Thread: Your experience from text to graphics.

I certainly don't think you've chosen the wrong language. I would suggest moving into 2D, being able to draw ASCII "Graphics" isn't going to teach you much.

Have you considered helper libraries like SDL?

My first goal was to be to make a text-based rpg. I wasn't concerned, or even very interested, in the graphics.

That's a great place to start with your games - I fear too many beginners are so concerned with graphics and are ultimately disappointed when they start programming in OpenGL and realize that drawing a cube takes upwards of 20 lines. Or even when they start their endeavors in ogre3d, and they don't know what the [bleep] is going on.

Would it be wise to start with acsii "graphics"

But if you're looking to integrate graphics into the picture (and I don't blame you, I find text-based games a little tedious to play myself), then ASCII graphics are definitely not the way to go (as zacs already said). The only real library for doing that anymore is ncurses (take a look at the man page) and it's not exactly the best-designed library in the world.

If you're interested in a history lesson then go straight ahead and do the ASCII graphics. It's fun for a while. But eventually you're going to move on to actual picture-graphics - it's inevitable. SDL is a nice library but I personally think that allegro (especially the older version - ie, v.4.4) is a lot easier to learn.

Do 2D first since you can then start learning your target API (directX). 2D is quite simple (probably simpler than ascii, which is 2D but will require more low level stuff I think).

Originally Posted by Xanderbeard

Is there another language that can make a concept tangible in shorter timer?

Probably (python seems to be increasing in popularity for this), but if you've already gotten into C++, why bother.

I think anyway you slice it graphics programming is going to seem overly complex -- but I think that's true of most programming realms. Everything with a computer turns out to be more complicated that you would think, because they can't intuit anything and must have the most basic details explained, in detail. Details so basic you probably have not even considered their existence. Detail on top of detail, and they all interact and influence one another. That all adds up to complexity!

There's a lot of math in graphics. You probably need basic trig for 2D, this rapidly gets more complex in 3D. Ever heard of the dot product? That stuff is not impossible to learn, but if you do not have a math background, it will probably seem very tedious and awkward to work with (does to me), at least for a while. Practice practice practice.

Thanks for the replies, I am looking into the posted resources now.

I played around with ascii using simple 2d arrays just to get a feel for how I would do a 2d 'tile-based' game. I worked out a simple collision detection system by making some tiles push the player back if they try to move there.

I am unfamiliar with helper libraries. I've basically just been working with whatever my compiler came with.

I don't really have any interest in 3d graphics or animation at this point. I'm almost entirely focused on gameplay mechanics. I would like to get some simple 2d graphics going though. As a graphic design, I am anxious to start designing a GUI.

So SDL and allegro make windows programming with Direct X easier?

I would suggest learning 2D graphics first before jumping into 3D graphics with DirectX or OpenGL. 2D graphics are much simpler and you can still do things like display and rotate bitmaps, simulate gravity and collisions and that sort of thing . . . .

I highly recommend the SDL. The learning curve isn't too bad and there are quite a few good tutorials about it, such as this one: Lazy Foo' Productions
Apparently Allegro is pretty good as well, I don't really know it so I can't really comment.

Here's an example of the sort of game that you should be able to create before too long if you're fairly proficient with C++: nort

I personally went through a very long process of learning graphics. I started with standard C text-based games, then went on to using DOS text-mode graphics (basically the equivalent of ncurses). After a while I got tired of that and started using actual DOS graphics in the 256-colour 320x200 resolution DOS screen mode 13h. Eventually this became too restrictive as well so I started using the SDL. At some point I switched to C++, and I have a number of C++ projects using the SDL that are not too bad.

Only then did I start learning OpenGL.

I don't suggest going through a whole process like I did -- there's not too much value in it really (and anyone today suggesting you learn DOS graphics should really figure out which decade this is). The SDL is definitely a good place to start . . . .

You should _really_ consider using SFML rather than SDL imho. SDL is C, SFML on the other hand has a proper C++ interface with classes, templates, overloaded operators and exceptions, it does everything SDL does, and on top of that it has support for GLSL. Finally, the rendering speed has been proven to be many times faster than SDL.

Oh and if you wish to follow Bubba's advice, you can simply use SFML for stuff like input, sound and setting up a rendering context, while using OpenGL for the graphics. (SDL does this aswell i should add, but again, it's alot more clumsy.)