Am I? Since I've been married my wife, who has supported me in my programming, drawing, and everything else I do for video games, I have been buying books from Amazon.com and games from our local stores. My problem is that I'm starting to wonder if I'm getting into programming and game programming too much here lately. I mean I have put out a lot of money in books, consoles, and games. Here is a list of all the books and games I have bought in order to see the dos and don'ts and what works and what doesn't work in games.
Books: Game Scripting Mastery, Red Hat Linux All-In-One Desk Reference for DUMMIES, gmax Bible, Teach Yourself Game Programming in 24 Hours, Teach Yourself C++ in 24 Hours, Game Coding Complete, Teach Yourself C++ in 21 Days, Game Design Secrets of the Sages, C++ for DUMMIES, Tricks of the Windows Game Programming Gurus, Tricks of the 3D Game Programming Gurus, Level Design for PC Games, Ultimate Game Design, C++ Primer, C/C++ Programmer's Reference
NES Games: Journey To Silius, Mario Bros./Duck Hunt, Zelda, Zelda 2, Metal Gear, Yo!Noid, Uncle Fester's Quest
PSOne Games(Mine): Parasite Eve, Parasite Eve 2, Final Fantasy Origins, Final Fantasy Chronicles, Final Fantasy Anthology, Final Fantasy VII, Final Fantasy VIII, Final Fantasy IX, Final Fantasy Tactics, Chrono Cross, Vanguard Bandits, Suikoden, Suikoden 2, Mortal Kombat 4, Resident Evil, Resident Evil 2, Silent Hill, Xenogears, Metal Gear Solid, Driver 2, Yu-Gi-Oh! Forbidden Memories, Spec Ops Covert Assault, Dave Mirra Freestyle BMX Maimum Remix, WWF War Zone, Gunship, Ehrgeiz, RPG Maker, Delta Force Urban Warfare, Countdown Vampires, Riven, Tony Hawk's Pro Skater 2, Tony Hawk's Pro Skater 3, Syndicate Wars, Grand Theft Auto, Grand Theft Auto London, Grand Theft Auto 2, Monster Rancher Battle Card Episode II
PSOne Games(My Wife's): The Land Before Time Return To The Great Valley, The Land Before Time Great Valley Racing Adventure, Rayman, Rayman Rush, Spyro the Dragon, Creatures
PS2 Games: Orphen Scion of Sorcery, Tony Hawk Underground, The Document of Metal Gear Solid 2, Red Faction, Socom, U.S. Navy Seals, The Sims, Dark Cloud, Aggressive Inline, Tony Hawk's Pro Skater 4, Final Fantasy X, Final Fantasy X-2, Matt Hoffman's Pro BMX 2, Grand Theft Auto III, Grand Theft Auto Vice City, Twisted Metal Black, Extermination, Metal Gear Solid 2 Sons of Liberty, Medal of Honor Frontline, Summoner, Gungrave, Resident Evil CODE Veronica X, Devil May Cry, Legends of Wrestling, Unreal Tounament, Stuntman, Kingdom Hearts, Shadow Man 2 Second Coming, Tony Hawk's Pro Skater 3, Max Payne
XBOX Games: Silen Hill 2 Restless Dreams, Sega GT 2002, Jet Set Raido Future, The Thing, Mech Assault, Star Wars The Clone Wars, Tetris Worlds, Airforce Delta Storm, Metal Gear 2 Substance
GameCube Games: Metal Gear Solid The Twin Snakes, Ty The Tasmanian Tiger, Midway Arcade Treaures, Sonic Mega Collection, Mortal Kombat V Deadly Alliance, NASCAR Thunder 2003
N64 Games: GoldenEye, Perfect Dark, Mario 64, Mario Kart 64, Duke Nukem Zero Hour, Mission Impossible, WCW/NWO World Tour, WCW/NWO Revenge, WWF No Mercy, WWF Wrestlemania 2000, Star Wars Shadows of the Empire, Yoshi's Story, Zelda Ocarina of Time, 1080° Snowboarding, Starcraft 64
Game Boy Advance Games: Golden Sun, Golden Sun The Lost Age, Pokemon Sapphire Version, Metroid Fusion, Lunar Legends, Final Fantasy Tactics Advance, Rayman Advance
PC Games: Starcraft, Starcraft Brood War Expansion Set, Majesty Gold Edition, The Sims Deluxe Edition, F.A.K.K. 2, Tony Hawk's Pro Skater 3, Sega Smash Pack, Sega Smash Pack 2
Dreamcast Games: Web Browser 2.0, Phantasy Star Online, Crazy Taxi 2, NFL Blitz 2000, WWF Royal Rumble

