A letter to a 12-year-old

  67 Responses to “A letter to a 12-year-old”

1. Internet Website Programming Blog says:

   March 15, 2008 at 2:07 am

   my answer, which may help other 12-year-olds out there wondering about getting into the industry. BTW, if you had to recommend a programming language to today’s 12-year-olds, what would it be? Dear _______, I’m sorry it took me so long to answer your..[more]. It is just getting started: (more…)
2. Chess Board says:

   March 12, 2008 at 3:03 am

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3. Chess Rules says:

   March 12, 2008 at 2:55 am

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4. Chess Pieces says:

   March 12, 2008 at 2:42 am

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5. Chinese Warrior Chess Set says:

   March 12, 2008 at 2:28 am

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6. Surferwoman says:

   March 12, 2008 at 1:56 am

   The Boar’s Head Tavernwrote an interesting post today on Here’s a quick excerpt I recently got one of those letters from a student asking about my job. Someday, I suppose, I will be too busy to answer letters like this. But I am not just quite yet. It’s been sitting
7. Novelty Chess Set says:

   March 12, 2008 at 1:42 am

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8. How To Play Chess says:

   March 12, 2008 at 1:25 am

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9. Free Chess Games says:

   March 12, 2008 at 1:22 am

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10. Free Chess Download says:

    March 12, 2008 at 1:01 am

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11. Gene says:

    March 11, 2008 at 7:31 pm

    BTW, if you had to recommend a programming language to today’s 12-year-olds, what would it be?

    It was C64 Basic for me but I think today JavaScript or anthing that comes from ECMA-262 (ECMAScript) would be a safe choice. This covers Flash (ActionScript), Director (JavaScript was added in the last version), Unity (looked pretty cool at GDC), the browser and lots of other stuff that should be relatively accessable to a teen and allow him to change his mind a few times about what to dive into.
12. Max Battcher says:

    March 11, 2008 at 9:39 pm

    Allow me to chime in with a suggestion for Python. It’s a language designed, to a certain extent, with readability in mind and I think it’s important for every starting programmer to focus on just trying to read and explore other people’s code as much as, if not more than, frustratingly trying to hammer out their own, from scratch.

    I’ve also heard great things about PyGame for those seeking to do something game-y with their coding. (Haven’t tried it myself, but the tutorials do make it seem nice.)
13. Morgan Ramsay says:

    March 11, 2008 at 10:58 pm

    Do you think it is impossible for me to create even if I am only 12 and in 7th grade?

    I started learning HTML and QBasic in 4th or 5th grade. I never programmed games; instead, I created system utilities, such as an operating system boot menu. I moved from QBasic to PowerBasic to start compiling my own binaries. I tried learning C++, bought and read plenty of books, but I couldn’t ever remember what I read. The language simply isn’t natural.

    Max Battcher wrote:

    Allow me to chime in with a suggestion for Python.

    Python’s great, but for a kid totally new to programming? Might not be so great. Today’s kids are treated to advanced user interfaces. Working with the command line would be a jarring experience. I recently replaced Windows XP Professional SP3 on my laptop with Xubuntu. I had to configure, make and install Python, Lua, and Ruby. Even I wasn’t sure how to do that at first, mainly because I never installed the basic dependencies.

    If I were 12, I’d probably go with Ruby, given the great introductory documentation and helpful community. BlitzBasic or DarkBasic, of course. Game Maker (GML) from YoYo Games, definitely. Visual Basic and VBScript as a last resort. Or start with just Metaplace and Lua when public.

    http://www.ruby-doc.org/

    http://www.ruby-lang.org/en/documentation/quickstart/

    There’s a great thread on the Ubuntu fourms called “‘Hello Ubuntu’ in every programming language”. Good place to go to check out which language makes creating your first application easiest.

    http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=497579
14. Rod says:

    March 11, 2008 at 11:27 pm

    I can’t answer for a 12 year old specifically, but I’m beginning to teach my 7 year old daughter how to program in Python. So far it’s going quite well.

    The main selling point, apart from its being a bloody good language, is its interactivity. It’s easy to play around with ideas and get good feedback on what works and what doesn’t without going through the whole edit-compile-link cycle.

