"Neque porro quisquam est qui dolorem ipsum quia dolor sit a

[Topagae]

Neque porro quisquam est qui dolorem ipsum quia dolor sit amet, consectetur, adipisci velit..."

[neowired]

@Neo
Not at ALL, we recently hired several guys here at Zynga because we saw they had posted some VERY impressive projects on the web. Usually you have to go LOOKING, but people in this industry stop and NOTICE when you do something impressive.

many people notice when you do something really impressive, I'd say this is truth in most arts ; p and most industries
if nothing else it at least means you have the conviction and working ethic to do impressive stuff, and that is often seen like a class of it's own

[Topagae]

Neque porro quisquam est qui dolorem ipsum quia dolor sit amet, consectetur, adipisci velit..."

[Altsyph]

http://www.torquepowered.com/

C++ based free demo engine. These guys also provide the stock engine for free Xbox live devs. Unity might work too.

As a programmer though, I'd write something from scratch. There's a million good tutorials online and really, "This is bad practice, this is good" is all just opinion, if you apply yourself to anything vaguely resembling game design, you WILL learn as much as you put in.

How much will you put in? Is really the question.

I'd work around all the week, almost no-stop. I'm trying a VN because I think it's simple and cool, as you can write the stories you want to (and I what I want most is to write stories).

I never started something from scratch, as I don't know how it works [When it comes to ENGINE]. I used eAthena and RPG Maker (as I said), but they were alredy full programs with incomplete / to be completed scripts. And nope, I don't have any load of cash so Unreal Engine is a big "no" for me. ... at least for now. However I'd say I want to start from scratch because of commercial games (not for now, as I'm still a beginner making VN and I think worrying about the story is a lot more important than the engine itself).

... I don't know how to start. Really. I'll dig in for some tutorials in google later. Thanks

[Topagae]

Neque porro quisquam est qui dolorem ipsum quia dolor sit amet, consectetur, adipisci velit..."

[Altsyph]

I'd highly suggest sticking with something like Renpy and picking up a Python book. Once you master one programming language, mastering another is fairly easy. And Python is a GREAT beginners language.

MySQL and HTML [no CSS] counts?


(I'm sure not, though)

[Topagae]

Neque porro quisquam est qui dolorem ipsum quia dolor sit amet, consectetur, adipisci velit..."

[Wintermoon]

SQL is a query language. HTML is a text markup language. Neither is a programming language. Learning them won't teach you programming.

That said, both SQL and HTML are used in the game industry in various ways.

[Topagae]

Neque porro quisquam est qui dolorem ipsum quia dolor sit amet, consectetur, adipisci velit..."

[LVUER]

HTML is a markup language, SQL is a computer database language, and MYSQL is DBMS that use SQL. They are not programming language.

But it doesn't mean they are not used in programming, and (sooner or later) you have to learn them if you are into programming (especially if you're making programs for internet).

[Wintermoon]

SQL,MYSQL, and HTML are DEFINITELY programming languages.

SQL is domain-specific language used for manipulating databases. It is technically a programming language in the sense that it executes commands, and there are extensions to the core language that make it act more like a general-purpose programming language, but it's fucking retarded to treat it as such.

MySQL is a specific database management system. It is not a language of any kind, although it implements its own variant of the SQL language. I'm not sure why you mentioned it.

HTML is not a programming language in any meaningful sense. It can be used as part of a program in combination with either server-side languages (e.g. PHP) or client-side scripting languages (e.g. Javascript), but it cannot be used to write a program by itself.

[Jake]

SQL is domain-specific language used for manipulating databases. It is technically a programming language in the sense that it executes commands

I would hesitate to call it a programming language just because it executes commands, to be honest. To meet the requirements of what any normal person - particularly one looking to learn to code - expects a programming language to do, I would expect it to have at least variables and flow-control structures, but to the best of my recollection SQL has neither, unless you count random database tables as 'variables'.

PL/SQL, T-SQL and so on are programming languages, but I wouldn't call SQL one.




Anyway, more to the point, I'd also take issue with the description of Python as a "great beginner's language"; it's very different in a lot of very significant ways to mainstream languages like the C-like family (C++, Java, C#) or even stuff like BASIC... and being duck-typed, I personally don't think it encourages the right approach for C-like languages.

It's certainly true that once you master a language, it's going to be easier to get others under your belt 'cause a lot of the time, the fundamental concepts are the ones which are hardest to learn... but if your end goal is driving tour busses, why would you start with motorcycle lessons? Most universities these days seem to teach Java to undergrads who haven't done any programming before; as much as I personally don't like some of the design decisions behind Java, it's not a bad language to start with if you're planning to go on to something like C++, IMO. Java and C# both are like versions of C++ that do half the hard/messy bits for you. And there's an abundance of tutorial material around for Java, at least.

[LVUER]

I find it very hard to learn Java. My first programming language is Pascal, C++, PHP, and then finally BASIC (VB.NET). I don't have any difficulty learning all of those. But when I was learning Java, I have great difficulties making even simple program with it...

And then my friend who learn Java for his first programming language, didn't have any difficulty learning Java... but find it difficult to learn Pascal and C++ (and so on).

I wonder why? Is it because Java is pure OO while Pascal is structured?

[Sin]

You don't have to make your own graphics engine but you're going to need to make something. You don't have to finish it. I have so many unfinished projects. The important thing is that you develop your skills as a programmer.

The more you write C++, the more you will learn. Make mistakes and learn from them. My first games looked great visually, but the code was a bloated mess. I didn't know how to write it any other way back then.
I wouldn't get a job if I wrote that kind of code today.

Oh and it's not uncommon for game companies to ask you to make a test that lets you solve a problem with code.

[Jake]

I find it very hard to learn Java. My first programming language is Pascal, C++, PHP, and then finally BASIC (VB.NET).

Seriously, if you can learn C++ and VB.NET then you should really have absolutely no problem whatsoever with Java. Java is very similar in terms of language constructs to VB.NET, the only big differences you'll notice when learning are the syntax - which is pretty similar to a subset of C++ - and the type system, and that's still a lot more similar than it is to something like Pascal or (*shudder*) PHP.

Out of interest, did you ever try C#? Because at this level, that's really a half-way house between VB.NET and Java; a syntax more similar to Java, and VB.NET's type system.

Could it be that you're working from a really bad book or a dodgy set of tutorials? Are you sure that your problem with Java isn't "there isn't an IDE that's so easy to use as Visual Studio" and not actually the fault of the language at all?

And then my friend who learn Java for his first programming language, didn't have any difficulty learning Java... but find it difficult to learn Pascal and C++ (and so on).

I wonder why? Is it because Java is pure OO while Pascal is structured?

Java is [for the sake of a learning argument] 'pure' OO, but I don't know if I'd call Pascal 'structured' in comparison; Java is far more structure-laden. Also: Pascal or Object Pascal?

OO programming isn't the be-all and end-all of programming, but I think you'll really need to understand it to make much headway into the world of professional programming, these days. It's possible to do games without doing anything OO (it's possible to do anything), but you'd still be better off knowing it.

(I wouldn't call Object Pascal a bad learning language, for that matter.)


Ultimately, though:

Make mistakes and learn from them.

This. Practice and learn from your mistakes, and keep doing it until you retire.