What coding language should I learn?

[TheAndroidSentByCyberlife]

I want to know which language is the best to learn for game development? I have no experience in coding at all. Oh yeah and I have an iMac.

[Dat Guy]

C++.

[Blackhole890]

10 minutes ago, Reallifecat said:

Oh yeah and I have an iMac.

oh yeah, i have a RGB pc  

[Blackhole890]

10 minutes ago, Reallifecat said:

I want to know which language is the best to learn for game development? I have no experience in coding at all. 

for me, java is the best way to create minecraft v2, i mean, to code and be compatible at any device... You should specify for which platforms are you going to code your game

[THE ABSURD BIRD]

C++ or JavaScript

[BeyondOGTD]

C++ is probably above the skill level of someone who doesn't have any coding experience. I would recommend Python followed by Java to learn basic coding mechanics etc. To get into the world of C++ and game development, I would recommend you start off with something like Unreal Engine that uses blueprints to help you visualize C++. This is also the point where you'd start to learn how to do things in C++. Good luck!

[argyle]

Honestly if you're on a Mac it may be a good idea to learn Swift. Apple has some pretty good tutorials available and you can test out both Mac and iOS game development.

 

For most purposes C++ is probably what would serve best in the long term.

[Rohime]

With no starting experience at all ... umm, tricky question.  

1).  Its the wrong question.  Its not "what language to learn" it is "what to learn FIRST".

2).  context missing.   "game development" needs much more information on what platform do you want to target.   Mobile?  Web?   PC? etc.

 

I'd recommend starting with two languages.   one highly structured language, and one scripting language.   try something like Python for a scripting  language.   Maybe C++ also so that you get exposed to a proper IDE.

you may also want to look at PHP for web.

[TheAndroidSentByCyberlife]

Just now, Rohime said:

With no starting experience at all ... umm, tricky question.  

1).  Its the wrong question.  Its not "what language to learn" it is "what to learn FIRST".

2).  context missing.   "game development" needs much more information on what platform do you want to target.   Mobile?  Web?   PC? etc.

 

I'd recommend starting with two languages.   one highly structured language, and one scripting language.   try something like Python for a scripting  language.   Maybe C++ also so that you get exposed to a proper IDE.

you may also want to look at PHP for web.

Windows, Mac and Linux. Possibly iOS and android.

[Rohime]

4 minutes ago, Reallifecat said:

Windows, Mac and Linux. Possibly iOS and android.

Ha Ha.   ie: "everything" - or for me reading between the lines "I dont know yet".

 

@BeyondOGTD advice is probably the best so far.

[BaneOfKnoll]

18 minutes ago, Dat Guy said:

C++.

Only if you want to die. 

If you want something to learn first, try Visual Basic or Python.

[Dat Guy]

"Which language would you recommend for learning how to write a game?"

"Visual Basic. Or Python. Or JavaScript."

 

Jeez. I'm out.

[Mira Yurizaki]

If you're fresh to programming, it's not so much what language you learn first that's important, but you learn programming and software development concepts.

 

Since game development is your goal, don't focus so much on which language to use, but rather, which development tools are best for you. You almost never create a game from scratch these days. You use an existing tool to see if it can do the job you want. A lot of those 2D indie games on Steam for instance were made with Game Maker (which I believe requires knowing JavaScript for more advanced stuff) or RPG Maker (which doesn't require knowing a language unless you want to modify the business logic of the engine). Unity is a popular one for 3D gaming development.

 

Either way, you should learn the concepts first and worry about what language to learn later.

 

8 hours ago, TopHatTom said:

try Visual Basic

No. Please no. While I like to give most languages a fair shot, this is the only one I won't.

 

At the very least, don't use it seriously.

[Beskamir]

As was already stated here I also suggest you start with Python to get an understanding of how code works. Anyway to make my post at least somewhat useful, here's a resource guide I compiled for a friend a few days ago and might help you as well.

ResourceGuide.pdf

[vorticalbox]

18 hours ago, TopHatTom said:

Only if you want to die. 

If you want something to learn first, try Visual Basic or Python.

please don't learn visual basic, no one uses it anymore and wouldn't give much in the way of a feature. For .net c# with WPF or universal windows app. 

 

1 hour ago, ElfFriend said:

As was already stated here I also suggest you start with Python to get an understanding of how code works. Anyway to make my post at least somewhat useful, here's a resource guide I compiled for a friend a few days ago and might help you as well.

ResourceGuide.pdf

you don't have to learn python to "learn" its just got a slightly easier syntax making it a little easier. 

 

I started on php then visual basic (college) then c# and now python and angularJS. 

 

I would start with something you're interested in, I was Interested in making text based browser games so I learn php / mysql

[Dat Guy]

1 minute ago, vorticalbox said:

no one uses it anymore

That's not true nor relevant (because there are good reasons that different languages exist).

[vorticalbox]

17 minutes ago, Dat Guy said:

That's not true nor relevant (because there are good reasons that different languages exist).

go look at the job market there are vastly more other .net technologies than vb. Here in the UK they still teach it and it's always brought up in meetings how it should be changed for a more wildly and more up to date language. 

