You may have to Search all our reviewed books and magazines, click the sign up button below to create a free account.
A fascinating examination of technological utopianism and its complicated consequences. In The Charisma Machine, Morgan Ames chronicles the life and legacy of the One Laptop per Child project and explains why—despite its failures—the same utopian visions that inspired OLPC still motivate other projects trying to use technology to “disrupt” education and development. Announced in 2005 by MIT Media Lab cofounder Nicholas Negroponte, One Laptop per Child promised to transform the lives of children across the Global South with a small, sturdy, and cheap laptop computer, powered by a hand crank. In reality, the project fell short in many ways—starting with the hand crank, which never ma...
Creating Games offers a comprehensive overview of the technology, content, and mechanics of game design. It emphasizes the broad view of a games team and teaches you enough about your teammates' areas so that you can work effectively with them. The authors have included many worksheets and exercises to help get your small indie team off the ground. Special features: Exercises at the end of each chapter combine comprehension tests with problems that help the reader interact with the material Worksheet exercises provide creative activities to help project teams generate new ideas and then structure them in a modified version of the format of a game industry design document Pointers to the best resources for digging deeper into each specialized area of game development Website with worksheets, figures from the book, and teacher materials including study guides, lecture presentations, syllabi, supplemental exercises, and assessment materials
Creating robust artificial intelligence is one of the greatest challenges for game developers, yet the commercial success of a game is often dependent upon the quality of the AI. In this book, Ian Millington brings extensive professional experience to the problem of improving the quality of AI in games. He describes numerous examples from real games and explores the underlying ideas through detailed case studies. He goes further to introduce many techniques little used by developers today. The book's associated web site contains a library of C++ source code and demonstration programs, and a complete commercial source code library of AI algorithms and techniques. "Artificial Intelligence for ...
"Game Feel" exposes "feel" as a hidden language in game design that no one has fully articulated yet. The language could be compared to the building blocks of music (time signatures, chord progressions, verse) - no matter the instruments, style or time period - these building blocks come into play. Feel and sensation are similar building blocks whe
Morgan is left out of the loop when everyone begins bringing their Robogamer Z7s to school, linking up online with one another and playing at recess and lunch. Even Aldeen, the Godzilla of Grade Three, has one. But when the other kids start to suspect that Aldeen is faking her gaming, Morgan has to decide whether or not to stand up to the bullies who are teasing her. With a situation young readers will recognize and enjoy, and a character they can easily identify with, this is a book that will appeal to kids starting to read on their own. The dyslexia-friendly features of the book include easier-to-read typography, page layout, and reduced-contrast paper stock, along with illustrations on every double-page spread that enhance the text.
A look at the first ninety games of a simulated baseball season featuring Negro league players versus major league players using a baseball board game.
On Call 24/7 chronicles the life experiences and lessons learned that have molded the outstanding career of Bill Lyght as a Black army lieutenant colonel and as a Black police executive. He tells the story of his grandparents and parents and the impressions that they made on him that hard work and education propel one's career. It is a narrative of his vast experiences while serving in the military as a commissioned officer for twenty years and as a police executive for almost twenty years. Bil
Studies challenging the idea that technology and science flow only from global North to South. The essays in this volume study the creation, adaptation, and use of science and technology in Latin America. They challenge the view that scientific ideas and technology travel unchanged from the global North to the global South—the view of technology as “imported magic.” They describe not only alternate pathways for innovation, invention, and discovery but also how ideas and technologies circulate in Latin American contexts and transnationally. The contributors' explorations of these issues, and their examination of specific Latin American experiences with science and technology, offer a br...
"An accessible, illustrated introduction to statistics and sports analytics for fanatics and newcomers alike. On February 27, 2013, NBA shooter Steph Curry wowed crowds when he sunk eleven out of thirteen three-pointers-only seven other players, including the likes of Michael Jordan and Kobe Bryant, had scored more in the history of games at Madison Square Garden. Four years later, the University of Connecticut women's basketball team won their 100th straight game, defeating South Carolina 66-55. And in 2010, one sports forecaster-an octopus named Paul-correctly predicted the outcome of all of Germany's matches in the World Cup. These are surprising events. Are they truly improbable? Mathema...