Quote:Original post by Terminalkillah
Cheers guys a lot of good points about the three. I think i will go with SDL beacause i am a complete begginer to game design and programming but i have basic knowlege in C++. But i am also doing a night school course in games design and programming using visual basic which is getting my feet wet in designing games but i want to do this as a career im going to have to advance to c++ and directx and such...

Cheers for all the help you guys its much appreciated

Terminalkillah

[edit ... pretty much a longer version of zer0wolf's post]

First of all let me begin this by saying I love 2d games and I am still lost when it comes to 3d games although I am learning :) I personally use SDL and OpenGL even though my post is going to leave me asking myself why.

If you want to do 3d games, it won't hurt to learn SDL but there is nothing stopping you from jumping into 3d right away. You won't be missing much by jumping into the 3d realm right off the bat and by the time you need a HUD or 2d stuff in your game it will seem so easy compared to the other stuff you won't bat an eyelash at it.

If you want to do 2d then the trend seems to be using a 3d API to do 2d. While yes it is easier to use SDL or Allegro you won't see hardware acceleration for scaling, per pixel alpha, or rotation anytime in the near future. While this generally isn't an issue for retro style games, more complex games use this stuff like water and from experience, SDL alone can be a real dog. So you can be ahead of the game by using a 3d API right from the word go for your graphics.

As for choosing an API, it is mostly preference but also your target.

If you don't care about portability and Windows users are your target audience then I would suggest Direct3D. You get an all in one package (sound,input,networking) with DirectX and Microsoft is constantly updating the API with new features. If portability becomes an issue once the game is made, it is always easier to find an equivilent way of doing something than actually creating it for the first time.

If portability is an issue from the start then OpenGL is probably the better choice since DirectX just isn't cross platform. This is only a graphics API however and you will need to use 3rd party libraries for sound, input, and networking.

There are also alternatives such as Irrlicht, Torque and more which offer complete packages that are more high level. While my experience with these is limited there are numerous posts similar to yours here on Gamedev.net that explain the pro's and cons much better than I ever could. Try your favorite search engine and read a little bit on what you find with what people have mentioned so far. I am sure you can make a good decision based on your needs and wants.

First, make the game work... Then, make it work better. As a popular saying here goes, "premature optimization is the root of all evil".