    But, as always, the answers to these questions depend on what you’re trying to do. For example, if you want to write simple 2d games then BlitzMax makes it very easy.

    When I was 12 it was TRS-80 Level II BASIC and Z80 assembler, which in my daughter’s eyes no doubt puts me one step removed from dinosaur fodder.

    — Rod
15. Ross Smith says:

    March 11, 2008 at 11:35 pm

    I’ll put in another vote for Javascript as a good first language (for anyone new to programming, not just 12 year olds). Reasons: First, there’s nothing to install; all you need is a web browser and a text editor. It’s easy to forget how big an obstacle installation alone can be to a new user.

    Second, you can do graphics straight away (for values of “graphics” equal to “animated web pages”, which is a pretty good value these days). You don’t have to spend a lot of time at the command line first, another turn-off to new users.

    Third, there’s a lot of depth in there. Javascript programs start off very simple (and the availability of “onClick” and similar hooks means that you don’t even need to start with a complete program, just a one-liner), but when you explore further, you can find a lot of advanced stuff that isn’t in most languages, such as functional programming. You can learn a lot more about computer science from Javascript alone than you can from almost any other language.

    (When I first started teaching myself Javascript, I had a fully working game of Minesweeper before the end of the first day.)
16. Eolirin says:

    March 12, 2008 at 1:14 am

    Javascript is certainly easy to pick up, but really, so is basic Java. If you want an interesting suggestion though, point them at RunUO. 🙂 Using C# isn’t the easiest thing in the world for a beginner, but having the framework of a fully functional server and client simplifies things and there’s a vast amount of user made scripts to examine.

    Course, I’m not sure what the legal ramifications of that suggestion would end up being for someone actually in the industry, but gray shards definitely are a good place to start if you’re interested in MMOG design. Metaplace will possibly fill that role just as well, but RunUO is out *now*.
17. Morgan Ramsay says:

    March 12, 2008 at 1:41 am

    Eolirin wrote:

    … I’m not sure [about] the legal ramifications of that suggestion …

    Use of RunUO can result in violating the Ultima Online EULA, but use of RunUO in such a way would probably not be cause for civil or criminal litigation; although, U.S. contract law might allow a case against the user for failing to fulfill the terms of the contract. Of course, that’s assuming the EULA is considered a contract. On the other hand, a hypothetical court might rule against EA given that EA had sufficient notice to “pull the plug” on RunUO—reasoned silence constituting a form of permission. Just guessing.
18. Social Gaming = Better People « Just Another Meme Vector says:

    March 12, 2008 at 3:04 am

    […] Gaming = Better People Interesting point from Raph Koster: Most games throughout history have been multiplayer, if you think about it. Everything from chess […]
19. len says:

    March 12, 2008 at 5:11 am

    VRML is easy to learn and uses Javascript. We had good luck with kids building with that language. Also, there are a lot of free tools, editors, browsers, models, tutorials, etc. It really helps the learning process to have a language that is amenable to View Source so a beginner can look at things they like and imitate and improve them.

    And of course, it is Internet-ready so easily shared.
20. Paul Stephanouk says:

    March 12, 2008 at 6:09 am

    Lua is a great way to get started. It’s easy. It’s free. And hey…game developers actually value Lua experience. I’m a big fan of using Lua on the Nintendo DS or Playstation Portable to make simple games. Many kids I encounter (both young and old) get excited when they find out they can make simple games for their DS without having to learn a complex programming language or IDE. You can also use your Lua skills to harness the insane power of Valve’s engine and game assets via the wonderful Gary’s Mod.

    Lua FTW!!!
21. Cybercat says:

    March 12, 2008 at 7:14 am

    I have to say, kinda disappointed it took you a month to respond to him (rant follows). How many projects back in school do you know had a due date of more than a month out at that point? I’m somewhat miffed mainly because I had to do this exact same thing over a decade ago and I couldn’t get a single game developer to write back in a timely manner. I sent out five or six letters and the EARLIEST reply was THREE MONTHS. Somehow people who interviewed firefighters and police got their replies almost immediately or within a week with a meeting set up. Tell me, exactly how are you more busy than a police officer or firefighter? The least you could have done was tell the kid “Sorry I don’t have time”.

