Rating: 
Summary: Not again
Review: How many times is this guy going to rewrite Teach Yourself Game Programming in 21 Days? We had that one, then the Black Art of 3D Game Programming (which was a rehash including stuff from Tricks of the Game Programming Gurus), then another rehash Windows Game Programming for Dummies, then yet another rehash Tricks of the Windows Game Programming Gurus, and now this one. And there is another one in the pipeline, Windows Game Programming for Dummies Second Edition. He takes the old book, cleans out all the obselete code from DirectX n, and slaps in a version of the DirectX n+1 documentation with corny commentary, and makes another giant wad of money.Hey, I'm not saying he shouldn't make all the money he can, but I'd be bored as hell with explaining how to write Frogger 4.0, this time with 16 bit color! It's pretty much the same book. All the old functionality from DirectX n is present in DirectX n+1, so why buy the new book? The old ones would work just as well if you want to know how to program a 2D game like Missile Command, and you can find them [cheaper] used. I also don't understand why "3D" appears in the title of this book if the only coverage of Direct3D is not in the book but on the CD. Come on, it's not that hard to do 3D. The answer to all these rhetorical questions is, of course, that the books are written for 14-year-old's with their first C compiler and ready to rock and roll, and as long as they keep buying this dude is going to keep making money. They're salivating over "3D"? Give them a book on how to write a Quake or a flight simulator or something and you'll see the money roll in. Yeah, it'd take about 1000 pages to explain the basics in sufficient detail, but LaMothe already takes that much talking about 2D ...intercourse. Cut it out (make them buy another book!)
Rating: 
Summary: MUST BUY book for windows game programming!
Review: A Great book that covers everything you need to know to create a windows based game. From the basics to more intense game programming stuff like AI and 3D.
I found the source code CD to be very very helpful. All the code in the book is on the CD as well as the executables.
Rating:
Summary: Great for any real-time interactive Windows application
Review: I highly recommend Tricks of the Windows Programming Gurus, 2nd Edition, both for its clear and comprehensive content, and for the amazing responsiveness of its author, Andre' LaMothe.
As context for the comments below, here at TechnoFrolics, we do not develop games, but rather, kinetic science-artworks and interactive educational science exhibits. What we were looking for was a book that provided information on Windows overall design, its API, and its extensions, as related to developing fluid, real-time graphics environments with near instantaneous (in the scale of human perception) response to user input. These issues are very similar to those encountered developing a computer game.
Mr. LaMothe's book is well written and easy to follow, very comprehensive, has good example code (a CD is included), and is organized in a manner that readily allows finding the pieces you need (for example, information on Direct X, the Windows event loop, etc.). The book does not assume extensive prior knowledge, starting with basic Windows programming, yet also gets into enough detail to be useful to experienced programmers. It addresses topics on various levels of complexity and abstraction, and describes both general structures and specific implementations.
Overall, the book educates without giving one a huge headache (a distressingly rare quality), and we have found it extremely helpful in our work.
Quite separate from his book, Mr. LaMothe is himself a fantastically helpful and friendly resource. Because of our unfamiliarity with the game industry, as well as subtle differences between our applications and typical games, we had several questions ranging from the simple to the complex. Mr. LaMothe responded to our email queries with a speed and attentiveness quite extraordinary.
How many books (technical or otherwise) come with personal assistance from their author?
Finally, if you are interested in the hardware as well as the software of dedicated game platforms, while we have not ourselves used the system and thus cannot comment on it in detail, you may wish to check out Mr. LaMothe's XGameStation Micro Edition development kit at www.xgamestation.com. Assuming it is of the same quality as his book, it is virtually guaranteed to provide a high quality learning experience.
Rating: 
Summary: Not the overall best available resource for this
Review: Having started reading LaMothe books going way back into the old DOS days, I have to say this book is definitely more extensive when dealing with the particular OS (Win). But as always he has a tendancy to fill pages with nonsense rather than content. If you follow up with his next book to this one; Tricks of the 3D Game Programming Gurus (adv. 3d graphics and rasterization) you'll find the same writing style. In fact, I have as of yet to see a departure from this very style in any of his works, and I'm talking about going back a bunch of years. I guess if you can get past the numerous pages of useless information and vapid attempts at overall humor, then you may find some very useful information that is organized fairly well in this book. Although his style grates my nerves, when you reach a section in his books where he actually deals with the topic at hand, he is clear and thorough, though never concise.
