The best programming language for beginners to learn is going to be the one that’s most in line with things you enjoy doing.
If you like playing games, learning a programming language used to make them might be a good fit for you. There are plenty of different languages out there you could use. You just need to find the one that matches your skills and interests.
If you’re not sure where to start, consider some of the most popular options for game development.
Best Game Programming Language For Beginners
What is the best programming language for game development?
Game developers use several programming languages, sometimes more than one at a time. The right language depends on the project, what features you need the language to have, and your experience level as a programmer.
1. C++
C++ is the foundation of most major console and Microsoft Windows games. It’s an object-oriented programming (OOP) language, meaning it organizes code into self-contained, reusable units. Those objects are designed to be reusable and movable, so you can code complex games without building everything from scratch.
C++ is a powerful low-level language built for machine readability. It’s a challenging language to learn for beginners compared to languages like Python, but C++ is well worth the trouble for game developers looking to maximize their creativity.
How do game developers use C++?
C++ is the most popular language for creating game engines—the development environments where game programmers create and host their interactive worlds. Game engines provide the technology for every aspect of a game, from graphics, physics, and sound to the behavior of AI-powered game bots.
Developing your own engine is the best way to gain complete creative freedom and control over your game. If you decide to go this route, you’ll absolutely need to know C++; it is the industry standard, and you will need its versatility and high-performance capability.
Designers also sometimes use C++ to program in pre-existing engines. Creating an engine from scratch is extremely time- and resource-intensive, but you can get nearly as much flexibility from a commercial engine if you can do some of your own programming. Many of today’s most popular engines use C++, including:
- Unreal Engine
- Lumberyard
- Godot
- Source
- Cryengine
C++ lets you get more out of these engines and develop more customized, higher-performing games.
Why is C++ used in games?
C++ is a popular video game programming language because it is fast, powerful, and flexible:
- It’s a very fast language. Gamers expect high performance and minimal to no delay in a quality game. Unfortunately, video games are prone to high server load, which can lead to latency if the code converts too slowly. C++ converts quickly, even when multiple tasks run at the same time.
- It works in close proximity to hardware. Video games rely on hardware for control functions. C++ operates closely to that hardware, so engines perform better with less chance of stalling.
- It works cross-platform. C++ lets you release projects on multiple operating systems and gaming platforms.
- It features high-performance tools. C++ has a rich set of open-source libraries that take some of the legwork out of coding. There are C++ libraries for many different aspects of game development, from graphics design to debugging.
- It’s compatible with other game programming languages. C++ gives you the flexibility to incorporate languages like C# or JavaScript to improve particular aspects of a game, like graphics or audio.
2. C#
C# (“C-sharp”) is a simpler, more accessible language than C++. It’s a high-level language, designed for humans to understand. Its syntax encourages code reusability, which makes it efficient, and its compilers reduce runtime errors by warning the programmer in advance.
What does C# do in video game development?
C# leads the pack as a video game scripting language. Scripting languages lay out the game’s mechanics and tell the computer what to do as the game progresses. If you want a player to see a certain graphic or message when their character picks up an object, scripting makes that happen.
Where does C# show up in game development?
C# is the default language for Unity 3D, a popular game engine. Unity was the engine of choice for 61% of developers in 2021, making it the top engine of the year. It’s the powerhouse behind many popular mobile games, including Pokémon Go and Temple Run 2. Unity is also a popular game engine for VR games—90% of all Samsung Gear and 53% of Oculus Rift VR games use Unity. If you want to create games in Unity or for VR, C# should be in your toolbox.
C# is also a back-end language; in web-development contexts, developers use C# to communicate with the server rather than the user. When a player takes an action in a multiplayer game, C# tells the server how to interpret that action.
Many developers have used C# to create Xbox and other Microsoft games on the XNA Framework. Although Microsoft has retired XNA, C# remains compatible with its successor, MonoGame. It’s also the scripting language behind many Playstation console games.
3. JavaScript
A leading front-end web development language, JavaScript is primarily used in computer programming to add interactivity to web pages. If you use a drop-down menu or click to play a video, JavaScript usually powers that action.
How is JavaScript used in game development?
JavaScript is often used to program games for hosting in web browsers. Today, online games usually run using the core web technology HTML5, which packages JavaScript code together with markup languages HTML and CSS.