    Anyway, I think a lot of your answers were too technical for some in 7th grade, although you don’t have any reference points to go off. Back in 5th or 6th I was getting into QBASIC and by 8th I was reading books on programming so it could differ widely. However, when you start talking about IDEs I’m pretty sure you lost him and any other non-technical person reading his paper. Overall, it looks like you started out good, but got more and more technical as you went on. BlitzBasic was a good suggestion though.

    If this sounds a little rough to you, it probably is, but I’m simply speaking from experience as someone who had to do this assignment many years ago and was disappointed with the large lack of response. As a suggestion, if you’re feeling up to it, a “show-and-tell” type feature (where you went out to his school) might make up for the lack of contact IMHO. If you’re not too busy :p
22. Raph says:

    March 12, 2008 at 7:21 am

    As a suggestion, if you’re feeling up to it, a “show-and-tell” type feature (where you went out to his school) might make up for the lack of contact IMHO.

    Unfortunately, he lives 1500 miles away.
23. chabuhi says:

    March 12, 2008 at 7:26 am

    Start ’em on Apple Logo 🙂

    My first exposure to programming was BASIC thirty years ago, but Assembly was what really blew through the barriers for me. I mean, I don’t know how much practical use it still has in the game development industry, and I’m sure it’s use will disappear completely before long, but you’d be hard pressed to find a better primer on how to talk to a machine. Granted, might be a bit much for a 12-year-old, but my 14-year-old seems to be understanding the fundamentals pretty well.

    Who knows? Maybe when this 12-year-old is hitting the “real world” coding will be drag n’ drop. Let’s face it, most people (of any age) who speak of programming games are really wanting to design them anyway, so he’s probably better off cutting his teeth on mod tools and scripting languages.

    In my completely inexpert opinion.
24. Cybercat says:

    March 12, 2008 at 7:48 am

    Apprentice him! Take him out to CA and teach him the wonders and dark sorcery of game development 🙂 Then again, I could be wrong and he could have one of those crazy teachers that assigns homework months in advance or maybe he got a hold of another developer. I would personally be interested to see what the outcome of this scenario was/is.
25. Dotswarlock says:

    March 12, 2008 at 7:55 am

    I have a suggestion but it will probably seem weird: Excel’s VBA. Almost everyone has a version or another of Office installed at home and it is a surprisingly useful tool. Finding information on google is easy, the macro editor is adequate and the macro recorder can be used to generate pieces of code and then reverse engineer it.

    Granted, you won’t make a pretty game out of it but you can do fairly complex stuff such as a two dimension table top game with it. Using it will enable someone to familiarize himself with the basic building blocks (if/else, switch, operations, functions, etc) which you will find in every other languages. It is also relatively less intimidating than other languages and offers direct results on screen.

    One last bonus: the experience gained from such coding can later be used in other fields if a gaming career does not work out. Even a very simple macro can sometime save days of work in an accounting department and it makes you look like a hero ;).
26. ME says:

    March 12, 2008 at 9:57 am

    I’ll also throw out there Randy Pausch’s project, which is a 3d programming environment made for teaching introductory programming. (It uses a drag-and-drop interface with a interactive story framework that helps young middle/high schoolers get their first taste of programming concepts.)

    I’ve seen it be very successful for middle schoolers to help cultivate a positive vibe for game-making. It’s not the best solution for making a wider variety of things, but it’s definitely a start, and helps children discern whether programming is something they’d like to explore more of.
27. ME says:

    March 12, 2008 at 9:58 am

    HA! I forgot to mention that it is called Alice.
    http://www.alice.org
28. Derek Licciardi says:

    March 12, 2008 at 10:07 am

    Baptism by fire I say. Start em out with C# using the XNA development environment. Getting a game working on your Xbox 360 is extremely rewarding and can be too cool when friends come over. The environment has tutorials on how to create simple games and can be used to create much more complex games later on without the need to learn additional tools.

