Begin game programming basics
My 11 year old kid brother wants to learn to program games. He has never programmed but would like to learn programming. His interest lies with games and game programming and he understands that it can be difficult but he wants to do that. So, obviously, I turned to SO folks to know what you feel on how he should go about it. Remember, please suggest on
- Areas that beginners can choose,
- how to begin in that area,
- what to read in the beginning,
- initial languages in the beginning etc.
Once the beginning part is taken care of, you may also suggest the intermediate and advanced stuff but this question is about very beginning level. If there are areas like Web games Vs. console games Vs generic computer games, then please advice on the areas. As I said he has never programmed, he might want to try all the areas and choose the one he likes the best. I hope this is not too much to ask for someone who is in this field but if this question is huge, please advice on how to break it into multiple questions. ~Thanks.
Answer
I started my programming career writing games when I was 15 and it was a lot of fun (even though I wrestled with C++ for 3 years just because "that's what's used for writing games"). My two cents:
- Start with a programming language that is easy to use (NOT C or C++)
- Get a beginners book for that programming language (not directed at games)
- Decide on some API or environment that provides what's needed for writing games. I started out by doing snake, space invaders etc in the console, but any 2D-environment will do (stay way from 3D for as long as you can; there are much more important things to learn first). SDL/GLUT for OpenGL has bindings in almost any language. Pygame for Python looks promising too. Using HTML5's canvas-element, you could even write the programs in the browser using JavaScript. Im not sure what's best these days, but there you have some suggestions.
- Find a community for inspiration and help when stuck. I used gamedev.net. Since we're on stackoverflow, gamedev.stackexchange.com should also be a natural choice :)
- Start small. Very small. I mean really tiny. Then take small steps to new challenges. Please don't write an MMORPG.
- The game design and graphics are fun, but focus on the programming (for now at least). When you've written a simple game, learn how to do the same thing better.
- Set a goal. Imagine the game that you'd want to make. Don't try to make that one immediately, but make sure that each new thing you learn or make takes you one step closer. Don't learn what you don't need so to speak (there's simply too much too learn).
I wish you and your brother the best of luck, I never regret going down the path he's about to take!