FreeGameDev

Hey Raph Koster has an interesting piece about JavaScript being implemented using a plugin, it sounds similar to the Google javascript engine that Syntensity is using except they're saying it can do OpenGL natively.... (?)

You probably know Raph Koster is the concept-guy behind the original Star Wars Galaxies game (hybrid skills, weird dynamic POI, 'elite' Jedi classes, etc) his link points to the Chromium blog that talks about O3D in greater detail:

http://www.raphkoster.com/2010/05/08/o3d-becomes-a-js-webgl-engine/

The Chromium Blog has announced that O3D, formerly a plugin-based system for rendering 3d in a browser, is instead becoming an engine for WebGL, using Javascript. And the bits that can’t be done in Javascript? Well, they will just move into the browser.

The JavaScript implementation of O3D is still in its infancy, but you can find a copy of it on the O3D project site and see it running some of the O3D samples from a WebGL enabled browser (alas, no Beach Demo yet). Because browsers lack some requisite functionality like compressed asset loading, not all the features of O3D can be implemented purely in JavaScript. We plan to work to give the browser this functionality, and all capabilities necessary for delivering high-quality 3D content.

via Chromium Blog: The future of O3D. http://blog.chromium.org/2010/05/future-of-o3d.html

Thanks, Peon

Ooo, now this sounds interesting... Not sure if Kripken will be able to look into implementing it, but it's definitely one of those cool sounding things

TheAncientGoat {l Wrote}:Ooo, now this sounds interesting... Not sure if Kripken will be able to look into implementing it, but it's definitely one of those cool sounding things

Ya it may just be a weird side-step, but it's interesting that it's a javascript engine, albeit with OpenGL and 3D built-in. Raph Koster had an earlier article about it.

Here's an url to a flash demo of it in action: http://www.youtube.com/v/uofWfXOzX-g&hl=en_US&fs=1&

That said Kripken's use of kinetic rockets and bullets using Sauer in some ways looks as good if not better. So it might not be a big deal....

Thanks, Peon

They haven't ported beach to the JS 03D driver yet, according to the first article.

And I don't see what the rockets and bullets have to do with having graphics rendered in browser? It's cool and all, and it would be cooler if you can have JS calculated bullets running on a JS coded engine running on a JS coded 3d stack

TheAncientGoat {l Wrote}:They haven't ported beach to the JS 03D driver yet, according to the first article.

And I don't see what the rockets and bullets have to do with having graphics rendered in browser? It's cool and all, and it would be cooler if you can have JS calculated bullets running on a JS coded engine running on a JS coded 3d stack

Ya I wasn't thinking as it being realistic to do right now, I was thinking more how Kripken's bullets + rockets + kinetics look really cool already, so in a kinda subjective comparison it's not likely the 3D engine would really make much of a difference. Since parts of Syntensity already look really impressive (and probably run about 20x faster than any 3D implementation!!)

I'm still amazed at how quick Sauer + Syntensity runs on my old PC, the graphics quality + speed is amazing. Kinda like Alien Arena it's like they've tweaked Sauer + Syntensity so much that even ancient hardware runs fast and looks great. I'm no game designer but it seems a really smart way to do it. I guess 3D is a pipedream, especially if you can almost get 3D-ish looking stuff already using the existing 2D + javascript already...!

Thanks, Peon

Erm, you can already render 3d in javascript in multiple ways, the O3D implementation is just another one (which seems to be going ahead) so definitely not a pipedream

What do you mean by 3D though? Syntensity is already using a 3D engine, rendered with OpenGL..