    That said, I started with Apple Logo and the Comodore Pet’s version of the BASIC programming language. That was back in the day when long term storage was done on an audio cassette tape. The only advice I’d give to aspiring game developers would be to become a sponge. Read, read, read, read and when you think your brain is full, read some more. You can never have too much knowledge about the disciplines involved in game development. I’m learning something new every day.
29. Morgan Ramsay says:

    March 12, 2008 at 10:44 am

    Cybercat wrote:

    How many projects back in school do you know had a due date of more than a month out at that point? I’m somewhat miffed mainly because I had to do this exact same thing over a decade ago …

    I vaguly remember doing a similar project, but I don’t ever remember receiving a response from whomever I wrote. I’m certain I was under the impression that the instructor had assigned such projects many times in his/her career, and that not receiving a response was the default expectation for students. Receiving a response was seen as the reward. When I look back on the way elementary school operated, there weren’t semesters; school was year-long except for long vacations. Receiving a response a month later, or even three months later, wasn’t a big deal. The instructor proceeded as though everything were normal.

    You probably had an instructor who failed to manage expectations or was simply too inexperienced to properly run the project.

    Somehow people who interviewed firefighters and police got their replies almost immediately or within a week with a meeting set up. Tell me, exactly how are you more busy than a police officer or firefighter?

    Police and fire officers are not as busy as a married-with-kids celebrity/thought leader who owns and operates a business, employs over a dozen people, and promotes the business like a madman (e.g., attending conferences and giving interviews apparently every other week, blogging daily, keeping up to date with trends, participating in internal and business development meetings, giving presentations to partners and prospects, talking with dozens of people every day, etc.) I’m probably underexaggerating the work that Raph does on a daily basis.

    That’s not to diminish the importance (or risk) of the work of police and fire officers. They just don’t have the work schedules that chief executives do. They’re not “on duty” 24/7 unless they’re involved with an undercover or emergency situation. Civil servants, and thus civil service, recognizes the time requirements and responsibilities of chief executives. That’s indicated in the court system’s automatic (once they’re made aware) dismissal of business owners from jury duty.
30. Morgan Ramsay says:

    March 12, 2008 at 10:51 am

    For kids, there are also programs such as the national Internal Drive summer camps. Internal Drive’s Gaming Academy has courses in game modelling with Maya, programming with Unreal Engine, and simply playing games.
31. Spaz says:

    March 12, 2008 at 11:24 am

    I second the above suggestion about RunUO. Working with it over the last year has grown my skills exponentially. To really learn how to make games of the caliber I want to make, “Hello World” just doesn’t cut it for a good example of code. Multiplayer game platforms have a lot of complex and counterintuitive concepts that I had to be shown, via a framework and ruleset with which I was already familiar. I wish there were more things like it. It’s what I use to sharpen my skills until I can have Metaplace.

    The legal ramifications make me sad; because of that risk, I can’t share what I make with people. It’s only on my local box as a tool of study.
32. len says:

    March 12, 2008 at 12:19 pm

    That’s not to diminish the importance (or risk) of the work of police and fire officers. They just don’t have the work schedules that chief executives do. They’re not “on duty” 24/7 unless they’re involved with an undercover or emergency situation.

    Actually they are, Morgan. They just aren’t always busy during that time. Police officers are considered to be on at all times in public which is why they carry weapons. Fire men have rotational shifts that are for example, 3 days on, two days off, because they stay on alert at the station during the on shifts. A chief executive has more control of how, when and where they spend their time. Not only do the public safety officers have these shifts, dispatch software keeps up with it at all times (see Intergraph I/Roster and I/Skill).

    That said, all of us have correspondence.
33. Morgan Ramsay says:

    March 12, 2008 at 1:22 pm

    len wrote:

    Police officers are considered to be on at all times in public which is why they carry weapons.

    Police officers typically work a 4-day, 10-hour rotating shift work schedule. They might be required to uphold the law, to be upstanding citizens, as an example to the communities they serve when not “on duty”, but they’re not usually “on duty” 24/7. When I say “24/7”, I’m literally talking about every hour of every day of every week. (My cousin who lives just a half-hour away was both a USMC MP and a civilian police officer.)

