   OpenGL Game Programming book
  I think of buying the book "OpenGL Game Programming " but I want to be sure as it will be hard for me to get it abroad. I would appreciate if you answered my questions...1)I read in a review that the demos on CDs were working with awfully bad rendering times, is it true?2)After studying only this book is it possible to make a commercial quality game?3)Does the book cover terrain, sky boxes, avi files, or how to import a terrain created in such applications like Bryce?4)Can I make a Quake quality engine with this book?
  I think I can answer all your questions with a no here, except for #3, the book does cover Terrain and sky boxes(Very basic).If you can make a commercial quality game after reading this book, then you don''t need to buy it. There is NO way that all of the topics you mentioned fit in ONE book. You''ll need about 25 books, at least.(Especially for #4)What Opengl game programming does provide, is a very broad, but not deep description of opengl specifics and a few directx specifics such as directsound and directinput.When you''re done with the book you will be pretty comfortable with the opengl api, which is a great starting point to learn game programming.Greetz,Mike Look at all the pretty colours! ;  none of the books over APIs like OpenGL or Direct3D would cover the aspects of making a final game, because there is not any one standard way of using those APIs to do so ... ALL current 3D games use either OpenGL or Direct3D in their game, but nearly all of them use completely custom games engines on top of them, which have wildly different features and architectures ...However, as the game engines become more advanced and complicated, people are more and more purchasing already existing engines to use as starting points (reinventing the 3D rendering engine is fast approaching the kind of backwards old-school mentality that reinventing the-wheel has long been held to demonstrate).  Also, as more experience is gained with programming 3D games, usefull generalizations are being found, that allow these cookie cutter starting points (game engines) to be usefull for more and more different types of games.Today, you still pretty much have to pick a genre of game before being able to decide on an engine (due to technical limitations of the various engines), but this is rapidly going away, and soon there will be very little distinction between the engines of a 3D first person shooter, a real time strategy games, and a peristant server based game.  As this day approaches, more and more books will be able to get you up and running with some particular engine, rapidly.However, for today, if you are a single developer using OpenGL or Direct3D directly, without the benifit of an existing engine, than writing the graphics or game engine will be a complete task unto itself ... without even getting into the actual game part of it ...You might want to look into freely or cheeply available game engines - or source code, just to help you get started ... some examples available:  Quake 1 (newer version for money), Torque game engine ($100 i think), PowerRender, OGRE, ... many more i don''t know about ..Also, you can get the complete source code to a real 3D space game published by Microsoft ... Alliegience ... at http://research.microsoft.com/research/allegiance/;  << 1)I read in a review that the demos on CDs were working with awfully bad rendering times, is it true? >>Depends on the computer and graphics card. On my 300 Mhz AMD with an old (1998) graphics card, most of the demos run terrible or not at all. On the computers I use at the office (HP''s purchased the last 2 years), I get 30 to 60 frames/sec or better.<< 2)After studying only this book is it possible to make a commercial quality game? >>It gives you the basics to do that. But only if you go further.<< 3)Does the book cover terrain, sky boxes, avi files, or how to import a terrain created in such applications like Bryce? >>At least two of the demos are terrain generators with source code. The Nehe World demos contain sky boxes I think.<< 4)Can I make a Quake quality engine with this book? >>Yeah, it gives you a start in that direction. One of the demos and chapters is a minimal first-person shooter type game. Also one of the chapters covers the .MD2 Quake model format.What you really need after this book if you want to go further, are the Red and Blue official OpenGL books. OpenGL Game Programming is a great introduction to what you need to know for a Quake type game.Near the bottom of my page are five of the better demos from the book. Covers DirectMusic from DX 8 also, although I''ve found FMOD much easier to useVazGames.com  Phil P ;  Great Book!The problem with the CDs was sorted out a while back, my copy I got 3 months ago was fine!The actual book goes through basic to intermediate topics and then helps you build a rudimentary (and I mean rudimentary) engine, I''m currently following it''s final stages and the engine presented can be re-constructed to take some more advanced graphical features into consideration (The book follows OpenGL 1.2, a lot of extensions have been added by 1.4) but in all it''s great.I learned a lot about how the GPU works, as before my C/C++ knowledge only got me understanding how a CPUs core worked. I also learned A LOT about Geometry (I actually hated it at school ), Vectors, Matrices the like, but I would say a 3d math book a longside this book would be wise as the math isn''t explained brilliantly (I suggest 3d Math Primer for Graphics and Game Development).So if you have a good, sound knowledge of C or C++, and no a little algebra then I would suggest you get this book.Have fun,Ad    