Real newbie with VC6 questions

Howdy friends.
Names Zedd. And I am currently the newest addition to struggling programmers ages 14 to 27.
Im a JSL Assembly programmer for the United States Air Force, but my current dream is to build a gaming community.
So my first thought is to make parlor games at my site, www.zeddweb.com.
First game is supposed to be stratego.
My staff and I talked and we came to a descesion that C++ was our best bet, and VC sounded even better.
So my questions for you are as follows :

Did we make a good choice?

IS VC code and code for Borland C++ compilers interchangable?

Where in the world do I use C++ code in the Visual Studio offered with Visual C++ 6.0. I know theres lots of C running around. But I want a to make a game here. Does anyone know any good resources. Ive looked. Can find very little.

Basically I need advice. I have lots of questions, so I am humbly turning to you, nameless faceless strangers that may reticule me for merely asking or take me under their wing for proper education until I am ready to at least waddle on my own.
Did I mention theres free cheese and Dr. Pepper to anyone who helps me? :-)

With that mentioned. PLEASE HEEEELLLPPP ! - Zedd

First Don't buy a compiler yet, visual studio.net will be coming out shortly and you will kick your self very hard since it is a major up grade.

>My staff and I talked and we came to a descesion that C++ was our best bet, and VC sounded even better. <

Good Choose on C++, but you might want to also use C. Second VC is not another programming language, it is a compiler. As of .net it looks to be the best.

>IS VC code and code for Borland C++ compilers interchangable? <

With some slight modifications most code will be interchangable.


For resources visit gamedev.net

One more thing before trying to create the next big 1st person shooter go www.cprogramming.com\boardfaq.html]here[/URL] and click on the C++ tuttorial link.

Actually I already have VC 6. It came with the software package we got on EBay a while back for the staff at Zeddweb.
So VC6 is actually just a compiler? It has a bunch of wizards for MRC and such, but its all confusing. All I want to know is where to start. Should I DL a new compiler, or use the vc6 I have and attempt to build off that.
not intrested in first person shooters. Only intrested in making stratego and chess.
Is C or VC6 capable of storing and altering text like data files that are stored on a websites webspace? I heard it can do anything. But Im trying to make sure Im not barking up the wrong tree here.
Thanks for the tutorial. Theres thousands of them out there. Couldnt figure out which one would be good to go with. - Zedd

MSVC++ is a double edged sword. It has a lot of nice features...but many of them take a lot of learning. Essentially either you will spend your time learning the actual programming or you will spend it learning how to use tools. Eventually you'll need to learn how to hard code many of the things that the tools do for you so don't even bother with them.

Oh yeah, as for the VC and Borland compatibility issue, they are mostly compatible. However, beware of the fact that VC tends to use many non-ANSI C/C++ things. And when programming windows apps it makes resource files that are pretty non-usable by anything but VC.

VC is a very good choice. It's an IDE/Compiler/Debugger/Profiler
combination that allows for powerful development.

You can do anything in C++. There are no limitations on the
language. That's a double edged sword, as no limits means
a lot to learn and understand. Depending on the Compiler
( i.e. Borland, VC ) you will most likely use it's windows libraries
( VCL or MFC ) which aren't easily interchangeble. MFC is nice,
but VCL has it's advantages, too.

Conclusion:
You have to decide for one, VC is a very good one, and as you
already have it, it's for no additional cost. Go with VC.

I would recommend VC, and if you want to do games with good graphics, try out DirectX or OpenGL, there are some very good books out there which teach how to do this kind of programming.

But if you´re new at C/C++, I would recommend you to do console (DOS-like) programming before, because you don´t have to worry about all that graphics programming, learn how classes work, inheritance, etc.(you can do console apps with VC) then try with Windows programming, when you do, be sure to have some help at hand, for example the MSDN library.


Good luck

Oskilian

I could help you a little more on depth with that (well, from 10000 kilometers away), but I could, contact me with any doubts you might have.

if you're going to give me the cheese and Dr. Peppers, you could mail it to me. :)


Oskilian

Thank you much sirs. Believe me, the you might grow to regret those words. As my knowledge of C is near nothing. I finally got some Sams books today and have been looking into the tutorial links provided above. Im just going over the mechanics now though.
I do appreciate all the advice given, and if I have any questions, I know where to turn to. Thanks again.

- Zedd

"Who ya gonna call?" AWAX