Should I learn HTML/CSS/PHP and only when jump into HTML5?

[TheScriptan]

Hello everyone, I am new to community and as you see it's my first post! So I came up with idea that I should learn HTML5 since it got really powerful (I think it was powerful since the beginning). Anyways I have never ever had any experience with web development excepot programming, I have experience with C++/C#/Lua and the nasty Python (That Syntax...). I was wondering should I learn HTML/CSS/PHP and Javascript to jump in into the HTML5 and Phaser.js beauty or should I learn HTML/CSS/PHP and Javascript?

[glass22]

If you want to do games with Phaser, then you really just need JavaScript and then learning the Phaser stuff, but if you know C++ and C# JavaScript will only take a few hours to pick up.

[SignalSin]

Like any job, the tools you need depend on what you want to make. As glass22 said, if you just want to learn Phaser, you'll really only need Javascript. Seeing as you have programming experience already, it shouldn't be too much difficulty to pick up by jumping into the tutorials and examples.

 

HTML and CSS are good to know for building web pages/apps but not really necessary to get started with Phaser. Personally, I'd leave PHP well alone if possible.

[balazsdavid987]

Master Javascript; you can use it on both client side and server side as well. NodeJS became a very powerful solution to create a backend for web apps, including games, and there is also a high demand for it on the job market.

[RubyHelix]

So as a web developer, I utilize the technologies listed quite frequently.  HTML/CSS/PHP and SQL are all extremely useful when moving in the direction of web applications and web development.  As for game development these skills maybe useful in the future if you ever need to create a website or webapp for the game or you're handling some backend processes for your game with PHP and SQL.

 

Actually creating the games though utilizing HTML5 and the Phaser framework, you only really need to learn HTML5 some CSS for specific situations and JavaScript as JavaScript is how we make things move around and do fancy things on the screen.

[Red Spark]

Only JavaScript and a little bit of basic HTML. But I'd recommend to learn TypeScript if you're coming from background of ActionScript 3 / Java / C# / whatever.

[Sebi]

It depends on what you want to do. Each language has it's purpose.

Learning CSS and HTML(5) is a must if you want to design HTML5 games because there are many things that you can't do with Phaser and other game frameworks or that you should not do with those. Best example is that you want to create an MMO game and you need a chat for your game. Or you want some scrollable div's for you UI.

However, HTML pretty much comes down to some divs, spans, sections, inputs. And maybe a few more tags, but it's really dead simple and you will learn it in no time.

CSS is a powerful tool that you should not miss out on. Same as with HTML, there are things that will greatly improve your games performance if done with CSS instead of canvas (phaser).

PHP is something that will most likely just waste your time. Don't get me wrong, PHP is absolutely great, especially when you need to do some heavy file system based stuff but you will not need it for your games since you can do all the things you need with node (js webserver).

But HTML5 games is more than just Phaser. You need to find the right tool (framework) for the job. And you will have to learn a million things that will take you months if not years to master.

My advice is to just start with the basics of HTML5 and CSS and then start with javascript. As you get used to the javascript syntax, start using frameworks (and try to understand what those frameworks are doing in the background to be able to write fast and powerful games).