maybe its just my overly positive personality speaking, but i dont think its that difficult. sure, its hard, trying to keep up with all the technological advances and trying to make a product that all will want to make money, but, if you believe you can, i believe you can! now, if your looking at it as something hard to do that youll never get the hang of, thats probably true. and i believe its the same vice-versa. just my 2 cents.... ;-)
The Shaz
Is it easy?
I definitely agree. Sure, I pulled my hair out and nearly died of frustration for the first 1-2 years, but if you can push yourself through that period (and there''s no reason it might not be shorter for you) then you''ll find that the difficulty drops off over time. Every now and again you''ll have a big revelation abut something or other that turns something that used to be a tremendous pain in the @ss into a snap.
I''ve been working in the games industry for two years now after having been in the embedded system industry. I find the programming aspect of game development way easier than embedded system work, but I have to admit that working as part of a team and trying to create a title that has broad appeal is very difficult. I spend all my time pulling my hair out over the feature list and design concepts, but when it comes to actually writing the code it''s pretty straight forward.
Author
But what makes game programming itself different from other programming. How is the code different? What exactly makes it harder?
"Pannekoek, Poitjie Kos, ''''n Bier en lekker Braai Vleis!"
"Pannekoek, Poitjie Kos, ''''n Bier en lekker Braai Vleis!"
Business apps usually push around small pieces of data at a given time. They may deal with a lot of data overall, but usually not all at once. Games manages tons of data and graphics and have other components - physics, AI, multiplayer, input from mouse/keyboard/joystick/whatever; some of which rival the complexity of some business apps.
Game programming is tough because it has to run in real-time at acceptable framerates. That means it needs to be efficient and at the same time, have certain features and look good. It''s about how to cram a lot of graphics, features onto limited hardware.
Game programming is tough because it changes really quickly. It changes just as fast as other programming fields. But on top of that, new techniques, API''s, algorithms, features are constantly changing as gaming hardware changes. The industry is deeply rooted in constantly pushing the envelope so the programming reflects that.
Game programming is tough because the industry is a bit odd. It''s a glamour industry so lots of people flock to it. It''s hard to stay afloat in the gaming business so schedules tend to be accelerated. It''s a risky industry so job security is very low.
Game programming is tough because games are becoming very complicated and codebases are getting very huge.
Game programming is tough because it changes really quickly. It changes just as fast as other programming fields. But on top of that, new techniques, API''s, algorithms, features are constantly changing as gaming hardware changes. The industry is deeply rooted in constantly pushing the envelope so the programming reflects that.
Game programming is tough because the industry is a bit odd. It''s a glamour industry so lots of people flock to it. It''s hard to stay afloat in the gaming business so schedules tend to be accelerated. It''s a risky industry so job security is very low.
Game programming is tough because games are becoming very complicated and codebases are getting very huge.
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