Hello world!!! I am new to the forums (duh) and would like to know if someone can give me a few pointers as to what are good choices to start building a portfolio. I have been working in another industry for a few years, but want to switch to Game Development in the future. Any suggestions are greatly appreciated.

Hi and welcome to game dev.

First of all, how experienced are you in what languages. See my sig for the link but the beginners section is a great place to start.

Take care

ace

Thanks for the quick response! Already I'm feeling the love :)
I didn't give sufficient info in my post. Here is a bit of my background.
I am a Software Engineer with experience in the pharmaceutical industry, developing software for process control. My main skills include C++, VB, and SQL programming. With only VB and SQL as professional experiences, C++ as college work and personal projects.
As far as what I want to do, probably something with AI and tool development. I really want to use what I know in games (databases being the most important).