I just want to point out some things I don't think have been pointed out yet.

To have your app published and put on the Apple App Store you must

* be a registered developer ($99 a year)

* I am almost positive that you must have a Mac to submit it.

There are ways around this. Some of the cloud based systems, where you submit your code to their servers and they build it for you, can remove the Mac requirement. A few tools let you also publish under their registered developer account, but I am unaware of the side effects of doing this. I personally wouldn't do it, but then, 99$ isn't a huge barrier for me.

If you do decide to use C# (Which is pretty trendy with beginner programmers), then you will also need to pay a fee up front for monotouch / monodroid if you want to run / test your game on iOS or Android.

This is not the case with C++ (though the $99 apple developer fee still is required). Since you already have experience with programming, then I think you might be better off with this.

C/C++ is also the only languages I know of that supports *all* platforms. Not just platforms that a C# virtual machine environment has been ported to. Which might be important if you decide that iOS or Android are not the only platforms you want to target at a later date. (Things like pandora or the raspberry pi come to mind)

If you do decide to use C# (Which is pretty trendy with beginner programmers), then you will also need to pay a fee up front for monotouch / monodroid if you want to run / test your game on iOS or Android.

This is not the case with C++ (though the $99 apple developer fee still is required). Since you already have experience with programming, then I think you might be better off with this.

C/C++ is also the only languages I know of that supports *all* platforms. Not just platforms that a C# virtual machine environment has been ported to. Which might be important if you decide that iOS or Android are not the only platforms you want to target at a later date. (Things like pandora or the raspberry pi come to mind)

There are tons of languages that support all platforms. JavaScript/HTML ( web and native with third part apps ), Flash, HaXe, LUA, or of course applications like Construct2 or GameMaker.

The big downside to C++ on iOS is, well, XCode support for C++ stinks. I would go far as to say XCode stinks, but some people seem to like it for reasons I can't quite fathom.

There are tons of languages that support all platforms. JavaScript/HTML ( web and native with third part apps ), Flash, HaXe, LUA, or of course applications like Construct2 or GameMaker.

Flash player for Linux has no 3D support.
Not a single HaXe output runs on raspberry pi, pandora, 90% of UNIX OSes.
LUA needs an interpreter... The reference (and fastest) is for C and this ultimately means that you are going to be using C or C++. If you don't use C/C++, then you are restricted by the limitations of whatever platform / language you have chosen and you are back to square one!
Javascript / HTML needs a pretty new web browser but a large issue is that 3D (via webGL) isnt supported on iOS for mainstream users yet.
Construct 2 or GameMaker... yeah right. These have no support for Linux.

Who the heck would waste their time with any of the above? Doesn't make sense.

The big downside to C++ on iOS is, well, XCode support for C++ stinks. I would go far as to say XCode stinks, but some people seem to like it for reasons I can't quite fathom.

When porting my game from any other platform to iOS... I dont touch Xcode. This is no argument against C++. An IDE for the Mac means very little to a developer when they don't use a Mac for development lol.

LOL... people care about Linux anymore?

Linux on the desktop lost, hard, to Mac OS X. There is a reason nobody supports Linux anymore. Perhaps Valve and their push towards Linux will change things, but I highly doubt it. The OP certainly didn't mention anything about Linux. There is a very good reason why these cross platform tools don't bother targeting Linux... there is no demand.

As to IDE meaning very little to a decent developer, that's just nonsense. An IDE is a productivity tool, and a pretty much universally accepted one. Cutting off your nose to spite your face is just ludicrousness. iOS development basically pushes XCode down your throat.

rancineb,

I do pretty much all my development in a pretty common text editor (Vim) and then use Makefiles and xcodebuild on my Mac build server to generate the iOS packages.

I have found that C++ and OpenGL to be the easiest to work with for everything because of the simple fact that once you have a rendering context up and running, the rest of the code (pretty much 99.9%) can stay exactly the same for all platforms I have ever used (and probably ever will use).

If you do have your heart set on a specific games engine, then you probably are going to have to use the language that it requires. If you want to do 2D games then I highly suggest C++ and OpenGL and for 3D there are also loads of different libraries to load 3D models etc... that you can put together your own engine extremely easily.

Perhaps all I am saying is don't just jump onto C# because it is "what everyone else uses" because similar was done with VB6* back in the day and once Microsoft dropped it in favour of .NET. People lost a *LOT* of work. Portability and longevity of my code (and hard work) is king in my book!

* VB6 code is not at all compatible with VB.NET.

rancineb,

I do pretty much all my development in a pretty common text editor (Vim) and then use Makefiles and xcodebuild on my Mac build server to generate the iOS packages.

I have found that C++ and OpenGL to be the easiest to work with for everything because of the simple fact that once you have a rendering context up and running, the rest of the code (pretty much 99.9%) can stay exactly the same for all platforms I have ever used (and probably ever will use).

If you do have your heart set on a specific games engine, then you probably are going to have to use the language that it requires. If you want to do 2D games then I highly suggest C++ and OpenGL and for 3D there are also loads of different libraries to load 3D models etc... that you can put together your own engine extremely easily.

Perhaps all I am saying is don't just jump onto C# because it is "what everyone else uses" because similar was done with VB6* back in the day and once Microsoft dropped it in favour of .NET. People lost a *LOT* of work. Portability and longevity of my code (and hard work) is king in my book!

* VB6 code is not at all compatible with VB.NET.

That is a load of bunk. Visual Studio 6 was released in 1998 and discontinued support in 2008! That is, stopped formally supporting/patching/updating the product. 10 years! There are hundreds of millions of lines of VB code running to this day. Hell, there are probably still millions of people writing VB6 code at this point. I am no fan of the language, but then, I wasn't the target demographic.

Also, unlike VB6, C# is an ECMA standards based language... if Microsoft went away tomorrow, it would live on in the form of Mono. This sounds like fanboi rubbish you would hear on Slashdot 4 years ago, not the type of stuff discussed here. Then again, anti-IDE I'm a Vim/Makefile guy sounds very Slashdot too...