Damnit Dwarfsoft, why do you keep responding to all of my posts! The means I have to respond to yours, can''t let you climb by me on the "list" now can we?

Thats the reason WHY I am answering all of your posts... I am just doing my best to get to that level... I don''t have very far until the next one. Merely 100

-Chris Bennett ("Insanity" of Dwarfsoft)

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made due to popular demand here at GDNet :)

QBasic
Turbo Pascal (7)
Assembly
C
C++

That''s how I''ve learned programming and pleeeeaaaazzze listen to everybody who''s saying that you should start with Basic/Pascal.

No.
Use whatever language you want. The long way is to start with something like BASIC then go on to C++. I''ll admit, that''s how I got started - anyone remember GW-BASIC? But I think in the long run it does more harm than good. BASIC teaches you horrible programming practice, and has no real OOP implementation (this should change with the newest version of VB, next year.. same OOP features as C++, and just as fast, though I take that with a grain of salt).
Anybody telling you C++ is too hard for a beginner to learn is greatly exaggerating. And starting in C++ will give you a solid foundation in good programming practice and OOP.
Frankly the common reaction around here is to assume all people making posts like this are stupid and/or incredibly ignorant, but on the off chance that you are not one of them, you could do well taking my advice.

-RWarden (roberte@maui.net)

Fine... If you think that people can''t use GOSUBS in BASIC then thats OK, but BASIC still teaches you the FUNDAMENTALS of programming, whether or not they are good techniques. Learn Pascal then, because that was a relatively OO language that teaches you the REAL way to program. It has a lot of support etc and is quite a good language. I do not exaggerate on the learning C++ side. If you don''t know how to program well (ie, PASCAL) then you are really going to get into trouble when it comes to Linked Lists, Pointers and Interrupts. Learn PASCAL BEFORE C++. It is far too much of a headache when you are looking for memory leaks when you have NEVER programmed with pointers before... PASCAL first THEN C++

-Chris Bennett ("Insanity" of Dwarfsoft)

Check our site:
http://www.crosswinds.net/~dwarfsoft/
Check out our NPC AI Mailing List :
http://www.egroups.com/group/NPCAI/
made due to popular demand here at GDNet :)

RWarden:

I said Basic/ P A S C A L!

And pascal is OO!!

So did I . We both agree on this, why don''t you? Do you think that Pointers and Linked Lists are easy to learn in C? I would have loved to see you try them at the time.

-Chris Bennett ("Insanity" of Dwarfsoft)

Check our site:
http://www.crosswinds.net/~dwarfsoft/
Check out our NPC AI Mailing List :
http://www.egroups.com/group/NPCAI/
made due to popular demand here at GDNet :)

Pascal is fine, but again, if your end result is game programming, starting directly at C++ will eliminate a whole lot of time. Dwarfsoft, it''s not like you need to use things like points, linked lists, (and to add a few more) templates and inheritance modifiers immidiately. You simply start simple and build your knowledge. You can become very comfortable with C++ syntax before even realizing that those advanced features exist.

-RWarden (roberte@maui.net)

But it is a lot easier to do that in Pascal, and you get the benefits of learning 2 languages, which makes it easier for later. You may eventually want to learn Java, so I still suggest Pascal first then C++. Because it is a LOT easier to do things in Pascal than it is to do it in C++. It isn''t all that different when you go from Pascal to C++... Maybe you haven''t done it - but I recommend it. I think I will just leave my recommendation there and let FLAME decide (gee... it is turning into a FLAME ).

-Chris Bennett ("Insanity" of Dwarfsoft)

Check our site:
http://www.crosswinds.net/~dwarfsoft/
Check out our NPC AI Mailing List :
http://www.egroups.com/group/NPCAI/
made due to popular demand here at GDNet :)

you mean im supposed to learn the basics first?
and basic is basic? so thats why they call it basic. well that isn''t very basic. well maybe if i knew the basics i would be able to understand the basics and then i wouldn''t be so stupid because its only basics and once i understand the basics then i can understand all the other stuff that isn''t the basics because its not basic and its not in basic so its not really basic although sometimes it is basic even if its not in basic but then how can it be basic if its not in basic... well it just is ok?