    A chief executive has more control of how, when and where they spend their time.

    A chief executive has an incredible leadership responsibility that consumes every waking moment. They are effectively slaves to the organizations they lead. The higher the altitude, the thinner the air, the harder to breathe. A chief executive actually has less control of how, when, and where they spend their time. Where this is not the case is in companies with poor governance.

    That said, all of us have correspondence.

    Great. We all use restrooms, too. Hey, how about that? We all eat. We all sleep. What an amazing discovery! You’ve just solved one of the world’s greatest problems. … Scale is important. Recognize it.
34. Raph says:

    March 12, 2008 at 1:29 pm

    I find it very amusing that other people are arguing about how busy I am. 🙂
35. Morgan Ramsay says:

    March 12, 2008 at 1:35 pm

    Raph wrote:

    I find it very amusing that other people are arguing about how busy I am. 🙂

    I can multitask! 😉 To some of us, your busyness is an important issue. Whatever happened to that song circle!?
36. Eolirin says:

    March 12, 2008 at 1:43 pm

    What Morgan’s saying is especially true in smaller operations like Areae; once you surpass a certain size you can delegate out a lot of work to other people, but Areae isn’t exactly big enough that that’s really feasible. The heads of groups like EA and Sony and Microsoft likely have vastly more time that they can put aside, but that’s because there’s a whole network of other administrative types taking up the slack. They don’t need to worry about evangelizing to VC, dealing with day to day operations, or hitting all the important trade conferences because they’ve got people who can do that for them. They just need to put out the really big fires and deal with the direction that the company is going to take over the long term. But a small business is much harder to deal with.

    That being said, if Raph (and I hate talking about people like they’re not there, especially in their own “homes”) can make as many blog posts over the course of a week as he does, he could probably have answered the letter a *little* sooner. >
37. Slyfeind says:

    March 12, 2008 at 2:02 pm

    I’ll be the odd man out and suggest Visual Basic for newcomers to programming, particularly youths. It’s very graphical, drag and drop, and you can get immediate results in just a few minutes. It’s also easy to outgrow it. Then JavaScript might be a good second language to get them thinking more in object oriented terms.
38. Pete Smith says:

    March 12, 2008 at 4:33 pm

    What about Phrogram (http://phrogram.com/Default.aspx)

    (From the site):

    Phrogram is a great way to get started and go further in learning and doing real computer programming. Beginners get a solid foundation and intermediate-to-advanced users take their skills far beyond what other learning-oriented programming environments can offer. With Phrogram, you can create games and other programs with just a few instructions.
39. MMOWTF.com - MMORPG News (Shamelessly Reblogged) says:

    March 12, 2008 at 8:21 pm

    […] EST Filed under: Culture, MMO industry, Academic, EducationPretty darn cool of Raph Koster to answer this letter from a 12-year-old kid on his blog. And though we’ve heard the guy talk before, it’s fun to see him boil down exactly what […]
40. damijin says:

    March 13, 2008 at 12:02 am

    I would definitely recommend Flash to today’s 12 year olds. I’ve met several 13-16 year old Flash devs in the past year, and they’re completely capable of making games that can be sponsored for hundreds (and even thousands) of dollars. Flash is an awesome way for young teens to learn to program and the good ones are even making cash doing it from the plethora of flash sponsors out there.
41. Dark Basic says:

    March 13, 2008 at 1:02 am

    […] and drop them to create storyboards actions in a little 3D world. But a lot more are mentioned: (again, check the […]
42. Ola Fosheim Grøstad says:

    March 13, 2008 at 4:21 am

    Logo is a OK language for taking the first few steps of structured programming. Other than that, why not use Flash? ActionScript3 is just an improved version of EcmaScript (JavaScript). C# is a better language, but motivation is important too.
43. len says:

    March 13, 2008 at 6:01 am

    Sounds good, Morgan. You have an n of one. You flunk stats 101. I realize you are a relationship manager and are paid to blow up skirts whenever possible, but you don’t really know much about this.

