Top 5 Free Courses to Learn Game Development in 2020 - Best of Lot

If you are a programmer with a passion for game development or computer science graduate who wants to become a Game Developer for the console, Android, or iOS device and looking for some excellent courses to start with, then you have come to the right place. In this article, I am going to share some of the best Game Development courses which are entirely free using Unity, Corona, and LibGDX, three of the most popular game engines for Programmers and Game Developers. While LibGDX is Java-based and Unity is C# based but probably the most popular game engine at this moment. Unity Game engine is both powerful and free, which makes it ideal to use it for game development. If you don't know, Unity is the same software used to create Pokemon Go and many other best selling mobile games!

These courses will teach you how to download and install Unity in your machine and start development at your own pace. Since I am a Java developer, I have also included a LibGDX course, which is another excellent game engine for Java developers.

If you are aiming for Android and iOS devices, you can also use the Corona game engine. I have also included one free course to learn game development using Corona on this list.

Game development can be both fun and very rewarding when publishing a hit game to the iOS App Store or Google Play store. Still, most importantly, it also teaches you how to program, and that's why I suggest anyone learning to code or program to start developing games. It has helped me a lot to build my coding and algorithm skills in the past and will help you as well.

Btw, If you are new into the game development world and want to learn everything a Game  Developer should know about C# and Unity that there is no better course than The Complete C# Unity Developer Guide  by Ben Tristem and Rick Davidson. It's not free, but it's completely worthy of your time and money.

5 Courses to learn Game Development in 2020

Anyway, without any further ado, here is a list of some of the free courses to learn Game Development in 2020. As I have said in the first paragraph, it includes courses on Unity, Corona, and LibGDX frameworks.

1. Introduction to Game Development with Unity

This is one of the best courses to learn Unit Game Development online, and the best thing is that it's free. In this course, you will not only learn how to install and setup Unity software but also how to create projects, scenes, and navigate.

You will learn how to use Camera and Lighting, Adding 2D and 3D game objects, manipulating the scene, and play with object colors and material to create real-world games.

Another beautiful thing about the course is that the Instructor is very enthusiastic, which makes this course more exciting and bright.

In short, an excellent course to get an overview of Unity's different features and start with the Unity game engine.

2. Game Development Crash Course w/Corona SDK: You Can Do It!

If you're interested in 2D mobile game development for Android and iOS, then you've probably heard of the Corona SDK framework. If not, it's another popular game engine for creating games.

In this course, you will first dive in and create a simple game. Along the way, you'll magically learn how to use the core concepts of Corona SDK like Animation, Tap and Touch Events, and Playing Audio.

The course is not long with just an hour of content, but it gives you enough ideas to go further. In short, an excellent online game development crash course for programmers interested in 2D mobile game development for Android and iOS using the Corona SDK.

3. Simple Game Programming From Scratch with libGDX and Java

This is another short course to learn Game Development in Java using LibGDX, one of the most popular game development libraries in Java.

In this course, you will learn how to develop a "flappy bird-like" game by libgdx and Java from scratch and learn the basics of programming and game development along the way.

The only thing I don't like about the course is that the Instructor is a bit slow and low, a bit of enthusiasm invoice would have made this course much better. Unfortunately, there are not many free courses with Java + LibGDX, so you have to contend with this.

4. Intro to Game Development Using Unity - Part I

This is the perfect course for someone who wants to learn Game development but has no programming experience.

In this course, A 2D game will be developed from scratch, and you will learn the basics of game development along the way.

This is not a long course but packed with 1.5 hours of powerful material where you will learn many important aspects of game development like one-tap start, characters with different behaviors, collision detections, animation, and so on.

In short, an excellent little course to learn Game Development with Unity, perfect for beginners, newbies, and anyone who wants to develop games without programming experience.

5. Introduction to Game Development with Unity

This is a great online course to learn how to develop a high-quality 3D game for web, PC, Mac, or even Linux using Unity.

In this course, you will first learn how to create, acquire, modify, and integrate AAA quality assets such as sounds, music, and 3D models.

You will also learn Agile Game Development design principles and practices geared towards Unity3D and .Net.

By the end of this course, you will have a survival game that you can publish and play with your friends and family or continue to develop into your own custom creation.

Btw, you would need a Pluralsight membership to access this course, which costs around $29 per month or $299 per year and provides access to their 5000+ online courses on the latest technologies. If you can invest that much money on your learning, then by all means you do, it's completely worthy of it.

But, if you don't have a membership, you can still access this course for free by taking advantage of their 10-day free pass, which allows 200 minutes of free access to all of their classes.

In short, a great course to learn game development using Unity3D, but some C# and .NET experience are needed for this course.

That's all about some of the best free Unity courses to learn Game Development in 2020. I have also included a game development course with Corona, another popular game engine, which will teach you how to develop games for the Android and iOS platform.

Though, if you want to create games in Java for desktop and Android platforms, you can also join Android LibGDX Game Development Masterclass to create Games Using Java with the LibGDX Game Development Framework.

Game development is both fun and rewarding when your game becomes hit on the iOS store, Google Play store, or on the web like Facebook.

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Thanks for reading this article so far. If you like these free game development courses, then please share it with your friends and colleagues. If you have any questions or feedback, then please drop a note.

P. S. - If you are new into the game development world and want to learn everything a Game  Developer should know about C# and Unity that there is no better course than The Complete C# Unity Developer Guide by Ben Tristem and Rick Davidson.  You should check that as well.