Students from SPGE “John Atanasov” created their first video game
We continue our series of interviews, in which we introduce you to the school club “Video Game development”. We present you Engr. Veselina Marinova, who is the tutor of the club in 10th grade in SPGE “John Atanasov” in Sofia. Her students are successfully taking their first steps in game development, and below you can see some of their completed projects.
Introduce yourself in a few sentences – how long have you worked as a teacher, what class do you teach, in which school. Share some of your achievements (awards, qualifications, etc.) that you are proud of.
Hello, I am Engr. Veselina Marinova. I have a master’s degree from the Technical University in Sofia, majoring in “Electronic technology and microelectronics”, as well as I have another master’s degree from VTU “St. St. Kiril I Metodi” in Veliko Tarnovo, with a major in “Informatics – Computer Multimedia”. I have worked as a teacher for more than 25 years and I have 4 PKS. I teach mainly classes related to programming. I work at SPGE “John Atanasov” in Sofia.
Along with my students, we have taken part in different competitions and forums, and one of the last achievements I am proud of is that we won first place in the National Programming Competition for professional high schools in 2020.
Why did you decide to become a tutor in the interested club?
The idea came up spontaneously after my students and I visited ARC Academy during the Open Doors days last year and we met all the lecturers and students of the Academy. The students were so impressed and curious to try out something in the game industry. That is how we decided to start the club, and when the Academy started the project with the high schools, we were convinced that we wanted to participate. I decided to take part in the initiative during the summer webinars of the Academy, so I can gain some experience and knowledge about the techniques and the technology they use.
What are your impressions of the club activities at the moment? What do students think of the club, how are they doing, do you have any difficulties?
“Up to now our club is doing great and students are very enthusiastic to give life to their ideas in the sphere of video games. The students find the guest lectures of the Academy are very engaging and inspirational. They assimilate the topics easily and as their teacher, I decided to broaden their knowledge with school materials for using/creating and editing graphics and programming. We checked out GIMP, Blender, and Unity. We used free resources from the web to dive into the world or our characters and 3D reality. That is how our great projects on different topics were born.”
Tell us more about the projects that you and your students managed to do thanks to the club. How did you come up with the ideas, what programs did you use to turn them into a reality?
We started with Unity, and because they are young and ambitious programmers as well as those who want to create games, write code, we decided to make 2D games. That was how some of the best games such as Angry Birds (Dimitar Dukov and Martin Mihailov), Flappy Bird (Dimitar Dukov), Flaying box (Viktor Vladanov), and Autumn Bird (Martin Uzunov) were created.
Check out the playlist for videos from the games:
Diving into the world of Unity, we started creating 3D realities and everybody could build his own 3D reality. Among all of the projects, the one that stood out was the project of Peter Mitov.
Right before the Christmas holidays, we created animations of different images and Martin Uzunov decided to surprise us by recreating the Christmas version of Winter Blade. All of the students like to experiment and create something innovative and different from what we study, and as their teacher – I gave them direction, ideas, and materials that can help them.
Martin Uzunov even applied for the suggested course – C# Programming at ARC Academy, and he shared that he is very delighted. Thanks to this education, he managed to broaden his knowledge in the sphere of programming, and he uses it in the games he creates.
Martin Uzunov: “I have always wanted to create a game. The gaming club gives us insights into the whole process of game development. During one of the club meetings, our teacher Mrs. Marinova gives us additional materials, which helped me to create the game Winter Blade and the earlier version of Autumn Blade. Currently, I am working on a new version that would be called Spring Blade. The idea came from my classmates who suggested me ideas in order to improve the game.”
Among the students, we have a young and talented artist – Yavor Djapanov, who sketches his ideas.
What would you tell teachers who are wondering whether they should apply to the club “Video game development” next year?
Colleagues, I highly suggest applying to the next year’s edition of the club, because students are very talented that have to be developed and found by the teacher. ARC Academy created a new game world, and our students are impressed by the lecturers and thankful for the knowledge they gained.
If you want to learn more about the process of game development, you can apply for our online course “How to become a game developer?” that starts on 8 Feb. Learn more here!
