I would say that the OP has quite a project going!

I don't think that VC6 is necessary as I think another alternative will work. Active State provides MinGW as a downloadable .ppd package via their ppm. This version of the gcc compiler and VC6 will link with the same version of memory management DLL, MSVCRT.dll - this detail can be very important for the XS parts to work together. Other versions of MS compilers will NOT use the same .dlls. The compiler matters.

I have installed MinGW before via ppm and it brings the right kind of "make" with it as a dependency. This installation takes about 5 minutes. I would try this first as far as setting up the compiler environment for the many next steps.

An Anon Monk has a post in this thread about installing GTk2 and one of the requirements is this MinGW package. I suggest using the compiler that Active State recommends and makes easy to install before resorting to more complex measures. Of course, mileage varies. I have not personally installed the set of software desired by the OP, but in general, the usual reason that some package is not available as a .ppd is that there is some "gottcha". How important or not that "gottcha" is varies.

Update: The OP didn't say, but I've found that I like the graphical ppm for most jobs. All the command line stuff is still there, but the graphics make some jobs easier. Just type "ppm" with no args at the command prompt. "ppm help" gives all the details about command line options.