JavaScript-powered HTML5 games run in web browsers and on mobile platforms like iOS and Android. You can host these games directly on a website, so they’re easier to share than console games. They’re also easy to maintain, thanks to the built-in stability of the JavaScript language.
What game engines use JavaScript?
JavaScript game developers have access to JavaScript-specific and compatible engines, such as:
- Three.Js
- Famo.Us
- Goo Engine
- Allegro
- Impact.Js
Because JavaScript is such a popular web development language, it has a diverse set of tools and frameworks, including the cross-platform graphics library WebGL and HTML5 game framework Phaser.
4. Java
Java is a versatile language commonly used by small game development companies. It’s powered some of the world’s top iOS and Android games including Minecraft and Mission Impossible III. Plus, Java is a cross-platform language, so it runs on nearly any system including Microsoft and Linux.
Why learn Java for game development?
Java is a beginner-friendly language that is popular for mobile apps and games. If you’re new to coding, you can get started on Java and start writing, running, and debugging code faster than with many other languages.
A Java game will most likely run on a virtual machine—a software-based computing system that functions separately from physical host computers. Virtual machines help make games and other software quicker and less costly to create, easier to distribute, and simpler to scale as they grow.
What are Java’s game development features?
Just because Java is beginner-friendly doesn’t mean it’s limited in what it can do.
The programming language supports multithreading, a feature that lets two or more instruction sets run at the same time. Game developers often prefer to have separate threads for different types of tasks, such as graphics rendering and gameplay logic.
Java also offers socket programming, which powers two-way communications with servers. This makes it easier for developers to create multiplayer games without the need for additional tools.
5. Lua
Lua may not rank among the popular programming languages in general, but it’s an ideal fit for game development. It’s the language behind popular games like Angry Birds and Age of Conan, and it powers engines like CryEngine, Gideros Mobile, and Corona SDK.
It’s an extremely lightweight language, meaning its small memory footprint doesn’t create drag. It also runs on virtual machines, so it’s fast and efficient.
Lua is a highly embeddable language, so you can easily integrate it into many other applications. That’s an important feature in game development, which often draws on multiple languages to get the desired effect.
Love2D, a free game framework, is a great learning tool for beginner game developers—and it uses Lua!
6. Python
A beginner-friendly language, Python was created to be readable by human beings. Its syntax is possibly the most English-like among programming languages, which is why it’s a common teaching language in software development.
Python is less widely used in the game development world, but it’s a good starting point for new developers. If you start learning Python, you can jump quickly into the game development library PyGame.
PyGame is a free Python library designed specifically for game creation. It’s easy to learn and features:
- Readily available, easy-to-understand tutorials
- Easy installers for Windows and MacOS
- Flexible, mix-and-match core modules
- Simple code designed specifically for game scripting
Learning Python also makes it easier to use GDScript, the programming language for the popular game engine Godot. GDScript’s creators built it to mimic Python’s readability and beginner-friendly syntax, while also offering features specific to gaming. If you already know how to code in Python, you’ll feel right at home writing scripts in Godot.
best programming language for android games
C/C++ game libraries
Start your C development with less Java Native Interface (JNI) by using our game libraries for C/C++ development. Most games and game engines are written in C++, whereas Android development often requires using the Java programming language. Bridging these two languages using a Java Native Interface requires effort and can introduce bugs or performance regressions. AGDK will help you build and customize game engines by providing C game libraries that minimize the use of the Java Programming language and JNI. This makes your games easier to build, debug, and maintain.
We’re focusing on what you’ve told us are your top frustrations. Initially, this will involve building foundational classes for activity and input. Longer term, we plan to make more C libraries to provide functionality that is commonly used across game engines. We’re incorporating our existing frame pacing and high-performance audio libraries into this effort, and adding three new ones:
- Game Activity provides a foundation for C++ games to be built on. It provides C interfaces for all the Android events that you’d expect, from screen rotation to app lifecycle. This way you can minimize the amount of development time you spend in the Java language. Unlike Native Activity, Game Activity is compatible with fragments and extendable, making it easier to integrate some of your favourite SDKs.
- Game Text input provides a stable way to use the software keyboard in C, that is officially supported and will work across Android versions.
- Game Controller is a way to handle input from game controllers in C, to map their functions and to reconnect to the device when necessary.
Learn more about these libraries in our C/C++ libraries session.
To make integration as easy as possible, you can get all our libraries as a Maven dependency, as a pre-compiled Zip file, or as source code.
Conclusion
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