I've just finished learning how windows programming works. I can successfully write my own drawing functions, get smooth movement with bitmaps, write resource scripts, make animations with frames, graphical menus, pausing features, etc.
Now I'm thinking of taking a stab at learning DirectX. I briefly looked over a tutorial for it and nothing look real foreign or anything, looks pretty easy actually.
Anyhow, this thursday I'm going to be installing a distribution of linux on my spare 20 GB hard drive, and use it to dual boot with Windows XP (Windows gets the 100 GB hard drive heh). I'm expecting to be using linux a lot, so might want to try out SDL, as I won't be able to use DirectX on linux (I don't think?).
What kind of games can SDL create? Good quality? As good or better than Windows API games? I'm sure DirectX has to be better, but how much?
By better, I mean -> DirectX and OpenGL are better than console and Windows API alone. Is SDL up there, or no?