Plate 0′ Shrimp

My son is an avid gamer, and a couple of years ago, when we lived in Fremont, I signed him up for a video game design summer camp through the City of Fremont Department of Parks and Recreation. He loved it, so when I saw TechKnowHow Summer Computer Camp – Game Design 2 listed in the City of Pleasanton recreation guide, I signed him up, along with his sister, who’s now old enough. At $350 each, it is a little steep, but we are looking at the computer game design major at UC Santa Cruz.

Here’s the summer camp description from the website, http://www.techknowhowkids.com/

Create your own computer games with interesting characters, storyline, music and settings. You’ll learn how to animate objects & characters, how to use scripts for 3d graphics, fog & lighting, and how to add screen effects, such as snow and rain.

Your first game will be a role-playing (RPG) adventure game, featuring controls for navigation, items to collect, power-ups, and offensive and defensive powers.

Your second game will be a 3d game with a first-person point of view. Travel through rooms looking for prizes and avoiding obstacles. Select or design characters & bosses, add sound effects, music, health, score tables, and more.

Take home your games to play on a Windows-based PC at home.
(The 3d game requires a computer with a 3d video card and at least 16MB of video memory).

Class Prerequisite: To enroll, a student must have taken Game Design 1 or be at least 11 years old, due to the advanced lessons.

Note: There is a $10 materials fee in addition to the tuition for this course. This enables students to take home a registered copy of the game design software so that they can continue to make games on a Windows-platform computer at home.

The one week camp is held at Amador Valley High, here in Pleasanton. You could call it “summer camp for nerds,” but MY kids aren’t nerds, so I won’t.