Some More OpenGL Questions:

Can it be used to make a professional-quality game(like a PS2 game)?

Do professional game programmers use it?

Is it easier to use than Direct X?

Is it more powerful than Direct X?

“Can it be used to make a professional-quality game(like a PS2 game)?”

yeah. ever hear of a game called doom III? the graphics engine is written in opengl.

“Do professional game programmers use it?”

see above.

“Is it easier to use than Direct X?”

note that directx is not the same as direct3d. direct3d is one part of directx, and is the only part that opengl can replace by itself. the other parts of directx, such as directsound, directinput, etc, provide services that opengl makes no attempt to compete with.

whether opengl is easier than direct3d depends on what you’re trying to do. for beginners, i’d say yes. but they’re pretty close now in terms of ease of use. it used to be the case that directx was ridiculously difficult to set up and use, and everything was wrapped in COM interfaces [shudders]. for certain things though, direct3d is easier.

“Is it more powerful than Direct X?”

i’d say yes. what opengl allows is for hardware vendors (or anyone, for that matter) to extend the specification in pretty much any way they see fit. this means that opengl is essentially as powerful as the hardware. this isn’t the case with direct3d. direct3d only exposes those features of the hardware that microsoft decides to put into the direct3d specification, and hardware vendors can’t extend the specification. that being said, the current version of direct3d has support for pretty much anything you’d want to do in a real time graphics engine.

anyway, i see in your profile that you’re an “aspiring programmer”. my recommendation is to learn how to program before you worry about graphics programming. good luck.

-steve