Silverlight JetLag

Published April 27, 2007
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Because you might ask this question later, the answer is:
Num Lock must be on. Use "4" to go left, "6" to go right. Space bar starts a game.

Here is my evaluation of Silverlight. Naturally, it is in the form of a JetLag clone.

http://members.gamedev.net/TANSTAAFL/silverlight/jetlag/JetLag.html

Plusses:

It was really easy to get up and going, with the most major setback being the question of how to get a simple frame loop going. Once that was solved (and it is a bit of a hack, imo), JetLag wasn't too far away.
I already know &#106avascript and XML. I was able to use NotePad++ to quickly whip something together that resembled a game.<br><br>Minuses:<br><br>The VS Template was not really helpful. Sure, it allowed me to create the boilerplate code for a project, but in the end, I'm no better off than I was working in NotePad++. Besides it is typically only a matter of time before I have my own homebrewed boilerplate anyway.<br>Documentation was spotty, but this is pre-release, so I don't expect much. I was able to glean enough from the example code to know what I needed to know.<br>My main complaint was that the application exists in a bunch of .js and .xaml files, which are just sitting there on the webserver in plaintext, so anyone who knows how can inspect my code and take what they want from it, and that may not be what you are looking for in a platform for online applications.<br><br><br>Conclusion:<br><br>This lies somewhere between Flash and Yahoo! Widgets for me. I'm going to wait and watch and see.<div> </div>
0 likes 2 comments

Comments

johnhattan
Worked for me under IE, although I first tried it with the 4-6 in the upper keyboard row rather than the keypad. Under Firefox I just kept getting the "you have to install WPF/E" dialog. Of course, this is pretty early beta so they're gonna be getting it running on IE first.

My biggest problem with Silverlight is that it relies on the Browser's &#106avascript interpreter rather than bundling in its own VM/interpreter/whatever. One problem I don't have with Flash is having to test it on every browser configuration, because I trust that the Flash plugin works similarly across browsers and platforms. And so far that trust has worked out, as I haven't yet had someone tell me that my browser-games run funny on their configuration. As long as their browser can run Flash, it can run my games.

I fear that deferring to every browser's &#106avascript interpreter is just gonna be a nightmare because you'll have to test it &#111;n every possible browser and version because it turned out that some obscure build of Camino or IE6 broke some obscure scoping rule in its JS interpreter. <br> <br>I guess we'll see if that's what happens. <br> <br>Once again, Jetlag sets the standard for every game that follows.
April 28, 2007 09:01 AM
MindWipe
I got the same screen in FF as johnhattan got. And IE7 gave a js error 'undefined'. :(


function supportedVersionIsInstalled(agHostHelper)
{
    var versionStr = detectAgControlVersion(agHostHelper);

    if (versionStr == -1 )
    {
        return false;
    }
    else if (versionStr != 0)
    {
        versionArray = versionStr.split("."); <-- There


Looking forward to Silverlight getting better though. I really like being able to use my C# knowledge to do flash-like stuff.


/MindWipe
September 09, 2007 10:29 AM
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