    I spent the last ten years working on police records management systems where all of my customers were police. It isn’t a citizenship nice-to-be. It is a requirement of the job and is considered ‘duty’. They don’t get paid for those hours and that is a big difference between them and an executive. I’m sure requirements vary among agencies, but I don’t think you will find a sworn officer who thinks he has enough time in the day for filling out reports much less answering mail. They hand those off to the PIO (Public Information Officer) typically. When they don’t, they are assigned to a liaison position for community relations and the time is scheduled. Some squeeze in private responses but they take the time to do that from their family or hobbies, which is pretty much what Raph has to do I suspect.

    On the other hand, the chief executive of my last employer lived in another state and came to the main operations about once a week on average. He worked hard when he was there; he played hard when he wasn’t. Another n of one, so I doubt that is a general example.

    I’ve never seen a CEO put his life on the line every day for an entire career only to retire with a medium house, medical bills for injuries, and a retirement salary that doesn’t keep up with inflation. I don’t really feel a lot of pity for the time they have to take to answer a kid’s letter.

    It isn’t the time in; it’s the mileage and the terrain that matter.
44. Dragonchasers » Techie Funk says:

    March 13, 2008 at 9:33 am

    […] then I happened upon this post at Raph Koster’s site: Raph’s Website » A letter to a 12-year-old It’s a fun read, but as kind of an offhand part of the post, Raph asks his audience: BTW, if […]
45. Echolocating says:

    March 13, 2008 at 9:46 am

    Kids need flashy graphics and instant results to keep them interested. I’d suggest an authoring environment. The best and simplest authoring tool I ever used was mTropolis. That one died a horribly premature death.

    Maybe I’m not giving 12-year-olds enough credit, but if the child hasn’t really touched a programming language before, authoring tools offer the same programming thought processes without concern for the real technical side of memory and asset management. Director is great in that respect. Perhaps even Wintermute would be a good start?
46. Swift Voyager says:

    March 13, 2008 at 9:52 am

    I started with TI-BASIC on the TI-994A computer. The games came printed in a magazine and you had to type them in by hand and save them on a cassette tape. There would always be typo’s so you had to debug them to make them work. I didn’t even realize I was learning to program until after I already knew how. lolz

    Good old fashioned BASIC is a great place for anyone to start because the procedural process is so visible, since it has line numbers and shuch.
47. Mike Weldon says:

    March 13, 2008 at 10:32 am

    I took a summer school class on BASIC when I was about that age. They taught us simple things like variables, if-then constructs, for loops, and how to print text to the screen. From there I was hooked. My Dad bought me a PC and I started making simple text adventure games, as well as many failed attempts to implement the entire D&D ruleset.

    I would say any simple scripting language where they don’t have to compile and where they can easily produce some visual output would be great for a 12 year old. What fascinated me was just being able to read input from the user and respond with different output based on the input. Such simple concepts that open up a universe of possibilities.
48. Morgan Ramsay says:

    March 13, 2008 at 12:40 pm

    len wrote:

    I’ve never seen a CEO put his life on the line every day for an entire career only to retire with a medium house, medical bills for injuries, and a retirement salary that doesn’t keep up with inflation. I don’t really feel a lot of pity for the time they have to take to answer a kid’s letter.

    Case in link: http://sic.conversationsnetwork.org/shows/detail3167.html

    Yes, nonprofits employ chief executives, too. So do governments. So much for your brash generalizations.

    It is a requirement of the job and is considered ‘duty’. They don’t get paid for those hours and that is a big difference between them and an executive.

    Police officers, like chief executives, hold highly visible positions. They are both targets of attack, personal and physical. They both have great influence, power, and responsibility. Both are also required to uphold the values of the organizations that employ them even outside working hours. Y’know, those hours called “off duty.” By the way, having a duty is not the same thing as being on duty. Moreover, having a duty is not the same thing as fulfilling the obligations of that duty.
49. len says:

    March 13, 2008 at 1:08 pm

    And that is a fine counter example although I don’t read where this guy has to face down a husband beating a wife only to be shot in the back by the wife. Welcome to the most dreaded call: domestic violence.

