quitting...

well, i guess if all you do everyday is game programming, you''re gonna get sick of it very soon.
i only do game programming as a hobby. but most of the times i have to make applications (this is how i make money) so i doubt if i ever get tired of game programming

hmm, why don''t to gather around a couple o people and start doing some serious game programming? it''s more fun when you work in groups

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- Pouya / FOO!!!

uh... you forgot to prototype life().

quote:

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Original post by gameprogrammerwiz
but as far as programming games, i'm going to quit. 2D programming is boring, and 3D programming is too hard. i could never get anything 3D to work because i dont understand the math. and i have no desire to learn advanced math because it is pointless and i will never use it in life (take that, 5th grade math teachers).

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Maybe that's your problem. I find the maths behind 3d programming far more intressting than the programming itself. You might be bored of 2d programming because you aren't stretching your mind anymore. I find 2d programming very tedious and you get more gratification from seeing a 3d scene I made than a 2d one. And what's all this rubbish about you won't ever use maths in life. If you don't like maths you shouldn't be programming, in the end programming is maths. I also hated the maths they taught me at school, everything in the syllabus was extremely boring and the teachers I had made it even worse. Most of the people who tell me they don't like maths went through the same problem. It's only when you get to more advanced topics where the maths becomes intressting and if you want to be a professional programmer your going to need to study a lot of (intressting) maths, so saying you'll never use it in real life is an invalid argument.

Edited by - Chris F on July 10, 2000 5:04:32 AM

quote:

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i will hang around here and the IRC servers, though (if you guys dont mind having a non-programmer around).

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Actually Wiz, yes, we mind greatly about any non-programmers attempting to interact with us. In light of your post, I talked to the moderators, and though it grieves them to do so, they''ve decided to ban your IP

Or maybe I''m over-reacting as much as you are. Go read some web tutorials for a few days, then return to your scrolling problem.

And d*** it, Envy, I don''t think you''re helping matters!

this once happend to me when i did a few weeks of nothing but programming. take another few weeks (or more) off and you will probably feel better..


-----------------------------
-cow_in_the_well

http://cowswell.gda.ods.org/

Cow is right. I was thinking of quitting my current project after the contest because of the stress, but I didn''t realize that I had burned out. I''m fine now and am slowly regaining the power of the syntax.

------------------------
Captured Reality

quote:

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Original post by nes8bit

Cow is right.

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some ppl might take that offensive ya know

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- Pouya / FOO!!!

Well Wiz, since you won''t be using that programming knowledge much any more. Care to sit down in a chair, plug into the matrix, and transfer the files to my brain? (Matrix, d''oh)

Seriously though. What the hey are you doing?

............
Guardian Angel Interactive

tutorials suck, so can anyone supply me with the title of a beginner 3D book? (OpenGL or D3D).

wait...

quote:

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beginner 3D book

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BAWHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!

Check out NeHe''s OpenGL tutorials.

Martin

http://www.itknowledge.com/reference/archive/1571690735/ewtoc.html
http://nehe.gamedev.net/

ive been to NeHe. and, his stuff is basicly the same as the "beginner" 3D books. i mean, he does explain what each line of code does...but none of his tutorials really go into depth.

quote:

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although, i might start programming applications. i could implement my client/server code into a nifty little chat system or an instant message type program.

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No! Don''t turn yourself over to the light side!

quote:

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but as far as programming games, i''m going to quit. 2D programming is boring, and 3D programming is too hard.

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Well, then you''re weighing graphics too much on this issue. Graphics are only part of a game. If the 2D programming is so dull, then get it out of the way and do AI or something!

Of course, there''s a possibility that my compiler has posessed my soul and forced me to say that, but I''d think the chances of that would be slim


lntakitopi@aol.com - http://www.geocities.com/guanajam

gameprogrammerwiz:- You will find that 3D graphics programming ain''t acually that hard. All you do is take it one step at a time. So maybe your first step is to learn about vectors and matrices. Then your second step could be learning how to implement the math into programming, and translations,rotations etc. You see it isn''t that hard to do that stuff once you get a grasp on it. It''s like you learn to do a straight line before a curved line. You just keep building up on what you know. And before you know it, you''ll be a 3d graphics programming guru.

Before I started doing 3d graphics/game programming. I couldn''t care less about math. Infact I hated it with a passion. I mucked up in math class, and just didn''t care. Now I love math, I try and gobble up every single little tid bit on the subject. As kiwidog said in one of his tutorials, "Math is only boring if you don''t have a use for it". And now you have a use for it.

-David

I think a lot of people go through 3d tutorials, books, and what not and quickly give up because of the math. I know did this several times. I think the problem is that many of the methods of learning 3d programming rely on a "ground up" approach of first learning the basic math and building to more complicated math before implementing anything that really motivates the student into realizing he''s learning anything. You learn all this math, it''s complicated, it''s hard, but you can''t do anything.

