Programming real-time graphics/games in C?

I'll second that, trying to learn both C++ and a 3P API at the same time may be a big pain. You'd better stick to one until you gain some experience with it. You could start with C++ but learning a new language just isn't as exciting as learning 3D APIs. Moreover, once you start learning C++, you can use it to do the graphical stuff you've learnt. It just seems more rewarding to me.