On Sat, 14 Jul 2007 10:35:26 +0900, Joe Wiltrout <wiltroutja / hotmail.com> wrote:
> Alls I want is to make a decent graphic game, with decent gameplay,
> and atleast some fun.

Assuming you mean 3d graphics, that's actually about the hardest types
of programming projects to do.  It's not only an issue of basic
programming, but you'll need to worry about advanced topics like
concurrency, as well as needing knowledge of a wide range of other
disciplines like:

 - computational geometry for rendering and world simulation
 - signal processing for visual effects and audio
 - drawing and design skills for your 2d visual assets
   (half of graphics is art direction)
 - 3d modeling for your 3d assets

There _are_, thankfully, libraries to handle much of the coding aspects
of these, but you'll still need to understand the principles to be able
to use the libraries effectively.

> At this rate, none of thats going ot happen soon. Soon I'm just going to take
> the hard road and directly try to learn C++. But for all intents and
> purposes, learning Ruby first would be an easier path.

Starting from scratch, it takes most people about ten years to become a
solid programmer.  The best way to approach the process is to get more or
less comfortable in one programming language/environment, and then learn
several more which are as different as possible from each other.  Find
modest, but fun, projects to do to keep you motivated: things that you
want or need to do, write programs to do them for you.

I would not recommend C++ as a first language, though you will have
to learn it eventually.  There are a lot of side issues in it that get
in the way of just programming, and it's a truly massive language.  I
picked up C++ 15 years ago, and I'm still finding new, weird features
in the language today.

> The original question was how would I get started making a game if I
> had no prior coding experiance?. And I haven't received much on that subject.

Use a series of simpler projects to build your skills to the point
where you can tackle the "real" game.  That was one of the reasons the text
adventure was suggested -- it'll build a lot of the skills you'll need
to write the core game logic for the 3d game.

My first projects involved taking example programs and incrementally
modifying them to do new things.  You may have success doing something
similar (the source code for many libraries comes with example programs).

-mental