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[LordBucket]

Hello everyone.

I've been inspired to make a game, but upon attempting to install my copy of VB studio 6 I've been told that it's incompatible with 64bit windows.

So I'm looking for some recommendations for a programming environment / compiler.

Requirements:
 * Must be friendly with 64bit windows
 * I will not be paying for it. Sourceforge is good.
 * Must be capable of TCP or UDP / IP
 * Must have native graphic support for standard file types. PNG, BMP, whatever. 3D support is not required.
 * Must be capable of multi threading
 * Must be capable of performing background processes without direct user input.
 * Something with command set descended from basic or LUA is preferred. I would prefer to avoid C if possible.

Any suggestions?

Thank you.

[G-Flex]

I suggest moving away from Visual Basic and never looking back, if that helps.

[qwertyuiopas]

As a *last* resort, there are MinGW and Cygwin, two versions of GCC for windows. The problem is that on their own, they are not graphical, and the languages they support are best described a C and similar.


Microsoft has free versions of some IDEs at www.microsoft.com/exPress/, though they are limited in some way.

Other than that, I don't know, but others (and google, if you haven't tried yet) might.

[LordBucket]

but others (and google, if you haven't tried yet) might.

...the problem is not the lack of recommendations, but way too many.

Wikipedia has a list of 67 various visual programming languages. Ambrosine lists 126 various game engines.

I was hoping someone would be able to help narrow the field.

The problem is that on their own, they are not graphical

...yes, I'd prefer to avoid having to create my own graphic utilities.

[qwertyuiopas]

I'm not the best person to give advice here *because* I usually write with notepad and compile through a batch file. (Even when working with flash!)

And I usually use C with MinGW, quite what you *aren't* looking for. (Though it can do everything you would want to use it for, it is neither graphical nor easy, and most of the more advanced features are optional additions...)


Still, microsoft's express editions of it's IDEs have some of the features you want, mostly free, probably as graphical as VB6, most likely 64bit supported, there is a basic version, and it might be able to support some or all of the other things you would want to do with them. I *don't* use them mostly because of startup times, since notepad is instantaneous, and they take at least 10 seconds, and what I use can run from a USB stick on any computer.

[Calculus]

I'd learn C#, either through Microsoft's free IDE's or through the open source Mono project.

C# is an excellent dynamic language. It's far superior to Java in syntax and power, you get the tight windows integration from being Microsoft's language of choice,  it's a good choice for most problems, and one day, you could make some money off knowing it. It is rare that the stars align so.

That being said, I use PHP, Ruby, Python, and Javascript, because they are the right tools for the web apps I'm building. But for games, C# would be the way to go.

[eerr]

Always choose a language based on what you need, not what you want.

[LordBucket]

Always choose a language based on what you need, not what you want.

Airplanes are very good at flying across oceans, but it's inefficient to learn to fly if you only want to go the corner drugstore.

[eerr]

Always choose a language based on what you need, not what you want.

Airplanes are very good at flying across oceans, but it's inefficient to learn to fly if you only want to go the corner drugstore.

I can't tell if you are agreeing or disagreeing.

[Andir]

Always choose a language based on what you need, not what you want.

Airplanes are very good at flying across oceans, but it's inefficient to learn to fly if you only want to go the corner drugstore.

I can't tell if you are agreeing or disagreeing.

I would say that's a very strong agreement.

Once you learn a language, it's not hard to transition to another.  I'd say the most difficult transition is going from imperative (C/C++/Java/etc.) to functional (Haskell/Clojure/etc.) programming but the knowledge gained from imperative languages can really help there.  Over time it's nice to learn more about the operation behind the scenes and higher level languages can hide some of that.  That's where the selecting a language can be the difference between a jet liner and a bicycle.  Some languages are easy to get the job done and others are more complicated, but get the most done.

[Nadaka]

First, let me ask, are you looking for a full featured programming language? or a game engine with scripting support?

Two very different beasts.

For full featured languages, I suggest either java or c#.

Both have GUI toolkits and support for 2d image compositions, networking, etc. Basically they can do practically all you are asking for with the default libraries, though additional libraries can make it easier, fast or add features.

Both are managed languages that lack a lot of the memory headaches common to languages like c++.
Both are compiled to intermediate assemblies and run much faster than purely scripted languages.
Both have free IDE's that provide a lot of value added features like code completion, simple refactoring, interactive help, etc. I prefer eclipse for java though NetBeans has getter support for drag and drop GUI design without having to download external plugins, and you can get Visual Studio Express C# for free from microsoft.

I really never played around with scripted game engines, afraid I can not offer much advice there.

[Andir]

I know it's not really like LUA, but I'm finding Clojure a bit of fun to use.  (If you are not afraid of a LISP-like format.)  You get access to all the Java libraries along with all the secondary libraries that give access to OpenGL.  It's built around concurrency using an immutable shared memory model to allow you to deal with things without having to worry about locking and the "finer" points of threading.  You can use NetBeans to create applications (which is what I'm working with right now) or a addon to emacs that may not be easy to learn if you have no prior experience.

[monkey]

but I'm Clojure a bit of fun to use. 

me too, nothing like the REPL, no more edit+compile+test !!
I was doing a very basic framework for lwjgl to play with procedural generations of tendrils,veins, etc, where you could redefine the generator function while its running (nothing fancy, Clojure makes it easy).

Im now playing with ogre4j.