I've been programming for a while, making stupid text based games, and messing around but you could count my list of finished projects on Bart Simpson's hand.
I recently tried to use SFML (GLUT didn't work anymore) but I just kept running into problem after error after problem. Before that I tried to get started with networking (sockets and that) but I'm on a Mac it's hard to find relevant tutorials for people with no experience. The list goes on.
I'm pretty open minded to any sort of interesting project, but the thing is I just can't find any. I am pretty fluent in C++ and a few other languages but I just am out of ideas (and steam).
It feels like I've followed all the 'beginner' tutorials, but where do I go now? The state of computer education where I live at my stage is abysmal.
I like games, but I am constantly getting bogged down hacking graphics libraries to work with my code.
I wanted to write a compiler but it seems all the tutorials are for people at university.
I wrote a text based adventure, it was pretty boring and I again got stuck at the final hurdle: actually releasing the executable and source files.
Where did you go after learning the beginner tutorials? I would like to do something vaguely interesting, what options are available? How can I actually implement my language skills, without getting bogged down in technology I don't really need?
Are there any half decent graphics/network/audio libraries for Mac? Are there any guides for getting started with them (I like SFML but there is not a lot of Xcode relevant documentation). Are there any intermediate projects you think are worth giving a shot?
If you want to make games or just learn how to code better, you could just switch languages and start messing with Unity/whatever (or the probably more straigthforward libraries for other languages).
You could also look for engines to do the ugly stuff for you. If you can find something that works with XCode.
If you cant, you could go low level and use simple libraries that offer low level cross platform access to graphics/input etc. Its probably easier to find something that works if you do this because theres many different libraries for each task, and you can use different libraries for different tasks. You wont be getting pretty results soon though. But youll learn how everything works, and write better code trying to hide all the ugly conventions the libraries use for whatever reason.
Starting with a text base game to teach you the language is great, and you probably should complete it. You just need the understanding of the language and the compiler. Start with the basic and get that to completion. As it will teach you the fundementals and principles that will apply later on. Once you're comfortable and ready to move on to the basic 2d games, try out python and pygame. There are a lot of libraries and engine out there, but to start out I would suggest going straight with the language and compiler/interpreter and once you understand the basic and fundementals then you can tackle slighly bigger project using other libraries and/or engines.
Might I suggest Allegro? It's as old as father time, but it works for 2d graphics, basic networking, basic audio and it's still supported and updated regularly. It also allows pretty painless ports to Windows/Linux(it's available for all of them).
As for game ideas... are there any kind of simple "casual"/arcade games you like? Draw some quick ugly graphics and make one of those.
What projects have you finished? Have you tried just a different type of development, like say web development? As someone suggested maybe you should look into something like Unity or Game Maker.
Or. You're just burned out and maybe just need to walk away from programming for a few months and engage in some hobbies that are more fun.
You could always use C#/MonoGame :). Mono works quite well enough on Mac and Linux these days. Its really nice, it feels like the sweet spot for "higher-level programming". And there is loads of documentation for it aswell, since its based off XNA.
Whenever I read a post like this, I always get this weird sense of disconnection. It's just so far outside my experience to be this unfocused. I sit down and try to remember if I ever went through a similar phase, and I honestly can not think of any time when I just flat didn't know what to work on or what I wanted to do. I always just wanted to make the games I was playing. That was it, that was the whole goal. But I do have to admit that I grew up and learned in a vastly different time than these up-and-coming young whippersnappers. (Get off my lawn.) When I was learning, there weren't any tutorials, beginner or otherwise. I was a kid stuck in northern Wyoming in the late 80s and early 90s, with a TI-BASIC manual and, later, a QuickC compiler+manual and nothing else. I didn't have an internet full of people yelling at me that this is too hard, that it's too difficult, you should start with Pong, etc... I just had this weird magical box and a thick, technical-sounding manual to go along with it, plus some games I loved to play; and the whole thing was 100% play time. I made games that mimicked what I was playing at the time: starting with TI-994A games (Hunt the Wumpus, Car Wars, Tombstone) moving on to Atari games (Pitfall, Boxing, etc...) moving on to NES games. Each step of the way, I just tried to imitate what I saw. It didn't matter if I was in way over my head, or if I was trying to take on something outside my reach. I turned out crappy games, and I turned out games that my family and friends said were "pretty cool". I failed, utterly and abysmally, at achieving most of my goals of mimicking what I was playing, but it didn't matter because what I did achieve had merit in and of itself.
Just work on making the kind of games you like to play. You're probably going to fail, spectacularly and with terrific force, but by God if it isn't going to be fun in the meantime, and at the end of it you're going to have a few battle scars, maybe a little bit of a nervous facial twitch, and a whole sackful of knowledge about what to do (and what not to do) the next time. But sitting around, staring at tutorials and wondering nervously to yourself "am I ready for this? Is this too hard for me?" quibbling about whether or not you are ready to move beyond the beginner stuff and on to "real" programming (whatever the heck that is, anyway), or waiting for someone else what you should do next, what path you should follow on your learning journey, just isn't going to do anybody a bit of good at all. Jump in, write some code, throw some sprites up on the screen, segfault a whole bunch of times, crash and burn. Fail, but fail with STYLE, man. It'll be an awesome time, I promise you.
And always keep reading. That's an important thing. Because failing does you no good at all if you don't learn the proper way to do things the next time. But don't just read stuff you think is at your level. Read stuff that you think is way, way beyond your level. You won't understand a bunch of it, but some of it just might stick and slowly, ever so slowly, things will glom together. Stuff will gel, and one day you'll be all "oh, shit, that's how that works!" It'll be an awesome moment, and there will be a bunch of those moments if you keep at this.
Cheers for the replies guys :) I like the look of MonoGame. I looked into Allegro but I'd prefer 3D, but I shall look into it again anyway thanks.
I was a kid stuck in northern Wyoming in the late 80s and early 90s, with a TI-BASIC manual and, later, a QuickC compiler+manual ... starting with TI-994A games (Hunt the Wumpus, Car Wars, Tombstone) moving on to Atari games (Pitfall, Boxing, etc...) moving on to NES games.
Yeah I sometimes wish I loved 2D platformers... but sadly I am not really a gamer, and when I am I play FPS games. Which reminds me I did have my engine knocking about somewhere, but no graphics libraries... arrghhhhhhh.... looks like I'll have to bash on with hacking at SFML... while I'm here, does anyone know of a better alternative or some decent Mac SFML tutorials?
