   Moving from Python  to C++
  Being fairly new to the world of gamedev what are people's thoughts on the effort needed to make solid progress learning C++ from a Python background? I have a good 3+ years solid (industry) Python experience and am comforatble with OOP as it relates to the Python world - it just seems with C++ there is so much more depth to the language and much more low-level concern (memory managment etc) that you simply dont have to worry about with languages like Python.Eventually the aim is to write games when spare time allows, and to get a better understanding of the whole gamedev process by actually doing it.I have superficially dabbled with a few C++ tutorials (text based RPGs) and have a bunch of video training material that goes through the basics of data types, pointers, functions, classes etc on to making a sprite based game. I also read somewhere on these forums good reviews about a book titled "Programming a Multiplayer FPS in DirectX".Is jumping in with rendering 3D, networking, audio etc etc a case of running before you can walk if you don't have a solid grasp of C++ as a language - or do some of you belong to the 'baptism of fire'/'throw you in at the deep end' school of thought?   
Quote:Being fairly new to the world of gamedev what are people's thoughts on the effort needed to make solid progress learning C++ from a Python background? Significant. You already have programming fundamentals, but you're missing knowledge and memory to work off of. The problem is learning C++ is a bit of wading a minefield. Aside from the fact that you have lower level abstractions to work with, you need to dodge bad learning resources and bad code. There's countless samples of code to look at. Finding good idioms, however, is much harder. Getting to the point where you can write good, robust C++ code comfortably thus requires a much greater investment of time. But no doubt you already know this and are experiencing it.Quote:Is jumping in with rendering 3D, networking, audio etc etc a case of running before you can walk if you don't have a solid grasp of C++ as a languageYes.Quote:or do some of you belong to the 'baptism of fire'/'throw you in at the deep end' school of thought?The problem is you'll just be frying. You're more than welcome to try and investigate various libraries. But if your grasp of C++ syntactical constructs, let alone idioms, is at best superficial, you'll find yourself unable to use any library.Again, you have 3 years of industry experience. By now, you should have a programmer's attitude. If you find yourself unable to understand the various syntactical constructs in sample code or decipher library APIs, you're operating with too little knowledge, and you should appropriately recognize this.   ;Quote:Original post by Chicane05Eventually the aim is to write games when spare time allows, and to get a better understanding of the whole gamedev process by actually doing it.Do you want to make games or do you want to learn C++? Python is a fine language and you can use OpenGL and tons of other libraries with it. C++ takes very long to learn sort of right and you need to worry about a lot more compared to python. You gain only little by learning C++. So to actually make games it would be better to stick with python and maybe reimplement performance critical parts in C/C++ and call that from python.And completing a game probably gives you enough insight into the gamedev process no matter what language you take.   