Are you on another bragging spree?

Seriously, that's stuff most of us could just dream about. Stop complaining.

Nah, you're just a compulsive buyer. 5 different C++ books ?:o Is that REALLY needed?

[edit]

It's MORE than most of us could just dream about. Buying 1 game/week would be enough for me:)

I agree with X-G, a supportive wife is very very rare.

Yeah, as long as your marriage is under no pressure from this, who cares? Everyone needs a hobby.

And if you have SC, I expect to see you on Sunday.

And here I thought 5 was far too little. Here's the C++ books I have (and these are only the ones I've kept)

C++ FAQs (2nd Edition)
STL Programming from the Ground Up
The C++ Programming Language (Special 3rd Edition)
C++ Primer Plus (4th Edition)
C++ Templates: The Complete Guide
The C++ Standard Library : A Tutorial and Reference
Modern C++ Design: Generic Programming and Design Patterns Applied
Exceptional C++: 47 Engineering Puzzles, Programming Problems, and Solutions
Thinking in C++, Vol. 2: Practical Programming, Second Edition
C++: The Complete Reference, 4th Edition
Effective STL: 50 Specific Ways to Improve Your Use of the Standard Template Library
Programming Embedded Systems in C and C ++
Essential C++
Inside the C++ Object Model

Actually, I go through an awful lot of programming books. I think of Amazon more as a rental service.

Incidentally here's the games I've bought over the last two years:
Heroes of Might and Magic 4,
Etherlords 2
Final Fantasy Tactics Advance

I would have bought more games, but everything else is a bunch of garbage. People don't write good games anymore.>:(

If you want to know if you're spending too much, a more relevant question is perhaps: are you enjoying your materialistic splendor and: are you financially secure?

I spend very little on video games and an awful lot on Power/Progressive Metal CDs and programming books, because that's the materialistic garbage I like.

Invest some in the materialistic garbage known as a mate perhaps? heh

It's not how many books you have; it's what you do with them

And Ashteth: I'm afraid
I can see maybe one C++ reference and one STL being a decent idea ... and something like "Exceptional C++: 47 Engineering Puzzles, Programming Problems, and Solutions" looks kinda fun, but wow! Overkill what? And if that's just the C++ books ...

Heh... I never go on and on about how much stuff I've got - I'd say you're on a real bragging spree too.

My wife supports me as well - I don't think they're as rare as most would like to believe... come on - it's the person you pick to 'spend the rest of your life with'. You really need to put some thought into that selection.

If it's getting to the point where it's taking away from other aspects of your life (like your wife). Either cut it down, or cut it out completely for at least awhile. But if it's not, and you have the time and money for your hobby, go for it.

I'm not bragging I'm just listing what I've bought in the past few years and wondering if I'm going overboard if I'm putting out that much money for my hobby(maybe I should call it a habit with all the stuff I've bought). I don't brag about what I own cause I don't consider myself fortunate to own it since others are way better off than me. Plus bragging means that I'm trying to look good in front of others and any one that knows me on here knows I could care less what others think about me. But I was just looking around my computer room/bedroom and started wondering if I am getting into programming and game programming too much to where I should ease it back some or just keep buying stuff and learning at the speed I've been learning. The games I own I only have cause I like playing them and they let me see what worked for that certain genre and didn't work.

