(Part 3) Top products from r/Unity3D

Buy The Pragmatic Programmer, read it from cover to cover. Let it change your life. It's not a specific language reference but it's pretty much required reading for any new programmer. It's about creating maintainable code, which is more of a mindset than anything, it's also a really really EASY and relatively entertaining read.

https://www.amazon.com/Pragmatic-Programmer-Journeyman-Master/dp/020161622X/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1520232423&sr=8-1&keywords=the+pragmatic+programmer&dpID=41BKx1AxQWL&preST=_SX218_BO1,204,203,200_QL40_&dpSrc=srch

Another more specific book to use as reference is the Effective C#:
https://www.amazon.com/Effective-Covers-Content-Update-Program/dp/0672337878/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1520232641&sr=1-1&keywords=effective+c+sharp&dpID=51ga39m0W5L&preST=_SX218_BO1,204,203,200_QL40_&dpSrc=srch

They make "Effective" books for nearly all popular languages, and they really are great references. If you don't understand everything in it like co-variance and contravariance google as a lot of good examples of these concepts in practice, as well as definitions. Believe me I understand that these things can get really confusing and frustrating coming from a non-academic background and trying to bridge that gap. But utilizing this book and understanding the lingo will also help you to find more answers to run on your own.

Now, as with anything in programming, the point is not to have to remember everything all the time in these books(despite what try-hard programmers on the internet will tell you). That comes with experience and you're human so don't set yourself up with that expectation. Read them once so you know what is in them, and keep them at your desk for reference.

When you need to construct an interface pull out the book go to the interfaces and give it a glance over to give you an idea on where to go.

I'd recommend C# 5.0 Unleashed (https://www.amazon.com/C-5-0-Unleashed-Bart-Smet/dp/0672336901/). It might look daunting, but if you're serious about learning C#, I think this is the one to get, because it not only teaches you the language, it explains why it is the way it is, which I think is an excellent way to deeper understanding. Depending on the version of Unity you're using, and your target platform / scripting backend, you might not be able to take advantage of everything C# 5.0 has to offer. And 5.0 is not even the latest version of the language. That aside, this book is excellent.

What it doesn't do, though, is walk you through projects, in a let's-build-this-game-step-by-step kind of way, which as others wrote might be helpful at first. I'd still recommend you buy this book and use it to read about the interesting details of whatever you learn elsewhere or through tutorials.

TL;DR

Take a look at spaced repetition. Study without any music and use the absence of music as a check to see if you are still motivated to do your studying.

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I fucked up my first part of my education too. Lucy i realized that and got motivated again before i finished school.

I am currently 19 years old and I also always loved math (and some physics). I am from the Netherlands so our education system does not really translate well to English but i was basically in highschool when i only did things that interested me. I got low grades on everything else.

1 moment in highschool really stayed with me where I now have finally realized what was happening. In highschool i had a course about the German language. I already had a low grade for that class so I sat to myself to learn extremely hard for the next small exam. The exam was pretty simple. The task was to learn 200 to 250 German words. So I took a peace of paper and wrote down all 250 words 21 times. 1 or 2 days later I had the exam. But when i got my grade back it sad that i scored a F (3/10) . I was totally confused and it only destroyed my motivation more and more.
What I now have come to realize is that learning something is not just about smashing a book inside your head as fast as possible.

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So these are some tips I wished I could have give myself in the first year of highschool:

Go and sit in an quit room or in the library. This room should be in total silence. Now start with you studying. As soon as you feel the tension to put on some music than you should stop and reflect and take a little break.

The default in nature is chaos. Learn to use this as your advantage. I sit in a bus for 2+ hours a day. 1 hour to school and 1 hour back. Nearly every student does nothing in this time. So I made the rule for myself to do something productive in that time like reading a book. Normally I am just at my desk at home and before I know it it is already midnight. So this is for me at least a really good way to force my self to start reading a book in dose otherwise wasted 2 hours.