    From the description, the worst problem Van has is when he gets pulled over for a traffic stop, he stays afraid until the call clears. On the other side of that is a policeman afraid that if he says the wrong thing, he’ll be talking to internal affairs the next day. And so it goes, but that is why dash-cams are in most rolling stock these days.

    Otherwise, we can agree here that anyone with a full time intense job has long hours and needs a break.
50. Raph Koster explains it all « “To the Blogmobile!” says:

    March 13, 2008 at 1:46 pm

    […] 13, 2008 · No Comments To a 12-year old. Really […]
51. Morgan Ramsay says:

    March 13, 2008 at 2:28 pm

    len wrote:

    From the description …

    I don’t expect you to listen to the podcast (i.e., the keynote) but, if you do, you’d hear that he encountered much worse problems than being pulled over for a traffic stop. (I recommend you listen to the keynote anyway. Van Jones is inspirational.)

    I don’t read where this guy has to face down a husband beating a wife only to be shot in the back by the wife. Welcome to the most dreaded call: domestic violence.

    On the dark side, look up Craig Peyer—the highway patrol officer who pulled over a 20-year-old woman for a so-called “traffic stop” and then proceeded to strangle her, smash her skull, and dump her body over a bridge.

    People face serious risks every day. Law enforcement exists to reduce those risks that we face, to protect our rights to life, liberty, and property. The risk inherent to a job, however, is irrelevant to the point I actually made.

    What I pointed out was that the work schedules of most chief executives is devoid of time for anything outside work, including friends and family. At the end of the day, the average police or fire officer can usually go home to have dinner with family, to join coworkers and friends at a pub, or just sleep in her own bed. At any given moment, they’re within driving distance of home. The average chief executive, on the other hand, might be able to call home from a hotel halfway around the world in between meetings with clients, prospective partners, and interviews. If the day ever ends, she might even be able to sleep in the hotel before flying onward to another location for more meetings.

    That work schedules differ from profession to profession doesn’t diminish the impact or significance of the work. The point is that complaining that Raph didn’t get around to responding until a month later is not a legitimate complaint when you consider that he has other far more relevant and tangible responsibilities. Basically, put yourself in his shoes. If you had his job, did what he does, what priority would you assign to an inquiry from a student you don’t know who needs help with a homework assignment?

    As an aside, I received a similar inquiry about quality assurance from a student via a school teacher via the executive director at IGDA. Although I prepared a response (almost immediately), I forwarded the inquiry back, believing the student would benefit more from the insights of a person more experienced and still involved with quality assurance engineering for games.
52. Posts by Mike Schramm at Massively says:

    March 13, 2008 at 5:51 pm

    […] @ 5:30PMFiled under: Culture, MMO industry, Academic, EducationPretty darn cool of Raph Koster to answer this letter from a 12-year-old kid on his blog. And though we’ve heard the guy talk before, it’s fun to see him boil down exactly what […]
53. len says:

    March 14, 2008 at 5:21 am

    If you had his job, did what he does, what priority would you assign to an inquiry from a student you don’t know who needs help with a homework assignment?

    I’d take a break.

    OTOH, I’m not complaining that he didn’t answer quickly. He answered when he was able or moved to. My answer is to deflect that characterization of police officer scheduling and comparing it to his work based on having them as customers for a decade and the fact that I am an executive in a software company. They have a much rougher job than Raph or I have or will ever have one hopes. The games they play aren’t fun.
54. Kerri Knight says:

    March 14, 2008 at 12:00 pm

    It’s been sitting on my desk guilting me for over a month now.

    I think it took a great dose of humility to admit something like that. I also find the response range depressing, however. Don’t forget that if you would really like to spend some time examining behavior or weaving better priority systems…

    …look inward.

    Western culture loves to present itself clean, problems don’t exist. Nagging little tugs on the conscience, never.

    “How are you today?”

    “I’m fine, you?”

    “I’m ok, thanks.”

    Try unloading even 2 or 3 things that have been bothering you, something that kept you up last week, watch the reaction on the person’s face go from passivity to some mixture of boredom and horror. We don’t talk about that!

