🎮 Ultimate Game Dev Planner & Skill Path 2026

The #1 Free Game Development Roadmap — From Zero to Published Game in 90 Days!

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🔥 Why This Repo?

Feature	Details
✅ Complete Roadmap	Beginner → Pro game developer
✅ Free Resources Only	No paid courses needed
✅ 90-Day Plan	Daily tasks, no overwhelm
✅ All Engines Covered	Unity, Unreal, Godot, Web
✅ Earn Money	How to monetize your games

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📅 90-Day Game Dev Plan

🟢 Month 1 — Foundation (Days 1–30)

Week	Topic	Free Resource
Week 1	Game Design Basics	GDC Talks (YouTube)
Week 2	Choose Your Engine	Godot Docs
Week 3	Programming Basics	CS50 Game Dev
Week 4	Build Mini Game #1	Pong / Flappy Bird clone

🟡 Month 2 — Building Skills (Days 31–60)

Week	Topic	Free Resource
Week 5	2D Platformer	Brackeys YouTube
Week 6	Audio & Sound FX	freesound.org
Week 7	UI & Menus	Unity/Godot UI tutorials
Week 8	Mini Game #2	Side-scroller / Shooter

🔴 Month 3 — Ship It! (Days 61–90)

Week	Topic	Free Resource
Week 9	3D Basics	Unity Learn
Week 10	Polish & Juice	Game Feel tutorials
Week 11	Publish on Itch.io	itch.io guide
Week 12	Market Your Game	Social media strategy

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🗺️ Complete Skill Path

BEGINNER
    │
    ├── 🎯 Game Design Fundamentals
    │       ├── Core loops
    │       ├── Player motivation
    │       └── Level design basics
    │
    ├── 💻 Pick an Engine
    │       ├── Godot (Free, Best for beginners)
    │       ├── Unity (Industry standard)
    │       └── Unreal (AAA quality)
    │
    ├── 🔧 Programming
    │       ├── GDScript (Godot)
    │       ├── C# (Unity)
    │       └── Blueprints (Unreal)
    │
INTERMEDIATE
    │
    ├── 🎨 Art & Assets
    │       ├── Pixel art → Aseprite (free)
    │       ├── 3D models → Blender (free)
    │       └── Free assets → OpenGameArt.org
    │
    ├── 🎵 Audio
    │       ├── Free SFX → freesound.org
    │       ├── Music → incompetech.com
    │       └── Engine → FMOD (free for indie)
    │
    ├── 🧠 Advanced Programming
    │       ├── State machines
    │       ├── Pathfinding (A*)
    │       └── Multiplayer basics
    │
PRO
    │
    ├── 🚀 Publishing
    │       ├── Itch.io (Free, instant)
    │       ├── Google Play (₹2000 one-time)
    │       └── Steam ($100 one-time)
    │
    └── 💰 Monetization
            ├── Ads (AdMob)
            ├── In-app purchases
            └── Game Jams → Prize money

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🆓 100% Free Tools List

Game Engines

• Godot — Best free engine, MIT license
• Unity — Free for personal use
• GDevelop — No coding needed!

Art & Design

• Aseprite — Pixel art (free if compiled)
• Blender — 3D modeling
• GIMP — Image editing
• Canva — Game thumbnails

Free Assets

• OpenGameArt.org — Sprites, music, SFX
• Kenney.nl — 40,000+ free assets
• itch.io/game-assets — Free game assets

Audio

• freesound.org — SFX
• incompetech.com — Royalty-free music
• Audacity — Audio editing

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💡 Game Ideas for Beginners (Build These First!)

#	Game	Difficulty	Time
1	🏓 Pong	⭐	1 day
2	🐦 Flappy Bird	⭐	2 days
3	🐍 Snake	⭐⭐	3 days
4	🧱 Breakout	⭐⭐	1 week
5	🏃 Platformer	⭐⭐⭐	2 weeks
6	🔫 Top-down Shooter	⭐⭐⭐	3 weeks
7	🧩 Puzzle Game	⭐⭐⭐⭐	1 month
8	📱 Mobile Hyper-casual	⭐⭐⭐⭐	1 month

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💰 How to Earn Money from Games

💵 Revenue Streams:
│
├── 🎮 Itch.io Sales          → $5–$500/month (indie games)
├── 📱 Mobile Ads (AdMob)     → $100–$5000/month (hyper-casual)
├── 🏆 Game Jams              → $100–$5000 prize money
├── 🎓 Teach on YouTube       → Ad revenue + sponsorships
├── 👾 Game Assets Shop       → Sell on itch.io/Kenney style
├── 💼 Freelance              → $20–$80/hour on Upwork/Fiverr
└── 🚀 Steam Release          → $1000–$100,000+ (with marketing)

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📊 Game Dev Learning Resources (All Free)

YouTube Channels

Channel	Best For
GDC	Game design theory
Brackeys	Unity tutorials
GodotTutorials	Godot engine
Thomas Brush	Indie dev mindset
GMTK	Game design analysis

Free Courses

• CS50's Intro to Game Dev — Harvard free course!
• Unity Learn — Official free tutorials
• Godot Docs — Best engine docs

Communities

• r/gamedev — 700k+ developers
• r/indiegaming — For indie devs
• Discord: Godot — Active help

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🏆 Game Jams Calendar (Win Money & Fame!)

Jam	Prize	Frequency
Ludum Dare	Fame + Portfolio	3x per year
Global Game Jam	Fame + Networking	Annual
itch.io Jams	Varies	Weekly!
GMTK Game Jam	Fame	Annual
Brackeys Game Jam	Community prizes	2x per year

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Share on:

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• LinkedIn: Tag your dev friends
• Reddit: r/gamedev r/learnprogramming

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🤝 Contributing

Found a great free resource? Open a PR and add it!

1. Fork this repo
2. Add your resource in the right section
3. Submit a Pull Request
4. Get credited as a contributor!

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📜 License

MIT License — Free to use, share, and modify!

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Made with ❤️ for the global game dev community Last updated: April 2026