Customer Reviews

Beginning OpenGL Game Programming

5 star:		(14)
4 star:		(6)
3 star:		(2)
2 star:		(2)
1 star:		(3)

 

 

As an author, it's important to me that potential readers of this book know what they are getting in advance, so that they can have all the information they need when deciding whether or not to buy it.

This book is intended for people who have some experience programming in C++ who can make a basic program on their platform of choice. Some knowledge of 3D math will be helpful, though not strictly required.

This book focuses on teaching the portions of OpenGL that are relevant to game development. Topics covered include using OpenGL with Win32, states, primitives, transformations and matrices, color, lighting, materials, blending, fog, images and bitmaps, texture mapping (including mipmapping, multitexturing, combiners, texgen, and environment mapping), extensions, displaying text, display lists, vertex arrays, frustum culling, and buffers. The material is pulled together in a Battle Chess-like example game in the final chapter. The demo programs were written for Windows, but we separated the platform specific code from the OpenGL code, so they should be easily portable to other platforms.

This book started out as a second edition of OpenGL Game Programming, but we decided to split it into two volumes (the second of which will be available next year). If you've already read the original book, you probably don't need this one, though you'll definitely find some useful things in it. We've reviewed everything and corrected many technical errors, as well as updating the text for OpenGL 1.5. Many sections have been completely rewritten, and we've added a new chapter and several new sections. We've also included many of the chapters from the original book on the CD, so at half the price (or less) we think it's a great value.

Additional information about the book, including contact information for Kevin and myself, can be found at glbook.gamedev.net. We're committed to providing continual support for this book, so don't hesitate to contact us.

This book is basically an updated version of "OpenGL Game Programming", with the old chapters on DirectX placed in a CD-ROM. It is definitely for C++ programmers who are unfamiliar with OpenGL. It doesn't focus on intermediate or advanced topics like performance, 3d math, collision detection, etc; it just covers the API. If you want to start learning OpenGL, and would like to use it to quickly make something that you can see, I recommend this book.

Beginning OpenGL Game Programming is a great introduction for those with little to no experience with OpenGL.

I have used it both as an introduction for a few projects I worked on as well as a refresher for a position I will soon begin.

Intended for a beginner (obviously), it does a very good job of getting someone up to speed swiftly. Unlike the many other books in the field, it manages to stay at only roughly 300 pages. That the authors managed to put so much information in such a (relatively) small number of pages is impressive.

The book doesn't waste time with stories and constant vernacular like "cool" and "dude" as so many other related titles do. However, while maintaining a professional feel, it is by no means a boring or a dry read.

Another aspect that is worth mentioning is the quality of the code and examples themselves. While most books will build a massive, hard to follow engine, Beginning OpenGL Game Programming manages to keep it under control. Much like the book itself, the source is without unnecessary bloat. I was able to look back on any chapter and read the source without having to jump to prior chapters for code clarification or explanation.

Lastly, I can say firsthand that the authors are easily reached and quite dedicated to the book.

For the incredibly low price, this is a terrific bargain.

While all the information in this book can be found free on the net, (nehe.gamedev.net would be an excellent resource and is even mentioned in the book), the book combines all that knowledge into one location with each topic thoroughly covered in an easily accessible way.

It doesn't try to teach you how to program C++ nor does it try to teach you 3D math fundamentals (outside of how matrices and transformations apply to OpenGL specifically). It just teaches you OpenGL. With that said, there are some bonus chapters on the CD that goes into vectors and matrix math, as well as an indepth chapter on how to work with windows. The other bonus chapters are great and worth studying as well, particularly the chapters on DirectInput and DirectAudio (though I would love to see at least some mention of alternative API's such as OpenAL).

Each chapter is presented with sample code and executables demonstrating the topic covered. Chapter 13 has a complete 3D Battle Chess style chess game. It won't win any awards, but it's very cool none-the-less! If that weren't enough, there's also a Bonus game, complete with code, that while not quite as cool as the chess game, is worth studying on how the authors put a game together, complete with (very) basic AI and gives you clues and direction toward implementing your own game.

Get this book and mess with the code! See what you can add to the Bonus Game! Try to make the monsters fight back, remove the double explosion sound bug (at least on my machine), make the world bigger and reduce the density of the fog, go nuts!

This isn't the last OpenGL book you'll need to buy, but it certainly should be one of the first!

I'm not new to programming, but I am new to OpenGL. With this book I was able to get a demo to my employer to pursuade them to do our next project in 3D. Very well written and easy to understand with lots of examples. With the additional material on the cd, it's a great value too.

I give this book five stars because it solved my problem for $20.

