As proud supporters of women in tech, we recently partnered up with GirlDevelopIt to host a virtual Buildbox workshop. GirlDevelopIt is a nonprofit organization that provides adult women affordable opportunities in a judgment-free environment to learn software development. It was founded on a single class in New York City in 2010 by Vanessa Hurst and Sara Chipps that sold out within 24 hours and has now grown into a massive community that spans across five cities with over 55,000 members nationwide. Initially, all of their classes were held in-person, but now they’re hosted virtually, to continue to give women a safe space to learn different development skills. We were honored to have the chance to team up with them to host a virtual workshop introducing Buildbox and game development.
Our 2-hour workshop called “Basics of Building a Gaming App” was held on Thursday, May 14th, and quickly sold out. Zack Griset, our Product Evangelist, led the class and was joined by Executive Director of GirlDevelopIt, Katie Nohe Franco. This beginner’s course covered all of the fundamentals of using our software. Students learned how to dive right into Buildbox and start creating a game from scratch without using a single line of code.
GirlDevelopIt! Buildbox Workshop Recap
We had the opportunity to chat with Zack Griest about the virtual workshop event and working with GirlDevelopIt! “It was a privilege to work with GirlDevelopIt, and the workshop went really well,” raved Griest. The course started with a short introduction to the software. Griset showed them where one could find templates, tutorials, and the user manual for the software. He also went over some basic logic and navigation controls. Then the students learned how to build out a racing-style video game using beautiful assets. All of the graphics used were found within the software for free in the Asset Library.
He walked the students through the whole process of building an entire game from the ground up. They learned how to create the main character, create enemies, design scenes, adjust physics behavior and gravity, character movement, camera movement, and so much more in the span of only 2 hours. Griset said, “This was only possible because the members of GirlDevelopIt were so sharp and talented and because Buildbox is extremely intuitive for all age levels and backgrounds. It was a great work workshop. I’m looking forward to working with GirlDevelopIt again and seeing what games they end up making.”
We hope to participate in more incredible initiatives like this in the future to empower developers and anyone with an idea to create amazing games! In case you missed the workshop, you can check out some of our other on-demand workshops and e-learning courses on Udemy. Thousands of students have enrolled in our Udemy courses. Our courses range from how to get started using Buildbox to the best game design tips and tricks for game developers to use and more. Just click on the button below to view current courses:
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