I have a niece who wants to make a video game. I have 0 experience teaching and am very likely to recommend her some crazy complicated shit that will turn her off to the idea. She’s 8. Anyone have experience with this? Her first instinct was to try and make games in the Roblox engine but I know exactly how exploitative that shit is and how nontransferable those skills are

Libre software is a must

  • crime [she/her, any]
    ·
    3 years ago

    For an 8 year old, definitely Scratch.

    For slightly older kids or anyone who's taken geometry I'll throw Racket (a Scheme dialect) out there — it's a functional language built specifically for learning, the course How To Design Programs uses it and is pretty accessible and specifically has libraries that are used for drawing, coloring, and animating images in a very beginner friendly, digestible way