NSO Preceptorial 2024

Developing Games for Fun and Profit

Agenda

1

Introductions

• Meet the board
• What is UPGRADE
• What do we do

2

24-25 Season

• Summer prototype
• Our game development process
• 24-25 season schedule

3

• How to join us
• Questions
• Play our games
• Freeplay

Wrapping Up

1

Introductions

Meet the board

• Penn’s game development studio
• Meets Saturdays 2-5 PM in Levine 307 and Wednesday 7-8 PM in TBD

Mission statement

UPGRADE strives to foster creative expression and cultivate career skills for the artists, programmers, and creatives interested in game development in the Penn community by providing opportunities for members to gain hands-on experience with all aspects of the industry.

Our Games

Codename Couverture

The Dev Pipeline

Design Doc

What’s that? Why need one?

Planning

Time to make it! Weekly meetings, tasks/progress

Iteration

Iron out basic things, change things if they don’t work, outline levels

Playtesting

Turned out harder than expected, reengineer

THE END!!!!

We have a demo now????

This took

all the time…

2

24-25 Season

First Sem

• Workshops
• Intro to Unity series
• Advanced Unity game programming
• Blender 3D modeling and asset design
• Unity URP and shaders
• Individual Minigame
• 3 weeks, intro to game dev
• Develop a 3D minigame of your own design
• Collection will be published on itch.io
• Halloween Game Jam

• PennBoy
• UPenn’s new game console™ releasing end of first sem
• Features a number of medium sized games about Penn life and culture
• 8-10 weeks
• Games will be made in small teams of 3-5 people
• First sem club game! Put everything we’ve learned together

First Sem

(NOT final logo please don’t

sue Nintendo)

• Tanks game (not the final name we promise)
• You’ll join us as the main development team!
• UPGRADE will go into full steam (get it?) working on tanks
• Target publishing on Steam by end of the semester and submitted to IGF
• Valentines Game Jam

Second Sem

• Penn Esports
• Collaborative gaming events
• Potential dedicated gaming space in Tangen Hall
• PAX East
• Send a few devs to attend and connect
• Speaker events
• Industry professionals
• We got the Outer Wilds team last time

Bonus Round

Photo dump!

3

Wrapping Up

Join us!

Discord

discord.gg/vrhDM7NHph

Instagram

@pennupgrade

First meeting on 9/1!

Mark your calendars!

​

This will mainly be an info session for students interested in joining and wanting to know a bit more about our club structure. No actual work will be done, but you’ll be introduced to your first task, and we may do some setup (joining the GitHub org, installing Git and Unity, etc.)

​

Sunday 9/1 at 2-5 PM in Levine 307.

No applications required.

From our Penn Clubs page:

​

Whether you like programming, drawing, modeling, writing, composing, or anything else, we welcome anyone who's interested in any aspect of game dev.

​

While previous experience with any of these roles is expected, we will get you up to speed with any game dev-related stuff, and you'll hit the ground running on your very first game in a matter of days.

Questions?

Can be about Penn, SEAS, college, DMD program, anything!

Time to play some games!

pennupgrade.itch.io

Tanks: pennupgrade.itch.io/couverture

Password: couverture

Freeplay mode unlocked!

1

• Join our Discord and follow us on Instagram @pennupgrade!
• Info session on 9/1
• Catch us at the SAC Fair and ESAF!

2

• Play our games at pennupgrade.itch.io
• Tank game is at pennupgrade.itch.io/couverture, password “couverture”
• Test and give feedback??? LOL

3

• Feel free to come up to us if you have any other questions or concerns! Stay and chill, or you’re free to leave!!

Thanks for coming~!

Discord

discord.gg/vrhDM7NHph