About this site

This website presents an introductory course Programming Games. The curriculum was designed for undergraduate students to learn the fundamentals of programming through making games, and assumes no prior experience in coding.

The site and curriculum was developed by Lee Tusman, Assistant Professor of New Media and Computer Science at Purchase College, with the support of a Topol Faculty Development Award.

The class is taught in the language Lua, using the LÖVE framework and Pico-8 game engine.

Making a game is fun but lots of work! Students are expected to follow along, code throughout the week, and complete all assignments. There are three main game projects: an 80s/90s arcade style game, an adventure game, and a final game of their choice, along with smaller projects and challenges along the way. The first 8 weeks of class are taught with LÖVE. Pico-8 will be taught in the following weeks. A student can choose to work with either LÖVE or Pico-8 for their final game project.

This site builds upon open source books, lesson plans and tutorials, cited. Mini workshops and projects are completed along the way, including building text adventure games and pong.

There are 15 classes, for a “semester-long” course, with one field trip class and one final projects presentations class.

Curriculum by Lee Tusman.

Lee Tusman 2023
Website design adapted from: Ashley Blewer, 2021 - 2022
CC BY-NC
Pico-8 gif by REZ.