VBGamer

hi everyone, my initial stages into the frontier of programming has been successful. i would guess to myself i have passed the initial stage, the stage where you feel if you've actually learned something from a book, and feel that its worth while to move on. I read the VB(dummy) book I bought in one week, and have written 80 lines of code, for shield status, power status and phaser power status readouts. Believe me I am not trying to impress you, (I would never be so naive) you would stick one line of directx code in front my face and I would pass out :) As I was progressing through the book I noticed I was moving quite fast, and I wasn't really practicing the stuff in real detail...reading is one thing doing is another.. so I then decided to create this little program to do what I described above. I decided to do this the day after I read the first 2 chapters in section 4, (writing basic code) finally after 200 pages the book got down to what I wanted to do. so one day after I had read 2 chapters in that section..I began the program..2 days later I had come so far, I said to myself, you know 3 days ago I would never have known where to start! And really you have to start somewhere! I find doing this gives experience...the know how.. anyway my main concern is where to go from here, im not one who can only learn from a structured or linear course or topics. but i dont want to make the mistake of jumping to something I shouldn't, or that would be easier to understand and learn if I had done something else first before I went to this (new) something. anyway ill find my way... i come to ask you, is vb gaming in trouble? what with the creation of this new enviroment(a basic language built on top a superb directx engine) darkBASIC. In the last few years vb gaming has really soared like the bond market. it's got so much better for you guys, you guys who code games in VB, faster, more efficient(even though its as hard to learn these news things, like directx) but never has VB been at its strongest in the element of programming games. It has come so far, will it go farther? do you farsee any more leaps and bounds in the efficiency of VB...from hearing others talk i guess i know for sure (definite) it will never catch up to C. (since i know not even one syntax in C, i can just report what others say who know it) so what do you guys think? do you think darkBASIC is really as hot as all their claims..I mean go read all the writeup they have on that damn thing.....you would think it's a nuclear missle...they have like 4 pages dedicated telling you why darkBASIC will be the enviroment of the future.. are they exagerating? are they just swaying a little bias? making it sound a little better than it really is? if any of you have or use both whats your impressions? whats the future for VB, in 2 years time will VB become completely obselete, and as fast as all these VB sites popped up they'll just wink out of existence as something newer and better comes along? will microsoft keep supporting it and keep it up to date and keep it moving with these new technologies? can anything else which comes down the market be as "easy" and as "powerful at the same time? (did I write a good post?? or no one thinks about this stuff really?) by the way i suck, i think maybe in time ill be an okay programmer, but in no way i am boasting anything. i humble myself before you great VBers! -cruisin out!