Hi,
I've been doing some research to find out what will be the future of game development. I'd like your opinion about new technology and also some kind of concrete information (articles, tendencies, etc).
I think the future of computer game will be web based games. But I want to know what will be used on web based game development (languages, frameworks and technologies, etc).
Thanks for the help.
[web] Future of game development
Personally i think that the future of gaming will as always belong to windows applications (Programs) as they are today.
But if you do not already know there are beautiful new technologies available in HTML 5 that you can actually make 3d/2d games with.
Before HTML 5 we we're limited to the resources we now had(Flash, Java) in order to make smooth running games.
But this new tag implemented in the new HTML 5 called canvas allows you to draw shapes, images and manipulate with them as in c++ graphic engine. The difference is that you can write a smooth 3d/2d game in no time using nothing but HTML and Javascript.
How i like to do a 30FPS game is using a interval calling a drawing function each XX milliseconds that cleans up the canvas current shapes and redraw them. It is amazing how fast you can actually redraw.
Only tested with 30FPS and it works like a charm, both for 2d and 3d.
Good luck with it
But if you do not already know there are beautiful new technologies available in HTML 5 that you can actually make 3d/2d games with.
Before HTML 5 we we're limited to the resources we now had(Flash, Java) in order to make smooth running games.
But this new tag implemented in the new HTML 5 called canvas allows you to draw shapes, images and manipulate with them as in c++ graphic engine. The difference is that you can write a smooth 3d/2d game in no time using nothing but HTML and Javascript.
How i like to do a 30FPS game is using a interval calling a drawing function each XX milliseconds that cleans up the canvas current shapes and redraw them. It is amazing how fast you can actually redraw.
Only tested with 30FPS and it works like a charm, both for 2d and 3d.
Good luck with it
If you've observed the evolution of web technology over time, you'll have noted the popularity of easily-accessed games (think Steam, Google Web Store, Facebook games). You'd have also noted the advent of browsers capable of achieving out-of-the-box technological feats previously only enjoyed by PCs, Macs, and consoles connected to an internet connection (think WebGL, WebSockets, and HTML5 goodies like Canvas, Audio, Video, and Manifest). And what with Google's Chrome Native Client (NaCl) and projects like NaCl Ports coupled with headlines earlier this year of Google opening a Games division, as well as other industry heavyweights like EA (and middleweights like Portalarium) expanding into the online market, it really seems like game development could potentially transition to becoming web-centric.
It is really only a matter of time before browser makers sort their stuff* out.
* Graphics - WebGL appears to be the dominant force for fully hardware-accelerated web graphics, with Google and Mozilla producing compelling implementation. We have little or nothing on handheld / mobile platforms yet, but I'm sure it will happen. Obviously Microsoft's absence in this picture is a problem (but perhaps not a big one; Windows users can still use Mozilla or Chrome. Windows Phone users are of course left in the cold, but then there are only two of them in the world.)
* Sound is a bit of a mix-up just now, but it's not rocket science.
* Network is a bit smelly - even Websockets is not well supported
* Fullscreen API is not consistently available. Whether this is a problem depends on the type of game (e.g. for RTS or resource-management games, it's not). The user can typically manually request fullscreen.
But I still think it's going to happen. For some types of games (e.g. the RM or turn-based strategy, type of games we often see on Facebook etc), the tech is sufficient already. For others, it's not yet. But it will be.
That's my view anyway.
* insert expletive here.
* Graphics - WebGL appears to be the dominant force for fully hardware-accelerated web graphics, with Google and Mozilla producing compelling implementation. We have little or nothing on handheld / mobile platforms yet, but I'm sure it will happen. Obviously Microsoft's absence in this picture is a problem (but perhaps not a big one; Windows users can still use Mozilla or Chrome. Windows Phone users are of course left in the cold, but then there are only two of them in the world.)
* Sound is a bit of a mix-up just now, but it's not rocket science.
* Network is a bit smelly - even Websockets is not well supported
* Fullscreen API is not consistently available. Whether this is a problem depends on the type of game (e.g. for RTS or resource-management games, it's not). The user can typically manually request fullscreen.