If you try to learn through a top-down approach, however, creating high-level scenes (with say, D3D RM, though I learned with OpenGL), then as you get curious about how to say, do rotations, or get moving objects, or do certain effects, then you can sit down with the manual, books, tutorials, and try to figure out that specific topic. Before you know it, you know more than you realize. And you can keep digging deeper, and as you do, you learn the math behind it, because you see how it''s used and how to use it, so you understand it better than if you just learn some formulaic method.

As far as burnout, just do something else for a while (like a week), before you know it you''ll start thinking about it again and coming up with new ideas.

All you guys sound like a bunch of cry babies! Sure I've gotten burned out plenty of times, but I know the second I admit that I'm bored to the point where I can't write more code, my career is over (might as well say my life is over). Here is my top ten list for curing the programming blues, programmers block, inspiration drain, creativity shunts, mental anguish, spite for my boss, spite for the university professor (that wont teach me stuff I want to learn), as well as carpal tunnel and geek-itis.

Marsupial's Top 10 Programmer's Cure-All

10. Drink a fifth of Captain Morgan. It takes me a few days but I always find that the solutions to all my problems are at the bottem of the bottle.

9. Read old Micheal Abrash anecdotes. Nevermind the whole technicle article just read his witticism.

8. Write tabloid-like e-mails to old college buddies about new gossip that is going on. For example... "Our colleauge, _________ was divorced by his wife and then had a battle for custody of the guinia pigs. Tradgicly the guinia pigs died after the settlement. Now he's banging __________'s ex-fiance. The other day, the bus ran over my car and completely destroyed it. Now the Detroit Department of Transportation will compensate me with a brand new Plymouth Prowler." (Note that friends I knew in college know that I exagerate alot (we all tell rediculous stories for fun) and thus take my stuff with a grain of salt. They are just happy to hear from me.)

7. Dirty Martinis! Roll half a drop of dry vermuth in a chilled martini glass. Roll 4 parts gin to 1 part olive juice over ice, strain into martini glass. Garnish with anchovie stuffed olives.

6. Indulge in Robert Sedgewick's Algorithms . Seriosly you don't know how bored you really are until this.

5. Ride a moutain bike down a 99% grade. Caution, this is dangerous and may cause severe impalement or dismemberment.

4. Race sail boats from Port Huron to Macinac Island. It's this weekend!

3. Beer! And if drinking beer is not interesting try brewing your own.

2. For heaven's sake! Get laid!

1. Hang out on GameDev.net

If you are still bored after all this, then you must be a boring person!

Edited by - Marsupial Rodentia on July 11, 2000 12:29:15 PM

I know this isn''t the same, but I was a writer before I was a programmer (and still am). I have been writing since I was 7 and never at any point did I think I would ever want to give it up. Then one day I realized I was having trouble writing. I didn''t want to half the time. When I did write, I looked at what I had written and found I disliked or even hated it. I was very critical of myself and began to feel like I was wasting my time even trying.

How did it turn out? I told myself that if I wanted to stop writing, I could. So I stopped writing. For about two weeks. I realized that I was still telling stories in my head, even if I wasn''t putting them down. I realized I still wanted to write, even though I was having trouble. So then I told myself, I could write but not pressure myself to publish or even to finish. Now I can write, but I still have difficulty at times. When I have difficulty, I put down what I''m working on and do something else (like program). I think part of my trouble is that I''m afraid I''m not very good at it, and I don''t want to disappoint myself. But I keep reminding myself that with time, there is improvement. By going back and reading stuff I wrote long ago, or even a year ago, I can see how I''ve improved. Maybe I''m not Shakespeare, but I''m chugging along and sometimes I''m even proud of my progress. Plus, even when I''m unsatisfied with myself, I still love to write.

I say, if you *love* to program, take some time off and figure out how to deal with that boredom. Try to work out a way to still program but also be aware of how you feel about it. If you never much cared about programming, I would say let it go. Maybe some day you''ll come back to it. Or maybe you''ll find something else to do that you would rather spend your time on.

quote:

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Original post by pouya

[quote] Original post by nes8bit

Cow is right.

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some ppl might take that offensive ya know

-----------------
- Pouya / FOO!!!




WTF???


Edited by - cow_in_the_well on July 11, 2000 11:43:43 PM

he''ll be back

-----------------------Today's Tips - 07-12-00

VC++ & General Tidbits

1) Resource files(.rc) are human readable ASCII text files

2) vc++ fact- Every Windows app is built around a message loop. A message loop makes
repeated calls to the GetMessage or PeekMessage functions and retrieves messages.
umm.. it then dispatches to window procedures through DispatchMessage

3) VC++ apps are targeted for the win32 environment(duh). But what some people don't
know(you should) is that it can be used as a cross-platform dev. environment and
lots of MAC programmers use it