I would advise against it

I first would like to say that this book is most definitely not for people with no programming experience (but you could have figured that out from the rest of the reviews)

I work at a video game studio as a scripter and am working my way up to become a programmer. I picked this book up a while back and just got around to opening it a few weeks back. The first section of the book was excellent in helping me understand the programming concepts used in video game development. But only because I was able to identify the absurd amount of syntax errors in the example that a beginner wouldn't.

I only had this book on my desk for two days before I was shamed into putting it far back in one of my drawers. It seemed that every programmer who noticed this book had something bad to say about it. Criticism of the choice to use DirectX to teach beginners how to program graphics have been the most popular. That is why I can't say anything about the book's effectiveness past the first section (so that's what gets 3 stars).

The review below entitled "A note from the author" below is from the author of the second edition about the second edition, mistakenly put on the first edition's page. That one sounds better but considering the author can't even do a shameless plug for his own book correctly... I wouldn't risk it.

Other Reviews

• 2nd Edition by Mr. Harbour
• Hard to get into
• An excelent learning tool.
• a pretty good book
• I would advise against it