Most Rust resources dump theory first. This book flips that: Fun First, Rust Second. You start by moving characters, then add procedural world generation, particle effects, A* pathfinding, and combat systems as you progress.
You master ECS architecture and Rust fundamentals by creating a complete game, not reading theory.
Chapters 1-7 are available for free online:
Chapter 1: Let There Be a Player: Setting up a Bevy project, understanding ECS basics, and implementing player movement.
Chapter 2: Let There Be a World: Creating procedural tilemaps and world generation.
Chapter 3: Let The Data Flow: Building a data-driven character system using RON configuration files and generic animation logic.
Chapter 4: Let There Be Collisions: Implementing spatial queries and collision detection.
Chapter 5: Let There Be Pickups: Building an inventory system, UI, and understanding the borrow checker through practical game patterns.
Chapter 6: Let There Be Particles: Adding visual polish and particle effects to bring the game world to life.
Chapter 7: Let There Be Enemies: Implementing enemy AI behavior and A* pathfinding.
Source Code https://github.com/jamesfebin/ImpatientProgrammerBevyRust