Listen, it's only too much if YOU think it is. We can't decide that for you. And in the meantime you're making us feel bad because you have much more than we will ever have, and you have the guts to QUESTION that!?

You can give me a bit of your money so I can spend it on your hobby for you

Doesn't have a whole lot of NES games, though.

No, there's something worse than that: he doesn't even have the SNES!!!

I hope you have a mod chip.
That's like.. a few thousand dollars worth of games there. In which case, imo, that is overboard. If they're burnt rentals, then it all makes sense.

OTOH, if it's you hobby.. then lots of people spend far more on other things like old cars and stuff. It's basically the same thing.

Really, no Super Metroid? Metroid Fusion doesn't count even though it's a lot like SM. It's the worst of them all; even worse than Metroid II which was for original gameboy and without the instruction booklet has absolutely no stoyline and makes very little sense. I don't know what the hell Nintendo was thinking when they created the story for that one (Fusion).

I mean, come on. Yes, I'm obsessed with the Metroid series, but that; and Half-Life are definitely DOs. Go play those for what to do in games.

Now my real question is; have you beat and finished every single one of those games; and have you made a use for every book you've ordered. If not, then there's a problem.

Fusion was a great game. Metriod II was kind of boring (though challenging). I gave it to my brother as soon as I beat it.

14 C++ books isn't too much, like I said, treat Amazon like a rental company. Buy everything used, resell most of what you have in a reasonable time frame and don't be the one left with the "hot potato" when the new editions come out. It makes life a lot easier to program if you've got a lot of good books around. Just make sure you don't waste your money on 20 "Intro" books.

Now if you really wanted to be excessive with the books, you could subscribe to http://safari.informit.com and write an HTML harvester / PDF converter. Even I think this is excessive though.

Actually I was trying to get a SNES and Genesis because I like Final Fantasy Mystic Quest even though it was bad for the series and I loved Shining Force on Genesis as well as Haunted. Shining Force is on the PC Sega Smash Pack 2. I also planned to get Mario All Stars, Super Mario World, Super Metroid, Ultimate Mortal Kombat 3, and a few others. For the Genesis I was thinking about getting the first three Sonic games and Sonic Spinball.

Metroid Fusion was good, but too short, and gives you directions on where to go. I heard that Zero Mission was very good in most aspects of the gameplay.

Harbinger:

Isn't it wonderful that you have such a deep interest in such a rich field? After all its not like you're some otaku who sits an entire week in front of some 'junkie skinner-box' like Everquest? - THAT would be a problem.

If you spend too much time/money on it?.. I can't tell what's 'too much' for someone in your circumstances..

It seems like a lot of things, yes, but to me it mostly says that you really like making and playing games - and people who have No interests are really boring

With all those games I'm impressed you can find any time at all for reading or programming!

I would say that it's only a problem when you find that you have nothing else in your life! I say that because one day you might find yourself getting very unsatisfied with it all, and then you realise that so much else has passed you by, and it's too late by then! That said, if it makes you happy and the wife don't mind (and you can walk away from it when necessary!)... what the hell, enjoy yourself!

Yeah I loved the Shining games on megadrive/genesis as well!

Nothing wrong with having all those games.

Books, on the other hand ...

Our first computer, a BBC Micro, came with a User Guide. At some point, the family bought an Advanced User Guide. These two were more than enough for me to do anything I wanted in the way of programming on there.

Knowing BBC BASIC already, I think I relied on the built-in help when I wanted to learn QuickBASIC.

When I wanted to learn x86 assembly language, I bought one book. That was enough, for 16-bit real-mode stuff at least. It didn't include how to program Sound Blaster cards though, so I bought another book with that and lots of other PC hardware programming details. That was the extent of my pre-DJGPP book buying.

