Dear,
im from Germany and 25 Year's old, so far i have nearly 0 Experience with programming and it will be just a Hobby. I want create small 2D Games so im looking for an easy Language + Framework.
My Toughts so far C# + XNA, Pyhton with Pygame or C++ with SFML 2.0.
I really like C# + XNA + VS but i did hear XNA is dying so what would you advice me?
Greetings Move
If you just want to be programming games as a hobby then you probably won't want to spend the time learning C++. It'll probably be faster for you to pick up C# or Python, both of which will do what you need.
If you like C# then go with it. I haven't used C# myself so maybe somebody who has experience with it can confirm this or add something. I believe XNA is losing official support but will keep community support. A lot of people have been working with C# and XNA and probably will continue to. I believe there is an alternative to XNA run by the community, MonoGame. It will also likely have continued support. Again, hopefully somebody who has been using C# and is up on the current state of XNA can confirm this.
For only a hobby, Blender is hard to beat. Also look a GameMaker.
XNA is mature but not dead. The reason why development on XNA has stopped is because it is mature. Games made in XNA will run for years in the future, so it is still alive. There are still many people using XNA, too.
MonoGame, an implementation of XNA, might be a better choice for the community support, and perhaps better implementation on a particular platform that you want to target.
Mono/ MonoDevelop are worth having a look. Unity 3D has some C# native coding, too. In fact it was derived from Mono.
Torque 3D comes with many art assets available for free or low cost. You would need to learn programming, but the community support is there.
For just a hobby, it is really hard to find better than Blender.
Consider one of the Lua based engines.
Lua is a wonderful beginners language, and is fast to embed, so it is often used as the scripting language for 3D engines. ( CryEngine and Gameplay3D both use Lua for example ).
My graphics engine is easy to use for 2D graphics and support more advanced graphics when you learn to write your own pixel shaders in HLSL. It was also designed to allow GPU acceleration of large calculations because I needed it for school projects in image analysis.
I'd like to also mention Unity, it allows fast game development without much knowledge and in addition there are a lot of tutorials. Besides this I like the python + pygame thing, but you still need to do a lot on your own there.
Honestly, it may just before hobby now, but you never know if it'll grow into something more. I'd still say prep to learn or learn C++ for that "Just in case" chance for a language. This way, if it grows from being just a hobby to something you really want to do, you've already got a head start with experience even if you use another language when it's just a hobby for you (Which will make it easier) when you do have to use C++. Just keep the others' suggestions in mind as well as this and if it does grow more than a hobby, you have everyone here to think because you were fully prepared. Me, I'm charging through with C++ as my first actual programming language ( I say "Actual" as I don't consider HTML as a programming language even though I have experience with it and know it is) and I'm learning it quite well, just have a few chinks to work out.
I don't know about C++ giving you a head start. Might slow you down in the early stages of learning. How about Assembly instead? That's what I'm doing. The lessons are more applicable to all programming languages and programming in general.
Honestly, it may just before hobby now, but you never know if it'll grow into something more. I'd still say prep to learn or learn C++ for that "Just in case" chance for a language. This way, if it grows from being just a hobby to something you really want to do, you've already got a head start with experience even if you use another language when it's just a hobby for you (Which will make it easier) when you do have to use C++. Just keep the others' suggestions in mind as well as this and if it does grow more than a hobby, you have everyone here to think because you were fully prepared. Me, I'm charging through with C++ as my first actual programming language ( I say "Actual" as I don't consider HTML as a programming language even though I have experience with it and know it is) and I'm learning it quite well, just have a few chinks to work out.
Did you even fully read my post? I didn't say C++ was the head start. I think some more reading is needed there.