Get to know your body and brain. I personally made a bucket list of 100 items that includes 10 items about doing something for a week like running at 6am for a week of being vegan for a week. Fasting is also really great. Just do it for 1 day. So only drink water for one day and look how you feel. And try the same with coffee, sex, fapping and alcohol. Quit 1 day and look at how you feel. And have the goal to quit 1 time for a hole week strait.

Watch this video to get a new few about the difference of low and high energy. I never understood this but I think that everybody should know about the difference https://youtu.be/G_Fy6ZJMsXs <-- sorry it is 1 hour long but you really should watch it.

Learn about about how your brain stores information and how you can improve apon this. Spaced repetition is one of those things that really changed the way I now look at learning something. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cVf38y07cfk

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I am currently doing my highschool math again for fun. After I am done with that again i hope to start with these 3 books.

• 3D.Math.Primer.for.graphics.and.game.development
  
• Mathematics for 3D Game Programming and Computer Graphics - Eric Lengyel
  
• Graphics C version
  
  I hope this helps someone and if you guys have any tips about learning shaders in unity than please share them.
  

One of my absolute favourite coding books has been C# in Depth by Jon Skeet. It will help a lot in gaining a better understanding of the different concepts in the language by taking you on a journey from when the different features first showed up to where they are today. (presonally I only had the second edition, which covered up to C#4. However, I've seen that the latest, fourth edition covers the language up to C#7 and the future of C#, peeking at upcoming features of the language and discussing its future course)

It will make you appreciate the languages compexity, and the work that has been put into it to allow for ease of writing, as well as allowing you to think more carefully about how you implement and design your own solutions in the best way possible by considering the inner works of the language.

For those who are interested in downloading/viewing the game. Here are the links :D


https://wafflegum.itch.io/io-shape-defense

https://www.amazon.com/dp/B07Z692QYC/ref=mp_s_a_1_1?keywords=Io+shape+defense&qid=1571297761&s=mobile-apps&sr=1-1

Yes, unfortunately I can't release it on google playstore. I have no dev account and have no money to pay for it, but hey! Thanks for the lovely support you guys are giving me :)

If you are starting from an amateur background as a developer on C# centric stack, I'd argue that Code Complete has strong to potential to protect against your weaknesses/blind spots than just about any book about software development. It doesn't go deep, but it will introduce you to breadth of fundamentals. Feel free to skim past the ones you are already familiar with.

https://www.amazon.com/Code-Complete-Practical-Handbook-Construction/dp/0735619670

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The particular techniques described evolve over time, but the principles endure. e.g. One poster commented of making backups. Tools in the C#/MS ecosystem have evolved considerably, but git based source control is pretty popular tech at moment. Github is popular for hosting source of open source projects - Azure Repos and Azure Devops suite has more depth for larger teams and complex processess.

I know you mean this as a joke, but with some interesting narrative and the right setting you could make this a very serious and involving game. You could learn about the characters around you, become endeared by their stories, even create a mystery as to what, if anything, everyone is queueing for. Here is some inspiration, both in form of Russian novels, The Concert Ticket by Olga Grushin and The Queue by Vladmir Sorokin

I always thought this type of thing would make an engaging game. Create my dream!

I honestly don't know what the best option is these days, which is super unhelpful. I started learning Java about 12 years ago before there were all the online options we have now, then switched over to mostly C# when I started using Unity (they're basically the same language so the transition is really easy).

The most helpful book when I was starting was Sam's Teach Yourself Java in 24 Hours. Really good at teaching the language while explaining how to think like a programmer, which is a huge step when you're starting out.

It looks like they have a book for C# too. I haven't read it and it looks like it's written by a different guy, but it's probably a similar approach to teaching.

For online resources, I've used codecademy for learning a handful of new languages. Unfortunately they don't have any C# but they do have Java. It looks like some promising sites for C# are learncs.org and programmr.com, but I haven't used either of them so this is just from a quick glance.

Unity has already been well covered here by other redditors.

Nevertheless, if you are also in the process of learning how to program, I would like to contribute with two pointers.