 

visual basic was declared legacy almost a decade ago. 

[Dat Guy]

Just now, vorticalbox said:

go look at the job market there are vastly more other .net technologies than vb.

 

Not everything you should want to learn is a job thing.

 

By the way: Do you know the current salaries of COBOL developers? And if so: Why don't you recommend COBOL? 

I guess you see what I'm trying to say.

 

Just now, vorticalbox said:

visual basic was declared legacy almost a decade ago. 

 

There are a lot of good reasons not to learn Visual Basic. "There are newer languages" is not one of them.

[vorticalbox]

1 minute ago, Dat Guy said:

Not everything you should want to learn is a job thing.

 

By the way: Do you know the current salaries of COBOL developers? And if so: Why don't you recommend COBOL? 

I guess you see what I'm trying to say.

money was never the point, opportunity was.

 

1 minute ago, Dat Guy said:

There are a lot of good reasons not to learn Visual Basic. "There are newer languages" is not one of them.

 i don't see why you would want to learn a language where the last stable release was 19 years a go. 

[Dat Guy]

Just now, vorticalbox said:

money was never the point, opportunity was.

 

So you're saying that nobody should learn a thing which does not provide a job opportunity?

Two years of school would be enough then.

 

Learning programming languages is not just about providing your work to potential employers.

 

Just now, vorticalbox said:

 i don't see why you would want to learn a language where the last stable release was 19 years a go. 

 

How many years ago does a language have to be released in order to be "relevant" to you?

[vorticalbox]

Just now, Dat Guy said:

 

So you're saying that nobody should learn a thing which does not provide a job opportunity?

Two years of school would be enough then.

 

Learning programming languages is not just about providing your work to potential employers.

 

 

How many years ago does a language have to be released in order to be "relevant" to you?

im not sure where the cut off is lol, but to me I'm looking to progress in my career my programing learning choices are centred around 1. Getting a job 2. To do a task i need completed. 

 

i guess there's no {} or ; in vb and switch cases are much neater. 

[Dat Guy]

Just now, vorticalbox said:

1. Getting a job 2. To do a task i need completed. 

 

And nobody fucking cares how old the language for 2. is.

 

Just now, vorticalbox said:

i guess there's no {} or ; in vb and switch cases are much neater. 

 

In some ways, (Visual) Basic is similar to ALGOL-like languages, using words instead of symbols.

[cluelessgenius]

"i want to learn programming"

                                                      "do want to get ants? because thats how you get ants!"

 

                                                      https://www.antme.net/de/

[sky99]

hello,

i teach computer science, and programming to students from 12 yo kids to university students.

And after a few years, i would say : PYTHON.

Why? 

1. first of all, it is simple, straightforward;
2. there is a library for almost anything on python;
3. it runs on almost everything;
4. it helps you to learn good coding practices.

As for the last point, i'll explain a bit.

An example is code indentation. You can have your code pretty much as you want in C/C++, provided you respect the syntax. You can have nice, clean, easy to read code, or compressed, impossible to read code, with the same result.

In python, you simply can't : indentation is the base of the language. So it forces you to write your code in a more readable way.

 

Furthermore, there are a lot of recommandations for python, called PEP, that give you canevas for GOOD coding.

 

If you want to start right away, download python for whatever system you have, a good text editor, such as atom, and find a good tutorial.

 

Python is made with a philosophy : there are many ways to make things, but one is better. So in python, most of the time, you have THE way to make stuff that will be presented to you, in the documentations/tutorials, etc.

 

C/C++ can be extremely powerful, but it takes time to master it. It is also easy to have huge mistakes in your code, whereas python is much easier on the beginner.

 

Python is interpreted, so you don't need to compile your code all the time, so you really need only python installed on your system to start coding.

 

I'll add that there are books under free licences on the net providing complete method to learn python, even for young children.

 

If you want to learn programming in a REALLY fun way, get a raspberry pi, a breadboard, and a few LEDs, and you'll be able to learn not only programming but also physical computing (the code will be the same as general purpose coding), only you'll interact with LEDs, buttons and stuff in the real world rather than just having stuff written in a terminal

 

What i do for my programming class is exactly that : i made raspberry pi robots with motors, sensors, LEDs, and within 2 to 4 hours, teenagers know enough to get on programming by themselves.

 

Good luck

[sky99]

Sorry i didn't see that you wanted to do specifically game dev.

If you want to do game dev, and you know how to code, the language won't matter much, you'll have plenty of options depending on the platform.

The thing is that you'll learn a framework, or the stuff attached to an engine for a specific project.

 

Unless you want to code everything from scratch, but nobody does that anymore.

 

So if you never coded, python is great to learn. When you know how to code, the language won't matter much.

 

If you want to make video games, coding is not necessarily what you want to learn (not that it won't be useful), but you may want to learn 3D modeling and animation... Depending on what you want to do, there is plenty to do.