Sorry if this becomes a wall of text, or if this was in the wrong section but I think this was the right place for this. I just created an account but I have been around on the forums for a bit but could really use some advice now. I just graduated from Cuyahoga Community College (Tri-C) and got my Associates of Applied Business - Programming and Development. Now I'm faced with the decision of do I see what I can do with an Associates or should I go to another college to get my Bachelors?

I currently work as an Intern at a company that my mom works, I have been there for about a year and a half but I don't really plan on staying there for long and in fact kind of wanting to leave soon after I find out what I should do. I don't do anything big but I do help test the applications that the programmers work on and can help them fix small bugs, and I have learned a lot while working there but most likely will just use that for work experience.

I mainly want to get into Indie game development which technically wouldn't need a really high degree but for just knowledge (at least I think so) but at the same time, going to college and getting my Bachelors might be the smarter choice as then I'll have a degree to fall back on and could try to work for a company if Indie development wasn't working. However, my issue is that I don't drive, nor do I really have any desire to so I would be limited to what I can reach with a Bus route (Tri-C was on a nearby bus route) or take the rapid downtown and could go to Cleveland State University (CSU) which probably would be my choice for college if I wanted to go back to college for a higher degree.

The problem with that is CSU doesn't have much for the programming language I want to get into which is C++, from what I saw they only had 1 C++ class and it's probably the intro to C++ or something like that which Tri-C also had that same class and I already took it there. I don't really want to go to CSU and take all these random classes that has nothing to do with programming and the classes that are based on programming are probably classes on Java  (just like Tri-C), so I'm hesitant on wanting to go and have to take out student loans and be in debt and not even get knowledge of the programming language I wanted to learn in the first place.

Which is why I was wondering if it's a better idea to just not go back to school but look up a lot of guides, buy programming books, and try to teach myself and gain the experience that way as I did mostly want to get into Indie development anyways. I could then focus on the languages that interests me like C++ and other important languages to know like SQL and HTML/PhP. 

Online schools are an option as well, and might end up being a better option for my situation. I just don't know much about Online based colleges, and never really liked online classes at Tri-C but if its the best option for me and offers way more programming classes then I can give a look into them.

Any advice? If you were in my situation, what would you do?

On 1/7/2018 at 2:55 PM, Dark Nephthys said:

doesn't have much for the programming language I want to get into which is C++, from what I saw they only had 1 C++ class and it's probably the intro to C++ or something like that

If you limit yourself to learning only what the teachers present, you won't learn very much. Take the courses and learn C++ on your own while in the classes.  For some classes you may implement routines both in their preferred language and again in C++. 

Few schools focus on C++ any more since most of the programming world has moved on. C++ is one of the better choices these days for systems-level work and most games use C++ for exactly that reason, but that doesn't mean it is the only language you should learn.  Experienced programmers should be comfortable working with a long list of languages, and should learn a new one every year or two.  I've recommended against hiring several programmers with 10+ years of experience but who only knew C++ and not any other language. We need people who can help into the future, not people who are exclusively stuck in the past, cannot work on the tools, or will otherwise struggle with the work. Learn the languages on your own, you'll be doing that your entire career.

Focus on the algorithms and data structures, then learn whatever you can about C++ and other programming languages on your own. The algorithms and data structures will be applicable to all languages. Even when C++ and Java and C# and other languages have all fallen out of favor, the algorithms and data structures will still be applicable.