Java/C++ Project Ideas

Community General Discussion
1

Hello everyone! Sorry about an odd topic, but I had no idea where to post this question. So the long story short, I basically want to try out programming in C++/Java. If for example I wanted to get hired by a gaming company such as Blizzard, what kind of project would I need to build or work on. I know there is no such thing as an ideal project, but if I could get an example that could be a learning experience WHILE building the program that would be just awesome.

I also made this topic in off-topic section just in case! :stuck_out_tongue:

My experience:
I went through the book called “Starting out with Java.” by Tony Gaddis. I may not be familiar with libraries, and advanced programming, but I do know java basics/classes/collections/generics and so on. But that is just textbook knowledge, and I don’t think it matters. I wanted for someone to point me into the right direction and tell me what to start on and develop.
APIs is something I am not familiar with. But I’ll look into it. (thanks)

2

Start small and simple. Maybe addon/mods, not just for WoW. Check out the APIs provided by developers so you can see how things integrate with the game.

This is gonna sound really dumb since i dont know your skill level or experience, but how about just making a hello world mod?

3

Are you familiar with programming from other languages already? If not, I’d honestly just start off simple, follow some tutorials or something to learn the fundamentals, even if it’s not related to what you want to do in the end.

4

I went through the book called “Starting out with Java.” by Tony Gaddis. I may not be familiar with libraries, and advanced programming, but I do know java basics/classes/collections/generics and so on. But that is just textbook knowledge, and I don’t think it matters. I wanted for someone to point me into the right direction and tell me what to start on and develop.
APIs is something I am not familiar with. But I’ll look into it. (thanks)

5

There’s a million books out there and they can give you a good set of tools. The biggest hurdle imo is learning to use weird APIs and windows/COM+ apis are perfect for working on those paradigms.

Call up some Windows stuff and make some COM classes in your program.

If you can dodge a wrench then you can dodge a ball.

:crazy_face:

6

If you want to get hired by a gaming company, either Java or C++ would be a good place to start. I personally would lean towards Java, since that’s the one that I learned to program in when I was in college.

If you don’t have any background in programming at all, I’d suggest learning the basics first before you try to make a complex project. Start with “Hello World” and work your way up from there.

7

To get hired from Blizzard you need a Bacholers degree in computer science, experience (I believe i remember seeing dev jobs that said like 10+ years or something experience) etc.

I wouldn’t try to be shooting for the stars if you haven’t even gotten basic java/c++ down as it takes times. I would recommend taking courses and looking as you advance more then look for local jobs to get experience. Major gaming companies like Blizzard is extremely competitive and if you don’t have those things under your belt the odds of you getting a job a major gaming company is probably slim to none.

Also, when I mean local jobs, I am referring to normal type jobs that need java programmers which likely aren’t gaming companies.

9

C# is > C++. At least I would imagine if I ever stopped programing in VB.

1 Like
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Howdy! Yeah I have some experience. I updated my post and added my experience. If you can even consider that as “experience” :stuck_out_tongue:

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If you want to make a lot of money not doing gaming- Java is good. Virtually no game studios use java they use c++ for the most part and to a lesser extent c#. C++ is actually a confederation of languages, C, C with objects, templates, Preprocessor, ect. C# is a .Net thing which is a lot like java but has some market penetration thanks to some game engines like unity.

Do a web search for Doom 3 BFG code review by Fabien Sanglard. He’s got a great site that’s a good starting point. In some of his other blog posts he talks about good books you should look into also.

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Thank you for the info! I’ll look into Fabien Sanglard’s site :slight_smile:

13

lol!

C# needs the CLR though and C++ can’t be touched for performance. Which is why WoW is built using it.

Edit: I’m not laughing at you I’m laughing with you. VB is so comfy. :hugs:

14

Find something that interests you, and just build it. Once you get a groundwork built, think of a feature you want to add and work towards it not giving up. Don’t know how to do something? Research till you figure it out, trial and error. Don’t be affraid of breaking things, and don’t get discouraged when you do break things. It happens and is a great learning oppurtunity. I personally started out doing mods for GTA which got me hooked and I ended up making a career out of it.

On a side note though, unless you end up at an indie studio … stay very very very far away from the games industry unless you enjoy 80+ hour weeks while making crap pay.

15

Gotta learn C++, as that’s what Blizz uses. It’s not all fun and games… no pun intended. It’s work, hard at times, and is thankless and your managers are overbearing and stressed.

You may think you want it, but you may not. Development is not for everybody.

1 Like
16

Like everyone is saying here a lot of work goes into these games. If you want to work for a game company ideally you should start a degree program and create small game projects on the side. Both Java and C++ are good languages but there are other things you need to learn like database management and software design.