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Blog Post · What is the best way of making games in C++ in Open Source toolkits?

What is the best way of making games in C++ in Open Source toolkits? ^

Posted On Thursday 5 August 2010 by Tom Leese (TomMan)

In C++ there are many ways in which you could create games. Here are your options:

• SDL


• OpenGL


• Qt


• GTK

There are probably some more that I've missed but these are the toolkits I am most familiar with.

Firstly, we have SDL. SDL is designed to be used for making games from the beginning. SDL is very fast and very lightweight. Unfortunately, it is low-level so it can be a hard to start programming with SDL. In general, SDL is an excellent toolkit for writing games.

Next, OpenGL. This is the best option for people who want awesome looking and extremely fast 2D games, or excellent 3D Games. OpenGL can't be used on it's own, it has to be used with a library for managing windows, etc. From what I know you can use OpenGL with Qt, SDL, Windows Forms, GTK, and GLUT.

Next, Qt! Now, Qt is by far my favorite toolkit of them all. It is fast, easy to use and has amazing documentation. Unfortunately though, Qt is not the best toolkit for making games. It has a lot of useless technologies behind it when you write games in it which can make the games slow compared to SDL or OpenGL.

Finallly, GTK. I have not really used GTK must, but I used to use PyGTK loads because I prefered it to PyQt. From what I can see GTK is not really a very good toolkit for making games, but it is an excellent toolkit for making applications.

In conclusion, I have decided that if I were writing a game I would choose SDL + OpenGL because it is fastest and although it requires some learning it is an excellent solution for creating games.

Further Reading

• NeHe OpenGL Tutorials


• Qt Docs