If you are interested in cross-platform OpenGL programming then DO NOT buy this book, it is M$ Windows Dependant. The title should have been "Beginning OpenGL Windows Game Programming".

Prior to reading this book, my only exposure to OpenGL was through code I borrowed from people off the net. The code created a simple window and drew an object, and I would tweak the code to do what I wanted. But I didn't really know how to use OpenGL.

This book helped me understand the basics of OpenGL, and it gave me enough information so that I could find additional resources to learn more. The authors have done a spectacular job of explaining technical details in a clear and concise manner.

Beginning OpenGL Game Programming started off as a second edition of OpenGL Game Programming. One of the primary characteristics of Premier's new "Beginning" series is that the books are shorter, and thus cheaper. Because this book is in many ways still a second edition of the original book, some of the text is the same. If you've already read OpenGL Game Programming, whether or not you'll benefit from it is debatable. But for the price, you're not risking much. The book is compatible with OpenGL 1.5, which was the latest version available at the time of publication. "More OpenGL Game Programming", a more recent publication, picks up where this book leaves off, covering topics including vertex buffer objects, shaders, advanced texture mapping, and much more. So if you like this book, you should love the more advanced sequel.
The purpose of this book is to offer a simpler introduction to programming with the OpenGL API than many other introductory OpenGL books currently in publication. This book covers most, but not all, of the current OpenGL specification and the OpenGL Utility Toolkit. The authors have mostly concentrated on the "beginning" aspect, making the book a short, focused, and easy read, meant to be useful to accomplished programmers with no experience using a 3D API and those programmers coming to OpenGL for the first time, presenting an OpenGL overview and avoiding the tougher and deeper aspects beyond the fixed function pipeline. While "Beginning OpenGL Game Programming" attempts to remain platform neutral, the primary platform focus is on Microsoft Windows. All of the examples are engineered for this single operating system, with an entire chapter dedicated to the specific issues you'll face when implementing a solution on a Win32 platform utilizing OpenGL. However, the authors have made every attempt, where possible, to make the information relevant to programmers developing for other platforms such as Mac OSX and Linux. To its credit, this text stays on topic and does not throw in the kitchen sink as earlier Premier Press graphics books tended to do. The authors assume that you know your way around a compiler, C++, and the basics of the math used in 3D graphics. The authors haven't assumed you know what a projection matrix is, or how to handle a camera frustum, but they are expecting you to know how to add two vectors and multiply two matrices.
The CD contains all of the source code from the book with accompanying Microsoft Developer Studio projects, an extension library that simplifies working with OpenGL, and eight bonus chapters that did not make it in to the printed book. These bonus chapters cover some not so "beginning" subjects such as quadrics, curves, and surfaces, plus "off-topic" chapters discussing how to utilize DirectAudio and DirectInput. This should be no surprise, since the book is very Microsoft Windows centric to begin with. The CD also includes "kitchen sink" information such as the obligatory, relatively coherent math primer, which also covers some basic 3D graphics theory, e.g. texture mapping and lighting. The CD also includes a bonus first-person shooter game for you to play along with full source code and a chapter on how it was created that demonstrates most of what was covered in the various chapters such as fog, animated meshes, view transformations, camera movement, and 2D text.
In conclusion, "Beginning OpenGL Game Programming" is a perfect introduction to developers not yet up to speed on OpenGL development issues. The only negative things I can say about the book is that it concentrates a bit too much on Microsoft Windows and that it covers only the fixed function pipeline of OpenGL.

Overall this book was an excellent resource for getting on your feet with OpenGL.

It covers pretty much every basic topic conceivable along with touching on the some advanced uses of basic concepts. One thing that I found particularly annoying, however, was that the book claims to go into "much greater detail" concerning models later in the book, but after that line I found nary a reference to them. The author just uses the MD2 file format in the concluding "End Game" sample on the CD without ever having mentioned it in the book. Writing any useful graphics application requires using a model format, and it irks me very much that the book didn't cover it.

One other problem with the book is its age - it covers version 1.5 of OpenGL, while 2.0 has been out for a while now. But like I have already stated, it's a great book to jump into GL with.

Some reviewers have remarked that the book concentrates overly on OpenGL running on a Microsoft operating system. But most of the text on the usage of OpenGL is quite independent of the OS. And the passages specific to Microsoft are a reflection of the market reality on the desktop. I considered Astle to be quite reasonably pragmatic in offering the latter advice.

You might find it handy to have done some graphics programming already. Irrespective of whatever package you used. The details in this book show OpenGL to be very formidable in capability. Luckily, you don't have to comprehensively know all the functions in the book.