I share the overal nostalgia here (I learned BASIC on an Amstrad 6128 with nothing but a book and some teenage summer nights to waste.)
I also agree that I don't know which took I would point out to a kid wanting to start today, that would not involve a probably complicated setup.
That being said, I also remember being pretty frustrated that the best I was able to do - lacking resources, books, Internet, etc... - was put a couple of pixels around, and pretend it was a game (and be ashamed of it, even if it was in 1993 or something.)
A kid starting Unity3D today, on the other hand, would probably, (after a few hours lost installing stuff), create a decent-looking game in a few weeks of following Youtube tutorials and stealing art assets all over the internet.
Or is it not even possible ?
Anyway, my questions would be: what kind missions where you doing, entirely solo ?
Do you think the language itself had anything to do with the ease of starting ?
Do you think it would be satisfying to someone to start with something that lets them draw stuff, bounce a ball, etc... in a "limited" language, in a "fake" environment, before diving into the "hard" part, trying to do it by hand, etc...
Had the exact same experience with C= 64 and the guidebook that came with it.
Never thought I was doing something silly peek/poke'ing memory and using data segments to represent sprites on screen. I was adding numbers to represent pixels on a 16 bit row as soon as I learned how addition worked at school.
Later on, I was using sin/cos to represent motion as soon as I learned how trigonometry worked at school. Along with some bresenham algorithms book I found at a university to draw lines and circles more correctly and effectively.
Some time later, I was visualizing prime numbers and geometric primitives in ways I could only imagine.
Later, I was using derivatives to represent optimal solutions to targeting problems as soon as I learned how differential equations worked.
Later, I was using field equations to represent gravitational pull in n-body simulations as soon as I learned about them.
Then things became more abstract, like visualizing finite automata and abstracting logic circuits.
Until that time, I did not need to leave the editor or download someone's libraries. It was all there. My age of discovery was a continuous experience that spanned over 10-13 years and defined my abilities as a programmer today.
I was never ashamed of "putting two pixels together" or envious of kids that "could make a game in two weeks using stolen assets and unity" - a program that places sprites on screen using easing algorithms and accelerated graphics. More power to them.
I also agree that I don't know which took I would point out to a kid wanting to start today, that would not involve a probably complicated setup.
That being said, I also remember being pretty frustrated that the best I was able to do - lacking resources, books, Internet, etc... - was put a couple of pixels around, and pretend it was a game (and be ashamed of it, even if it was in 1993 or something.)
A kid starting Unity3D today, on the other hand, would probably, (after a few hours lost installing stuff), create a decent-looking game in a few weeks of following Youtube tutorials and stealing art assets all over the internet.
Or is it not even possible ?
Anyway, my questions would be: what kind missions where you doing, entirely solo ?
Do you think the language itself had anything to do with the ease of starting ?
Do you think it would be satisfying to someone to start with something that lets them draw stuff, bounce a ball, etc... in a "limited" language, in a "fake" environment, before diving into the "hard" part, trying to do it by hand, etc...