Reader reviews

Good value. Not perfect, but I would buy another book from this author.

This is the third book I have read on game production this year, and it is comfortably the best of them. There is a section near the end that ties several earlier ideas together in a way I had not seen before. The early chapters move quickly through material I already knew, but the later sections were genuinely new to me. Worth picking up if you already have the basics. Set realistic expectations and you will get a lot out of it.

I have read a lot of books on this subject and this is the clearest.

I have been working with game development for a few years now and I still found plenty here that was new to me. The index and cross-references are surprisingly good, which matters for a book I will come back to. The code samples assume a particular environment, which took a bit of fiddling to get running properly. I particularly liked the way the author builds up from simple cases before introducing the harder material. If you have the prerequisites, this is an easy recommendation. I will be keeping it on my desk rather than the shelf.

Excellent from start to finish. No filler, no padding.

A colleague recommended this and I can see why. It does something that few technical books manage: it respects the reader's time. The code samples assume a particular environment, which took a bit of fiddling to get running properly. The chapters on data visualization are the strongest — the examples are stripped down but complete, and I could follow along without constant guessing. This is the book I wish had existed when I started working with data visualization.

I have read a lot of books on this subject and this is the clearest.

I came to this book already familiar with the basics, and it still had plenty to offer. I particularly liked the way the author builds up from simple cases before introducing the harder material. A few of the examples could be more realistic, but the underlying points come across clearly. The book rewards careful reading. Skimming it would be a mistake. An easy five stars from me. I look forward to whatever the author writes next.

Some sections were excellent and others felt like filler.

I had been on the fence about this one for a while, and I should have bought it sooner. The balance between theory and practice is well judged; neither side dominates. The code samples assume a particular environment, which took a bit of fiddling to get running properly. The author clearly knows the subject deeply and has thought hard about how to teach it. Useful as a reference, less so as a straight read from cover to cover.

Solid and well-organised. A couple of chapters dragged a little.

A colleague recommended this and I can see why. It does something that few technical books manage: it respects the reader's time. A couple of chapters felt like they could have been merged, but that is a minor complaint. The exercises at the end of each chapter are worth doing — they caught a few misconceptions I did not know I had. Good value for the price and worth the time it takes to work through properly.