best video game youtube channels design doc

Recommended game development channels on YouTube

Suggested by our followers

After asking our community to tell us about the YouTube channels on game development they watch we've compiled a list, the channels are categorized but listed in no particular order.

Game design

• Game Maker's Toolkit

A deep dive into game design, level design, and game production, hosted by Mark Brown. The channel is also home of one of the largest game jams in the world which is hosted yearly.

• Ask Gamedev

A group of game industry veterans offers an insight in the game development industry and answer any questions you might have.

• Gamedenker

Gamedenker takes a look at video games as an art medium to which ideas from other forms of art and sciences can be applied.

• Adam Millard

Adam's channel is dedicated to exploring game design, critique and thematic exploration in a laid back, occasionally funny style.

• Design Doc

This channel discusses various topics on game design using motion graphics and visual aids, especially goes into game design in mainstream games.

Visual effects

• GameHut / Coding Secrets

Jon Burton shares his experiences when he worked on such titles as Mickey Mania, Toy Story and Sonic 3D (Blast). He'll go into detail how impressive effects were done on lower-end hardware.

• Makin' Stuff Look Good

Unfortunately the channel isn't active anymore but the previously shared videos are a great source for learning about various effects, especially shaders.

Programming & math

• Freya Holmér

Freya previously worked on Shader Forge, Shapes and VR game Budget Cuts and often shares insights on math and programming.

• Sebastian Lague

Sebastian is primarily a programmer, making detailed videos about specific pieces of game-dev-relevant maths and tech - covering his journeys exploring daunting topics like compute shaders and ray-marching.

• Jorge Rodriguez

Jorge offers a large selection of videos dealing with math for game developers which covers subjects such as trigonometry, basic linear algebra and vectors, pathfinding algorithms, geometry, and other aspects relevant to game coding.

Art & animation

• MortMort

MortMort makes easy to follow art tutorials and tips & tricks videos that cover both software and design theory. Mainly focused on pixel art and stylised 3D in Blender.

• Video Game Animation Study

A channel dedicated to both 2D and 3D animation in games, goes in-depth on animation in popular games and how you can improve your animations.

• IndieTales

A largely 2D art oriented indie development channel using Aseprite, Tiled and Unity. Learn the principles of palette selection, shading, UI Design, animation and more.

Engine specific

• Brackeys (Unity)

Brackeys created Unity tutorials which are suited for both beginners and intermediate developers looking to either expand their skills or learn about new Unity features. Unfortunately they aren't active anymore, whoever they leave behind a great library of videos.

• Mix and Jam (Unity)

Mix and Jam teaches viewers how to recreate interesting effects from popular games in Unity. While Unity specific, a lot of the techniques can be applied to different engines as well.

• quill18creates (Unity)

Various tutorials and guides for both beginners and those wanting to learn new aspects of the Unity engine.

• Godot Tutorials (Godot)

Unsurprisingly this channel is Godot focused with a beginner video series on the various aspects of the engine in some detail, however they also have a series on Basics of Design Principles which details SOLID principles with specific examples.

• HeartBeast (Godot/GameMaker)

HeartBeast creates both Godot and GameMaker related videos, keeps a devlog of his in-development game and even shares pixel art tutorials - all you need to get started yourself!

• Shaun Spaulding (GameMaker)

Shaun is a former Ubisoft game designer and currently creates tutorials for GameMaker. He has a long running series on creating an action RPG.

Gaming

• Boundary Break

Goes behind the scenes (quite literally) of popular games to look at secrets and tricks that lie beyond the boundaries of game worlds.

• Strafefox

Strafefox shows how popular games did visual effects, created effects way ahead of their time and goes in-depth on various subjects.

• TetraBitGaming

Their 'Lost Bits' series takes a look at cut content of various popular games, why was the content cut and what is left of it?

• Noclip

Noclip creates documentaries on the development of video games, they often go to different studios to make reports on how they work and which problems they face(d) during development.

• GVMERS

Similar to Noclip the channel specializes in mini documentaries, analyses and in-depth looks at the history of popular game series.

General & other

• Game From Scratch

Game From Scratch posts regular updates on news relevant to indie devs such as changes to platform policies, indie deals/bundles, and most importantly reviews a wide assortment of engines.

• Miziziziz

This channel offers an interesting series where four game developers create games using the same game art within 48 hours. Other than that the channel is largely Godot focused and follows the development of (jam) games by the channel owner.

The article has been written with suggestions from community members AlexM, Any Key, Harry Damm, Jhonxay, Kay Lousberg, Mr4Goosey and Pop.

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