Reddit reviews Fundamentals of Game Design (3rd Edition)

> I should get Game Maker

First of all, do not buy anything until you know how you're going to use it.

If you're just starting with basic stuff, grab the free version of Game Maker, Construct, Scratch, or something like that, and learn how to do something, anything, with it. Then try to hit the free version limitations, before you even consider taking the next step.

I would recommend grabbing a book about game development in general, like Fundamentals of Game Design or similar. Something code and tool agnostic, that you can learn general concepts from.

Learn about version control before it bites you in the ass.

Finally take a look at stuff like OOP, data structures and software design patterns.

After that, you should be able to learn some -enough to get by- C#, JavaScript, Java, Python or whatever with minimal effort, decide on your own whether you want to go for Unity or something else, and ask some more concrete questions in general.

I saw this book on Amazon : Fundamentals of Game Design (3rd Edition).

It also have some add-on book : Fundamentals of Construction and Simulation Game Design and many more.

Any one of you read it already ?
Does it worth it ?

Any other book to suggest about simulation game design ?
Thanks,

Mostly, to keep up with things, I play games. I also read design retrospectives and customer reviews. I use gamasutra a fair bit too. But mostly, it's actually playing games and then thinking about what worked and didn't work.

In regards to books, I'm not a huge fan of "one-size fits all" design, but I found http://www.amazon.com/Fundamentals-Game-Design-Ernest-Adams/dp/0321929675/ a useful book, more geared I think towards starting out though.