At some point dad got Turbo C from somewhere, and I borrowed a book on C from the library. I learnt enough to solve some kind of maths problem in C, but I couldn't do graphics and gave up in favour of what I was familiar with. Then I found DJGPP, and with it, Allegro. I think I may have borrowed another book on C from the library. After a while I didn't need the book any more, and when I'm not sure of something, I use online references.

I learnt Java from lecture notes, so that made me familiar with OOP in general. I then proceeded to figure out C++ from online resources.

I've bought an introductory book on DSP (digital signal processing). It took me ages to find one that was actually written in English instead of deep, incomprehensible mathematics, and it's still too difficult for me.

I have bought a grand total of four books on Japanese. First I bought Japanese for Busy People Volume I. Then I got near the end of it, bought Volume II, and had a look at the other books in the shop. An Oxford grammar and verb reference caught my eye. I asked a Japanese person to judge it for me, and she said it looked good, so I bought it. Finally, I bought JfBP Volume III a week ago. I have also been using a couple of pieces of software to learn the writing, and watching plenty of anime to practise my listening skills.

I'd say that commitment, motivation and perseverance matter a lot more than the number of books. Some of your books look interesting, but most of them are just to help you learn the language. You should only need one such book.

I do have a slight problem with buying more fiction books than I have time to read. But bookshops are such a nice place

Didn't say there was, lucky for me since I have way to many games.

yaaay! You too huh? BBC Basic was really cool.
I loved the way it had a built in Assembler too, One of the few (only?) 8bits with 2 built in languages.
I once typed in a proggy from a magazine, it had 2 versions, one basic one asm. It filled the screen with crap!! the asm version ran about 10 times faster (seriously!) it was almost instant. The basic one took aaages! my first experience of the power of low level programming.
Oh! sorry I'm rambling... happens when you get old!

THREAD SUCCESSFULLY HIJACKED AFTER what is it 24 posts?

We've still got our BBC computer. It's sitting to the right of my PC monitor right now. I power it up and play with it every now and then.

If only the Speech ROM still worked. That was fun.

Pah! I have one book on QuickBASIC (tehQuickBASIC Bible), one (real-mode) assembler book, two books listing interrupts (one for BIOS functions, one for DOS functions) and one book on C. That makes five programming related books total. Add my SuSE Linux guide (and two updates), my PostScript reference and a bad book on HTML and you have all computer books I own.
You really don't need that many. It's not bad if you have more (especially not if it's your field ofwork - I have several books on thermodynamics and quantum mechanics), just not nescessary.

I share your pain... if only I could sleep less, I couldread so much more...

I didn't bother reading much of the other posts; but to clarify about Metroid Fusion (even though this is off topic):
By saying it's the worst of the series I am talking about storyline and coherency with the rest of the Metroid world. It just didn't fit in as nicely, and it lost a lot of the exploring feel that Metroid offered by having that computer tell you where to go almost every turn you take. I found it frustrating. That's the only major gamplay flaw. "I see that some thing has blown up. Oh well, now go to sector X and get this item which I will tell you about so it takes away the whole fun of finding items on your own." Granted, that system made the game make more "sense" and seem more realistic in terms of "finding" items, but.. ehh.

As for the complete game itself, yes, it was a good game. You may even say it was great. I was just greatly disappointed with the storyline for that one. I think without fusion the Metroid series would be just a little more great. The initial concept was very intriguing; I just think it was pulled off incorrectly. (Adam Malkovich... pfft. Give me a break;D) I'm just bitter because it disappointed me; that's all.

[edit]
Upon re-reading my post I would like to say that, given the fact that another installment of the series may arise which gives more insight into the seemingly "shoved in there" parts of storyline that lack cohesion with the rest of the series; I may change my attitude entirely about Fusion. But; that's only a Dream (please come true!;D:)), for another Metroid game. I think they're making a sequel to Prime, but that's not the same as classic 2d.

I've got Haskell - A guide to functional programming and some Java book. Both for my education. And that's it.

