So I'm looking to go into programming and game development. Where do I start? I don't want to start with utterly basic tutorials, because I know basics like for loops, variables, console in and console out, and I dont want to have to start all over. Where to start?

PONG!

But seriously try to recreate basic classics (since you say you are at that point).

Tetris, Pac man, break out, etc, etc.

This article, while somewhat dated, might help you out. Swattkidd has the right idea as well, the best way to start making games is to simply start making them. Pick a simple classic like pong, space invaders, breakout, or one of the many others and build your own version from scratch.

The best advice for you really depends on your exact skill level and preferences, so I'll toss out some options in ascending order of difficulty:

* Try a program like Game Maker or The Games Factory and "click together" some basic gameplay to get a feel for how the development process goes, then move on to cloning classics or creating your own simple games

* Try a library specifically designed for games like PyGame and gain experience in actual programming by building a simple game like the ones mentioned above

* Learn how to use a set of libraries that can work together to create a compete game. These libraries include Allegro, SDL, Fmod and many more. For a (very) complete list, have a look at this page

* Learn DirectDraw, Direct3D or OpenGL and choose complementary libraries to aid with other aspects of the game (such as OpenAL for sound)


Best of luck to you! [smile]

Ok, I've done the first one. Ive used game maker scripting language and thats where basically all my coding experience comes from.

Quote: Ok, I've done the first one. Ive used game maker scripting language and thats where basically all my coding experience comes from.

Then, I’m going to assume based on your first post, you want to leave the packaged environment of a game maker program, and start working from scratch through traditional programming.

Start from scratch with a general programming language. There’s countless programming languages out there, and there is no “best” one. A handful of languages are usually recommended to beginners, Python and C# being the most prominent. Since the question of “what language” is so frequently asked, I suggest you browse through this forum’s past posts, or other reputable forums’ archive of posts, to get a feel for the general opinion. I won’t bother regurgitating the debate here, but if you have trouble understanding or want clarification on what you read from the debates, do ask.

This is not a one day or week task. Gaining even good competency of a language takes quite a while. Spend time with your language. Not all the syntax will be easy to understand. You might not quite “get” classes, inheritance, lambda functions, whatever. But get a good chunk of the syntax done. Also become familiar with language core libraries, and the general idioms of the language. It extends quite a bit more than outputting to console and writing a few for loops.

If you can get past this stage, you can have a more in depth discussion of how to proceed to making games.

In that case, aside from the already mentioned point of recreating simple games for practice or moving on to a more difficult (and versatile) form of game creation, your next logical step might be to read a bit about Game Design and see what others are talking about in the Forums.

Try to apply what you learn by creating simple game mechanics in Game Maker or whatever you're most comfortable with. Don't worry about creating complete games for right now, just try to learn as much as you can. It'll help you out a lot in the long run, even if you only ever intend to make a "simple" platform game.

Once you know a little bit about game design, you might consider reading some Postmortems, which can are usually very informative, being written directly from personal experience, and even entertaining at times.

There are many other paths you could take, if you intend to create a heavily story based game then you might read about writing, if you intend to make a game that generates information from music then you should read about music theory. In general, learn all that you can and start thinking about what KIND of game you want to make.

Keep trying, don't give up and if you're really stuck don't be afraid to ask for help. [smile]

Oh no, I dont want to continue with Game Maker. I'm trying to move up to C++

Quote: Oh no, I dont want to continue with Game Maker. I'm trying to move up to C++

I’ll stress once again, read the archived forum posts on picking a language. One of points you’ll pickup is that it’s highly inadvisable for a beginner to pick up C++ as a first language.

Ah yes, a friend of mine who also visits the forum decided he would do it, and he did, and hes now very fluent and efficient with it.

Either way, I've made my choice

Ok, if you've made your choice, now you just need to stick with it. Program lots in C++. Program all sorts of things just for the sake of programing, simple things, stupid things, just make them.

Might seems like a giant pile of wasted time, but its time spent learning all sorts of things, most of which are fairly vital. Even pong and pack-man are a ways away from consile i/o, and the only way to get there is to learn as you go.

Its goings to take time, alot of it, so spending a bunch of time reading articles/colummns/posts here is another good time-sink.