You can direct them to Allegro (http://www.allegro.cc),
or even pygame (http://pygame.seul.org)
if they show an interest past your class. Both of these packages
can be set up in Win32 (with some work), and are a great start in C/C++
and Python development. They're free, use free compilers, don't
require too many additional libraries/includes, and they have excellent
example programs the kids can play with/learn from. They also
have support forums geared to beginners, and have very friendly
followings willing to help newcomers.
SDL (http://www.libsdl.org) and
Java (http://java.sun.com) are less
optimal choices. SDL requires a ton of includes, and someetimes
has a tricky compiler setup. Java doesn't have terribly much
support for game programming, and doesn;t have a great game-support
community.
Granted, they're not Klik and Play type programs, but it's useful to
know about these things in case a student wants to continue their
learning on their own.
This law also covers:
Sierra's SWAT games
Tom Clancy's Rainbow Six Games
Freedom Force's police bystanders
Counter Strike's anti-terrorist forces
Half Life's Barneys
Need for Speed's police persuit vehicles
Virtua Cop
Resident Evil's RCPD
Midtown Madness
Sim City (natural disasters vs. police stations)
Midnight Club
and...
The SIMs (I could create a family of cops)
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From their message boards, they're not supporting Win98 (only XP). Get on the ball guys - I'm not upgrading to M$pyware just to play your mod. :(
Let me see, they're suing IBM for 1 billion $.
That comes out to 60-100 million dollars per line of code.
I think we've just found the most expensive ASCII text in the world.
You can direct them to Allegro (http://www.allegro.cc), or even pygame (http://pygame.seul.org) if they show an interest past your class. Both of these packages can be set up in Win32 (with some work), and are a great start in C/C++ and Python development. They're free, use free compilers, don't require too many additional libraries/includes, and they have excellent example programs the kids can play with/learn from. They also have support forums geared to beginners, and have very friendly followings willing to help newcomers.
SDL (http://www.libsdl.org) and Java (http://java.sun.com) are less optimal choices. SDL requires a ton of includes, and someetimes has a tricky compiler setup. Java doesn't have terribly much support for game programming, and doesn;t have a great game-support community.
Granted, they're not Klik and Play type programs, but it's useful to know about these things in case a student wants to continue their learning on their own.
This law also covers: Sierra's SWAT games Tom Clancy's Rainbow Six Games Freedom Force's police bystanders Counter Strike's anti-terrorist forces Half Life's Barneys Need for Speed's police persuit vehicles Virtua Cop Resident Evil's RCPD Midtown Madness Sim City (natural disasters vs. police stations) Midnight Club and... The SIMs (I could create a family of cops)