I, believe it or not, do not own one programming book that deals with C or C++. I have a Java book and a Linux book, though. Rarely used; but very useful when I need to use them. I also have a Game Design book, which was quite good. Read it from cover to cover; which is something you don't usually do with a book of that kind, but I liked it. I wish I could invest more money in books and not feel like "Oh, hey, there goes 50-75 bucks for each book I just bought." They're so expensive.

I've got 11 or 12 technical books. A bunch I found used. The really good ones would be:

• (the original) Tricks of the Game Programming Gurus

• Sam's Teach Yourself C++ in 21 days (both very good and very bad)

• OpenGL Game Programming

• And a C/C++ reference book.

I've got about a dozen programming books. Last two I bought were Effective C++ and More Effective C++. They didn't teach me a whole lot of new stuff, actually ... but I did kind of get my understanding clarified on a few points.

I'm still trying to figure out what to do with my fat income tax refund. Probably mean more books ...

Books, you gotta be kidding me, all I need can be found online, no need to pay for it.
I'd buy spellcasters book though, if it wasn't in german.

I wanted to post in this thread for some while now... I can assure you, that you're not over the top - at least not with regards to books.. here's a small list of books I have next to my computer:

The Dragon Book
OpenGL Red Book
Artificial Intelligence - A Modern Approach
Zen of Graphics Programming
Zen of Code Optimization
Prgramming Win95
The Humane Interface
The Photoshop Wow! Book
Managing Projects with make
Win95 Regitry Coding
Graphic File Formats
The Blender Book
Game Programming Gems I
Game Programming Gems II
Game Programming Gems III
Designing little languages
Effective C++
More Effective C++
Real Time Rendering
Advanced 3d Photorealism techniques
Inside DirectX
Pragmatic Programmer
Desging Patterns
Desgning Arcade Computer Game Graphics
The Essentials of User Interface Design
The C Programming Language
Algorithms in C
Game Architecture and Design
Sword and Circuitry
Secret of the Sages
1000 Game Heroes
Tricks of the Game Programming Gurus

And those are just the books I normally use while coding games... add Perl, PHP, ASP, Java and some really abstract books (Art of Pgramming, Operating Systems, etc.) books to that list... and you know why we need a larger flat

I've a large collection of games, and I normally don't even have the time to play games... my GBA SP is covered with dust... geez... I really need some time off

But what I wanted to say is: You're not alone

Yes... But you are a machine!

And where is your book?

Right now it's on my desk between Zen of Graphics and Programminging Win 95.
But I decided to list only the English books

I thought it would be "Secrets of the Spellcaster" next to your Secrets of the Sages book.

I only have a few books. They are thick and comprehensive, but my memory is poor so there is not so much point having lots of books. I'd spend all my time rereading them!

Steve++: I have no projects listed cause I don't use Allegro anymore. I use WinAPI/DX/C++ and I'm currently learning scripting. I may come back to Allegro in the future but right now I'm pro Microsoft and I like developing just for Windows. Matthew, Bob, 23yrold3yrold, and several others have told me that I could ask questions here about Windows game programming (which I have a little but it is pretty easy to do at least easier to do than what others have made it out to be). All my Allegro projects that I had going that I hadn't put on the Depot I turned into Windows games, but I've backed off from those projects because of personal reasons. When I dealt with the problems I started working on my new project Lockdown, but I don't like releasing demos so it won't be released until I get 100% done with it. As for beta and alpha testing I have my friends at work do the testing for me since they love games and have PCs.

I hate the Super Metroid wall jump!!!! it's impossible!!!

also, I've got the Waite Book "Object Oriented Programming in C++" it's not bad. I used to have the Waite Book on game programming, for any language. It was all like "your a magical magician creating magical spells in the form of 1's and 0's". It came with some Apogee games, a space shooter and Wolf3D, taught you raycasting and stuff like that.

In case it hasn't already been mentioned:

Extreme Programming Explained

Harbinger, what kind of game are you working on at the moment? Any screenshots? What are you gonna use the scripting for?