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I bought this book called "Programming Video Games for the Evil Genius" by Ian Cinnamon. If there is anyone who has read or is familiar with this book I am wondering if they think it is worth reading.

I am interested in making video games. I have already taken intro courses in C++, Java and Python and got through okay. I've been going through this book for about a month now(SLOWLY). All I have to do is type the code exactly in the book, BUT a lot of the code is not clearly explained. I do some research online but I usually still have some trouble answering my questions. Then I found stack overflow. It's been a ton of help.

Right now I am trying to make a racing game right out of this book and I got to a point where the author left a bunch of errors in his code. One of the members of this website fixed it up for me, but added some stuff that I'm having trouble understanding. I spend more time trying to figure out the authors errors and fix them or get someone to help me fix them than I actually do learning code.

I REALLY want to learn how to do this and I am ready and willing to put in the time, but I'm not sure if my time would be better spent learning from a different source.

Are there any veterans out there that are familiar with this book and think it's worth it/not worth it? Should I try to move onto another book? Any advice for a fresh start for someone who wants to learn some video game programming?

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If the code's full of errors then the book is rubbish and you should move onto another - or maybe it's language agnostic and the code is actually pseudocode you should be rewriting as actual runnable code in your language of choice, and the book is fine. That said, this place isn't a place to find out how to get started (see the FAQ) - we answer specific questions you might have that have actual answers, and "How do I get started" is something that invites a lot of discussion and opinion. – Jonathan Hobbs Jun 3 '12 at 6:00
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The Game Programming Wiki or GameDev.net community could be other places to find out how to start. Google, too. – Jonathan Hobbs Jun 3 '12 at 6:01
don't limit yourself to just one book. Get what you can out of it, but teach yourself (game) programming from a wide a range of sources. I know there is a nice satisfaction involved with completing a book from start to finish, but don't let that hinder your learning – Aralox Jun 3 '12 at 6:04
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GameDev is the place to ask about game development questions - it's more the issue that a Q&A system such as the one the entire Stack Exchange network is built upon isn't well suited to this sort of question. – Jonathan Hobbs Jun 3 '12 at 6:13
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Asking for a review of a book is quite out of the scope of this place, asking for advice on 'how to start' is covered by a lot of similar questions. Searching for references and books on any programming-related wiki or forum will give you a lot of material to get started. – Darkwings Jun 3 '12 at 8:58
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1 Answer

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I would say I had been through the same situation before. Now, there are a lot of good and bad books. One of the book that have some impact on me, though I never finished it, is "Game Programming All in One by Bruno Miguel". I have known C++ before I read this book, but I still get a lot of code design ideas out of its example. Even so, good or bad is based sorely on opinion of the reader.

I would like to advise you to just choose game engine of your choice and dive into the game development as quick as possible. Most starter would anticipate to have everything figured out before start making one. I would like to point out that game development is not a linear learning process. You learn most by actually making a game----encounter flaws in your designs, then recode or solve it. As for problems, you could post that here or search for answer yourself. You won't know the problems unless you actually face it. At one point of my life, I have to recode the very same program several time, just to get it working with the newly added features.

My advise for diving into your game creation is to never worry about making changes. I actually remade a whole set of classes before. Actually, it is better if you have source code control such as svn or git to help record changes.

The next question that you might asked is how should you start the process. My answer is find some tutorials on how to use the engine of your choice, then use tutorials as starting point. Try implement code design that you think will fit your game. Of course, your initial code design will have plenty of conflicts, but that's why we have gamedev and stackexchange.

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