Ive got a great idea for a game, I've planned it, how it looks, graphics, gameplay, everything. The bad news is, I don't have a mac and I don't have any programming skills. Please can you recommend a programming language I should learn that will work for an iPhone game, what graphics software I should use and where to get a cheap-ish mac from!? (or can it be done without mac?)
You can learn to program without a Mac obviously, but ultimately you're going to need one to write something for the iPhone/Touch. I'd suggest learning C/C++ to start. Ideally you want to have at least a working knowledge of Objective-C, but the compilers for Windows are basic affairs; you can run the GCC compiler to compile Objective C code, but you don't have a proper IDE to debug and trace through the code. If you're desperate though, the option is there. And you'll only get a basic working knowledge of Objective-C, not iPhone-specific frameworks like Cocoa Touch or anything. I'd go with learning C/C++ first, as that'll get you more than half the way there. When you're comfortable with that, you can get yourself a cheap Mac -- a Mac Mini or cheap Macbook would work great, as long as they're Intel-based machines. I picked up my first 13" Macbook for C$500, and recently upgraded to a 15" Santa Rosa-based Macbook Pro for under $700. (My Pro has the stagelights issue with the LCD though, which is why I got it so cheap. Gonna see what Apple want to charge me to replace the LCD and logic board.)
You can use C. Realistically speaking, Objective-C is just C that took a (very) different route to object oriented programming than C++ did. It's still very much plain old C at its core. Learning C++ will not help specifically with actual Objective-C code, but it will help you wrap your head around concepts like polymorphism, inheritance, objects, methods, classes, and so on. You'll have to adjust to the way Objective-C does things compared to C++, but at least you'll have the conceptual foundation you'll need to understand it and make the translation easier. To me, if there's no chance of you getting a Mac any time soon and you want a full-featured IDE (rather than just a compiler) then learning C and/or C++ is a good way to get your feet wet and build a foundation by learning and understanding the concepts involved, especially if you've never programmed before. When you're ready and you get a Mac and pick up the SDK, you'll be prepared to make the necessary adjustments for Objective-C and learn Cocoa Touch while you're at it. Depending on what sort of games you want to do, you might also want to look into OpenGL while you're at it. There are some awesome tutorials online (don't have a link here at work) that can point you in the right direction. For that matter there are some pretty awesome C/C++ and Objective-C tutorials available freely online, too.