Code: The Hidden Language of Computer Hardware and Software, by Charles Petzold

For the very basic of computer science

https://www.amazon.com/dp/0735611319

Inside C#, by Tom Archer and Andrew Whitechapel

This is quite old now but very easy to read and good to understand the language

https://www.amazon.com/dp/0735616485

If you are not in the US, just google around for other sources.

Happy hacking

>mostly because you need to be good at a lot of mathemtics, is this true?

This is primarily for algorithms. It's pretty easy to be good at math, the hardest part I find for people who program is that they often don't think "outside the box" in breaking their program down.

I and others recommend programming in C#. You should be able to get off the ground with the following resources:

http://learncs.org/

https://mva.microsoft.com/en-US/training-courses/software-development-fundamentals-8248?l=D9b9nHKy_3404984382

https://mva.microsoft.com/en-US/training-courses/c-fundamentals-for-absolute-beginners-8295?l=bifAqFYy_204984382

http://www.amazon.com/Exam-98-361-Software-Development-Fundamentals/dp/047088911X

This list is for programming in general:

http://www.amazon.com/Pragmatic-Programmer-Journeyman-Master/dp/020161622X/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1453520022&sr=1-1&keywords=pragmatic+programmer

http://www.amazon.com/Clean-Code-Handbook-Software-Craftsmanship/dp/0132350882/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1453520045&sr=1-1&keywords=clean+code

http://www.amazon.com/Design-Patterns-Elements-Reusable-Object-Oriented/dp/0201633612/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1453520067&sr=1-1&keywords=gang+of+four

http://www.comp.nus.edu.sg/~stevenha/myteaching/competitive_programming/cp1.pdf

http://visualgo.net/

http://www.sorting-algorithms.com/

http://code.tutsplus.com/tutorials/3-key-software-principles-you-must-understand--net-25161

Don't know about migration but this book is pretty great: http://www.amazon.com/5-0-Pocket-Reference-Instant-Programmers/dp/1449320171
Other than that just Google away!

Well, then you may want to check this out:

http://www.amazon.com/Contagious-Why-Things-Catch-On/dp/1451686579

An excellent book about viral marketing, I applied it's principles to my game and plan on doing so to every other game I make. (Sure hope that this link doesn't get removed too..)

My advice, as a long time UI/UX designer is test early and often on people who have never seen your game. This has been the only way for me to ensure things are improving. Once someone has tested your UI once, they bring that knowledge with them into their next play session, negating any indications of weather or not this is easy to understand and use.

Also, don't try to reinvent the wheel. Billions of dollars have likely been spent trying to solve the very problem you are. Look at what is out there, find the good stuff, and use it as a starting point for your own problems. Shops in particular, have TONS of examples of successful and unsuccessful designs. My primary resource is the hundreds of games I own on steam, and my memories of the best systems I've encountered.

The Design of Everyday Things is about the only book I'd recommend, but it does not focus on UI/UX so much as design as a concept in itself.

I like Effective C#. Also worth taking a look at are C# 5.0 in a Nutshell and Beginning C# Object-Oriented Programming.

Very interesting.

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My books on 3D modelling; https://www.amazon.com/dp/B07TW91PKH https://www.amazon.com/dp/1077426879

Get this book :)

https://www.amazon.com/Foundations-Game-Engine-Development-Mathematics/dp/0985811749/

Forgive the shameless plug, but the 2nd edition of my book Unity in Action just came out. It's explicitly designed for people who already know how to program but are new to Unity.

back in the 90s I got paid to do the dynamics on a racing game.

so much fun.

hardest part was understanding impulse vs. force applied, keeping the time dimension straight.

plus figuring out the axis of rotation of wheeled vehicles, how exactly tires turn a car.

https://www.amazon.com/Race-Car-Vehicle-Dynamics-Experiments/dp/0768011272 is the bible of course but it didn't answer any of the hard problems I ran into, like how to transfer the (uneven) forces in the shocks into angular vs. vertical acceleration.