I rate all his books as 3/5 because of this. Some people find his departure from topic and humor entertaining. If you are looking for a book dealing with this subject matter; Windows game programming foundations, then this is a very good book. Just be aware you may have to read 4 pages of somewhat related material on the chapters subject before he gets to the point. I know it fills the pages in the book, but from the standpoint of rapidly finding pertinent and useful information his books can be a trial of your patience.
I buy his books because as I said, when he gets to the point, his information is accurate, albeit sometimes older methodologies, and will allow you to bring to life on your windows your very own game. I recommend the second book in this 'series' with the same caveats.
Both he and SAMS publishing are always far too proud of their products, reflected in their inflated pricing. If you can find his books second+ hand at a substantial discount from retail, buy them.
Another warning to the casual reader looking for understanding of the subject, he can have the tendency of exposing advanced techniques early in a chapter that he doesn't explain fully until many chapters later. This goes for his math and derivations too. But when dealing with an advanced subject like 3D math; vectors, points, planes, intersections, etc.., you would do well to have a very decent book on algebra, geometry and in some cases calc (just in case it's been a few decades since you've used it).
And as always, he really needs a better group of proof-readers before it hits the shelves. Other than that, get it.
Rating:
Summary: Fantastic & Balanced
Review: I was a little weary of giving this piece a five-star rating but I think it duly deserves it. LaMothe has taken a very large topic, Game Programming, and elegantly explained the core workings of a game engine, programmed in C (some C++) based in a graphic environment (Windows).
This book is by no means "exhaustive" on the topics of game programming, (If you want to understand 3d game engine rasterization, try his second volume in this series), however, if you feel as though you want to know how a game engine is designed from the ground up with virtually nothing more than a window and some directx interfaces, then this might be your book.
The Book's Strengths:
- Well written & casual
- Deep, meaningful explanations of function calls & mathematics
- Well structured game engine architecture
- Excellent coverage of advanced physics (more mathematics) & how they are converted directly into EFFICIENT algorithms
- Code is easy to read (READ THE CODE, NOT JUST THE BOOK!)
I would like to note that this book is worth it's source code's weight in gold IN MY OPINION. I read the first eight chapters and felt lost... but when I just reviewed every example in the source I had been reading about, I started to understand and now everything makes sense! If you want to know even more, make sure you have the MSDN (at msdn.com) open in a browser somewhere for quick reference.
THE BOOK'S SHORTCOMING'S:
(this is what you all want to know right?)
*- excessive descriptions of inefficient algorithms FIRST, then moving into how the efficient algorithms were resolved.
- some code lines (maybe 12 in the whole book) don't match up correctly with the disc source (This isn't a problem if you use just the source on the disc. That code compiles correctly).
- some explanations of rudimentry C syntax is missing like explanations of complex #defines for macros and some struct notation but this is assumed.
- his humour is very ... well, it's LaMothe. :)
*Note: I am not sure if this is so much a shortcoming as it's a hinderence to someone who wants to understand the current and correct way to render or do something. First, LaMothe likes to show you how something was originally done (for example, the handling of DirectX COM objects, or the simplistic drawing of a line pixel by pixel) and then shows you the more effective way of doing it. This is great for someone who doesn't know or doesn't need to know how to get started right away and doesn't mind coming back to those pages in the book a week later ;-) but for most people it doesn't matter. Ironically, I didn't mind this but most might.
BOTTOM LINE: I am not an expert programmer or an expert reviewer.. But I think this book is fantastic. It is well organized and contains stunningly easy to read source. If you want to try another book, try the "Game Programming Gems" series. I hear they are wonderful as well.
Buy it for no more than 2/3 of it's list price ($60) though!
|
