I''ve been learning C and C++ for quite some time now ( through books and the internet ), but I really haven''t programmed anything that would make use of what I have learned. I want to hold off on making games until I learn how to manipulate C and C++ efficiently so my games don''t come out sloppy. What I''m looking for is some ideas of applications to program that will help me understand and utilize most of C/C++. Any suggestions would be great, Thanks! Adam Sheehan

Well at what point in the language are you at?

Finally someone who doesnt feel like after the first week of C++ programming they can make state-of-the-art games

text based games.
they''re easy compared to other things.
also you''ll make good use of pointers (especially if you are programming in C)
file i/o.
AI (depending on you game).
game design as well as code design.

that would be your best bet.
i think.

or you can pick up some college programming books and code the practice problems they have in there.

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A nice place to start that involves simple games is text based games. For example, make a text based tic-tac-toe game. Or a simple text adventure game (not a full rpg, but a choose your own adventure style). There are a lot of things you can do in text to get the "behind the scenes" part of programming down. Otherwise there are libraries out there to take away most of the hard part of graphics and just let you make a simple game. Might want to check out CDX. It''s a very nice 2D graphics wrapper. But then again, it also depends on how far along you are as DM0407 said...

Always remember, you''''re unique. Just like everyone else.

I''ve been learning off and on for about a 2 years or so, so I''ve read up on most of the language. The problem is I''ve never implemented any of it. So I have all the information, yet nothing to do with it.

I''m looking to program something that would use some C++ concepts, such as classes and inheritance. One thing I haven''t really looked into was the STL, so I am not familiar with that. If anyone has some requests for a trivial program that they don''t feel like writing, I''d be glad to help ( if I can ). Just looking for some suggestions, Thanks.

Adam Sheehan

I would definately recommend learning STL. I did it very late in the game and realized just how much time I wasted trying to do something that was already done!

If you want something trivial, why not make a simple game? Trivial tools are somewhat hard to come up with sometimes. You don''t know you need them till you need them Whereas a simple game like tic-tac-toe or a trivia game can be a good learning tool. You have a lot of places for a class in either one, and even inheritance. But don''t go inheritance overboard. *puts on flame vest* I find it best to only use it when it is needed. (yeah that could be flame bate and I appologize...)

If you want to jump into graphics a little, CDX (as I mentioned above) will conceal the DX stuff in the background and just let you practice programming games. A good starter game might be pong.

Always remember, you''''re unique. Just like everyone else.

Code a text battleship game. After that maybe learn the windows gdi (since its really easy and quick) and make a graphics version, or use it to make a tetris clone. The flickering is annoying but if you code it so that only the blocks that are moving are redrawn every frame it''ll look decent. I assume you know basic win32 programming?

I''m a newbie when it comes to C++, I haven''t got anywhere from simple console programs. However, I love to do all kinds of useless programs, heres a few of them:

Starfield for console, used a Java applet for advice on this one. Like I said, it runs in the console, and looks horrible because of the bad resolution.
My C++ version -> http://personal.inet.fi/cool/hakki/starfield.zip
Java tutorial on the effect -> http://www.electricfunstuff.com/jgdc/tutorials/t0004/t0004.htm

HTML2HTML, converts HTML code to a colorcoded HTML page of the source. Yeah, it is hard to explain, so go try it yourself. This was one of the first useful programs I''ve ever done with C++, you can see it from the sloppy code in some parts. I used to have a version of the source code, that was excactly 1337 bytes, too bad I don''t have that anymore.

Source code -> http://personal.inet.fi/cool/hakki/html2html.cpp

These two are the ones that are the most ready, I haven''t really finished everything, theres always something I would like to change but I don''t have enough energy for. I have loads of useless unfinished programs on my HD, and I''m afraid I''ll make some more.