    Meanwhile, in someplace called reality, we all have a few letters on our desks…

    …waiting
55. yvivilla says:

    March 14, 2008 at 1:48 pm

    Raph, I would welcome a good very graphic presentation that provides information to children regarding the questions posed by your 12 year old.

    I can assure you it would be very welcomed by kids and teachers alike.
56. Mark H says:

    March 14, 2008 at 2:27 pm

    This would all be solved if the postal service offered some form of synchronous communication!

    I learned c++ first, and I hear that that’s difficult, so I don’t really have a grip on what’s hard and what’s not since c++ is so natural now.

    However, before really learning c++, I dabbled in python, and loved it. If not for it I wouldn’t have gotten interested in programming, at all.

    I’d recommend python, it’s free, it’s pretty simple, enforces good readability. It’s extensible, powerful. You can make code for it in any text editor and many free syntax highlighting editors are available. (PSpad, Notepad++, Programmers Notepad)

    Then again I’ve only been programming for a couple years now.
57. Andy Havens says:

    March 16, 2008 at 9:22 am

    Hmmmm… The role of “writer” doesn’t seem to be on Raph’s list of job types that go into games. Maybe we’d have fewer games that involved the main character suffering from amnesia if a few more professional writers were brought in at the design stage.
58. Michelle D'israeli says:

    March 16, 2008 at 10:07 am

    I’m going to be daring and say a Pascal variant, especially something like Delphi.

    For all its evil, an object orientated pascal style language is a wonderful first programming language. Most of them allow access to pointers, allowing you to practice with lower-level systems (but then, I am a computer systems engineer by training, so I view understanding the internals as vital). Delphi made it easy to get working GUIs fast, and taught some good practices.

    The problem with anything that doesn’t give you help with a GUI is that it either limits you to minimal console IO, or extremely complex systems (there’s a reason I’ve written a personal include file for IO in C).

    I suppose however, in this day and age of advanced compilers, the better question is not ‘which langauge’, but which compiler and IDE. A good compiler for learning will give highly meaningful error messages that make immediate sense and are not followed with more frightening run-on errors.
59. Raph Koster explains it all — To the blogmobile! says:

    March 16, 2008 at 3:15 pm

    […] To a 12-year old. Really good. […]
60. Tess says:

    March 18, 2008 at 3:10 pm

    BTW, if you had to recommend a programming language to today’s 12-year-olds, what would it be?

    Oh, geeze, I wish I could answer this question. There’s no equivalent to the ubiquitous command-line BASIC parser, anymore.

    I’d say that for today’s kids, quick gratification is important. There are a lot of folks out there working on kid-languages, with fancy multimedia crap and whatnot. I’m not sure what I think about those. (I wasn’t a big fan of LOGO, as a kid, to be honest.) I’d almost say that a kid should, instead, pick a favorite moddable game, and write scripts for that. It provides fast, tangible feedback, with very satisfying results.
61. Pritchard says:

    March 20, 2008 at 2:13 am

    Hah. BlitzBasic? I guess I must be strange for simply enjoying BASIC syntax and seeing it as a language for general use. I use FreeBASIC at the moment for my BASIC coding. I was in fact, programming a game in BASIC and was getting prototypes done fairly quickly until I ran into problems due to lack of inheritance and the likes.

    Anyways, your post made me realize that BASIC syntax isn’t enough. Even though I’m comfortable in FreeBASIC, and it’s what got me into coding other languages, to really appeal to beginners, the community should probably consider putting together a Beginner’s Suite of some sort.

    Of course, now with pre-existing frameworks becoming so popular, I might as well just recommend them Java instead. Netbeans is a great IDE. Java’s framework is excellent. The naming conventions are great for beginners. The official sun tutorials are wonderful, too… Hrm.
62. Which Game Development Language to Learn? « Gamer Brasilis says:

    March 27, 2008 at 11:16 am

    […] subject had reminded of a post on Raph Koester’s blog where he is asked about which would be a good programming language to learn. Flash showed up a good […]
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