is great and I love to read my daily cartoon.

My daughter loves day by day calendars & Get Fuzzy. It was a perfect match

"Get Fuzzy" is the current reigning champion of comic strips. Anyone with pets (or who loves animals) can appreciate the inter-species conflicts and hilarity in this comic strip (I particularly enjoy Bucky's attempts at world domination and related ventures.) Here, as in years past, some of the best strips have been put together in calendar form to ensure that everyone can have a bit of humor in their daily lives.

I can't imagine not having this calendar in my house; it's always a great way to start the day. Many of these strips are so good that I have cut them out and saved them or sent them to other animal lovers in my life, while the remaining pages become great for scratch paper.

This is a great calendar and I highly recommend it to anyone.