Well, you''re off to a good start. You found NeHe''s site.
Take a peak at my Disasteroids 3D Dev Page for information about the software I used to create my little OpenGL game. http://www.lmnopc.com/disasteroids3d/
(Please excuse the dust if there is any -- I''m moving the site onto a new host so things may be a bit wonky there for a bit)
My game''s quite simple, but I don''t imagine you''re going to get much more done in a single semester. One of the key things to keep in mind before you start your project -- start something you can finish. Don''t set out to make Quake. Set out to make Gauntlet or something like that.
I found that resource creation was the most time-consuming part of making Dis3d. I would spend HOURS trying to learn my tools just enough to get out of them the simple models I was trying to create.
As far as tools you need, I recommend:
Visual C++ 6.0
MilkShape 3D
Paint Shop Pro (or Photoshop if you can afford it)
(You can find links to all these programs on my Dis3D Dev Page)
Another tool that wasn''t ABSOLUTELY essential but definitely helped me in a big way is 3D Exploration. 3D Exploration is a 3D file converter, but it also exports 3D models to C code so I didn''t have to write any model loading code, nor include any external model files with my game -- it''s all compiled into the EXE. I know you could pack your models into resource files, but this was much simpler than mucking around with RES files.
Good luck!
ThomW
www.LMNOpc.com