It’s one of the globe’s longest simmering conflicts. Year after year, the tensions peak and ebb, with both sides occasionally firing volleys before retreating back to their respective bunkers. But after several seasons of comparatively low-key gamesmanship, that calm is inches from once again exploding into one of the rivalry’s fiercest clashes ever. As a fabled Jedi master would say, reignited, the console wars have. With game announcements already launching fast and furious, the late year rollouts of the fastest, most powerful next gen consoles ever will have the battle between Sony’s Playstation 5 and Microsoft’s Xbox Series X back on the gaming world’s front pages. If you think you’ve got the stuff to step to the front lines of this rager, you can actually amass the knowledge to start building AAA-level game experiences of your own with the training in The Hardcore Game Development and Animation Bundle ($29.99, over 90 percent off from TNW Deals). The collection includes six courses that can serve as your video game bootcamp with a particular focus on one of the most vital elements of game creation: crafting memorable characters and environments that look and move as brilliantly as any EA or Nintendo release. The training begins with the basics in Stylized Game Art: Character Sculpting for Video Games, a full primer on how key creation tools like Zbrush, PBR, Maya, Substance, Unity, and Unreal help bring fully realized 3D characters to life. Next, the instruction looks into a pair of those character creation platforms more closely, as Character Modeling and Sculpting in Zbrush examines how Zbrush is used as well as the professional workflow of sculpting a 3D character for use in gaming or even movies; while iOS iPad Game Development 3D Character Sculpting and Modeling tracks how that same process happens using this popular iOS app. But a video game character is just a drawing until it actually moves — and the courses Maya and Unreal: 3D Character Animation Jump Flip Fundamentals and Maya and Unreal: 3D Character Kpop Dance Animation Fundamentals help users understand Unreal Engine’s A.R.T. rigging tools for the Autodesk Maya animation creation process to make your characters do virtually anything you can imagine. The artist’s process takes centerstage in Game Design Concept Art Intro: Digital Environment Drawing as students learn a step-by-step guide for turning all the visual elements of a game from an idea into a fully rendered part of your game world. Each of these courses, a $200 value, are now on sale for only $5 a piece, just $29.99. Prices are subject to change.
