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Beginner needs book recommendations

For Beginners

Started by The Mastermind November 27, 2005 11:38 AM

18 comments, last by TheOther 18 years, 4 months ago

The Mastermind

100

Author

November 27, 2005 03:44 PM

Are there any other good recommendations? I would really like a good DirectX book to pick up for a broad overview of the SDK.

Samsonite

528

November 27, 2005 05:06 PM

Hello Mastermind!

No, I do not have any DirectX beginners books that you might need because the only one I got is a very bad one and I've been searching around on Amazon for DirectX learning books.

And so far I haven't found any.

I suggest you buy "Beginning C++ Game Programming" by Michael Dawson and stick with it. What the other guys here say may be good and well but I find it much more encouraging and fun to learn C++ from a game programmers perspective, and the book doesn't lack any information on the C++ language so far.

Now. You might be a little ahead of me on the math side, although I'm 14, because we don't have such a good math education here in Norway. And as far as I'm concerned the math education in the US is far better than here.
But I wouldn't have bought the "3D Game Engine Design" book, as it's quite heavy math-wise. This is what I recommend( might be an awfully wild guess though).

Hope this helps and encourages you to program games in the future. [smile]

EDIT: Jeez, I have a math test tomorrow *runs off*

Hope I was helpful. And thank you if you were!

Samsonite

528

November 27, 2005 05:07 PM

Quote:Original post by Azh321
well, the first thing I noticed, when my 7th grade teacher asked us who knew what functions were, I raised my hand, she said to demonstrate, I walked up to the board and wrote:

int main()
{
printf("Function Demo!");
return 0;
}

Nice one [smile]

Hope I was helpful. And thank you if you were!

m4gnus

240

November 28, 2005 10:33 AM

Quote:
what do you mean about that most of the stuff in game develpment is not learned in school?

i mean that you won't learn the math you need for game developement. my brother learns what i need for game programming and he's 10 years older than me and is going to an university...

regards,
m4gnus

"There are 10 types of people in the world... those who understand binary and those who don't."

The Mastermind

100

Author

November 28, 2005 04:52 PM

Ah, I gottcha there. So, thank you so much for the recommendations. I think that I am going to go with the recommendations here, and I will get the book Beginning C++ Game Programming and then I will check the mathematics books out for game programming and graphics development. I think I am also going to get the Introduction to 3d Game Programming with Direct3d to get an overview of just part of the directX language. I am also going to purchase Programming a Multiplayer FPS in directX. This will probably jump me into all the areas I will need to cover, and if I need more help, I will probably search around for other books. Does anyone have any other suggestions for books?

Also, what do you think of OpenGL? Is it any good and is is better than DirectX?

Trapper Zoid

1,370

November 28, 2005 05:13 PM

Quote:Original post by The Mastermind
Also, what do you think of OpenGL? Is it any good and is is better than DirectX?

There isn't really a definitive answer to that question; some people swear by OpenGL, some people prefer DirectX, and some don't really mind either way.

From what I've read and experienced, I think the differences break down a bit like this:
- DirectX is a complete package for controlling the entire system (video, sound, input), whereas OpenGL is just graphics (you will need something else, like SDL, to control the other things).
- OpenGL is cross-platform, whereas DirectX is Windows only
- DirectX has an object-oriented (C++-like) approach, whereas OpenGL has a more procedural, C-like approach

I'm a bit rusty on DirectX myself, but I've been teaching myself OpenGL recently, and I find it really easy and a pleasure to use. But that might just be because it suits my coding style. I'd recommend trying both of them out and seeing which one you prefer. The NeHe tutorials here on GameDev.net are a good starting point for learning OpenGL. There's probably some good starting tutorials for DirectX here as well (I haven't really looked for DirectX stuff). You could try both out for a little while and see which one you prefer.

If you are looking for a good OpenGL book, I recently got a copy of the OpenGL Superbible, which I find to be really good. You need to be decent with your C programming (or C++) to really get the most out of OpenGL programming, however.

Best of luck!

The Mastermind

100

Author

November 29, 2005 02:17 PM

Thanks very much for the opengl suggeston. I have already ordered some of the books. Are there any really good ones I should be looking out for for dx9? Also, is dx10 coming anytime soon?

greytone

174

November 29, 2005 03:29 PM

As far as directx programming goes, I found "Introduction to 3D Game Programming with DirectX 9.0 by Frank D. Luna" to be a very concise reference that has helped me out a lot. It covers the basics very nicely from setup to models to simple shadow techniques and ends with an introduction to shaders.

Of course I also recommend my own tutorials, which do come in the form of a book. Although most people just read them online for free :P

Good Luck
-Greytone

Visit My Beginner DirectX Tutorials - www.experimentsingameprogramming.com

The Mastermind

100

Author

November 30, 2005 02:58 PM

Would Visual C++ Toolkit 2003 be compatible with the .NET form of Visual C++? I have been using toolkit, and things are going smooth with some of the basics. Also, are there any good, free compilers besides devc++?