But I still think it's going to happen. For some types of games (e.g. the RM or turn-based strategy, type of games we often see on Facebook etc), the tech is sufficient already. For others, it's not yet. But it will be.
That's my view anyway.
* insert expletive here.
Flash and Unity3D will likely remain the top options for web game development for a long time. Both platforms are currently focused on game development and are adding features for this purpose. With Flash's recent addition of GPU accelerated graphics, things just got a lot more interesting for web games, as you can see in this video:
Portable Devices (phones, tablets, hand held)
Social Networks
Cross Platform targeted type games... like... You play on your iPhone or Tablet, then when you get home, you hop on your PC and play the main game.
Those are where it's at for the next 3-5 years IMO, maybe even longer.
In other words... html5 / webGL.
Social Networks
Cross Platform targeted type games... like... You play on your iPhone or Tablet, then when you get home, you hop on your PC and play the main game.
Those are where it's at for the next 3-5 years IMO, maybe even longer.
In other words... html5 / webGL.
Portable Devices (phones, tablets, hand held)
Social Networks
Cross Platform targeted type games... like... You play on your iPhone or Tablet, then when you get home, you hop on your PC and play the main game.
Those are where it's at for the next 3-5 years IMO, maybe even longer.
In other words... html5 / webGL.
Unfortunately JS + HTML has a long way to go before it's really competitive for game development. Also, the current trend is for game content on mobiles to be distributed through "app stores" rather than through a mobile web browser. Thus the playing field for cross platform development is a little more open, since frameworks like Flash and Unity allow developers to compile their apps for all of the major mobile platforms.
Ahh, I didn't realize this was a debate, and that we were supposed to argue with people about their responses...
I thought he was just asking people for their opinions. Mine is that the future of web development is HTML5 + Canvas, and/or webGL. You disagree, well good for you, I don't give a crap what you think, and I don't like Unity or Flash. So my future of web development will be html5 and webGL. It will most defiantly NOT be Unity or Flash.
The OP also didn't specify a timeframe. So perhaps you are right, tomorrow, Unity and Flash may be popular still. However, in a 3-5 years from now, as I said in my post, I think html5 and webGL will be bigger players in the industry.
After all, they ARE DESIGNED for the web... they aren't made for Mac, and then ported over to Windows, and then translated to other platforms, like Unity is.
To each their own I guess.
I thought he was just asking people for their opinions. Mine is that the future of web development is HTML5 + Canvas, and/or webGL. You disagree, well good for you, I don't give a crap what you think, and I don't like Unity or Flash. So my future of web development will be html5 and webGL. It will most defiantly NOT be Unity or Flash.
The OP also didn't specify a timeframe. So perhaps you are right, tomorrow, Unity and Flash may be popular still. However, in a 3-5 years from now, as I said in my post, I think html5 and webGL will be bigger players in the industry.
After all, they ARE DESIGNED for the web... they aren't made for Mac, and then ported over to Windows, and then translated to other platforms, like Unity is.
To each their own I guess.
Its unclear how long the legs of browser plugins like flash and silverlight will be, even Microsoft is on the HTML5 bandwagon, even if half-heartedly in some respects (like WebGL support). I think over the mid-to-long-term, say 3-5 years, we'll see the fall of browser plugins, though Flash may survive as AIR applications, and the flash environmeht might well evolve to target both the traditional runtime for AIR apps, as well as HTML5 for web apps.
As others have said, HTML5 has defined most of what's needed to do high-performance games. What we still need are broad support for current features, and to fill in a few key areas, like defining a better sound API (with minimum requirements for number and type of voices supported simultaneously) or broadly-supported fullscreen API.
I think Freemium MMOs and their ilk will be the first to go HTML5.
Another possibility for subscription-based games will be to use streaming technology similar to OnLive, which, while not perfect, has soundly proven to work better than most people ever thought it could. For say, large-scale MMORPGs there is a real benefit to centralizing the games processing at the server cluster -- it becomes easier to stay in sync when you don't have to deal with "rich clients" -- it would simplify the whole system if each player were simply a dumb video terminal with keyboard and mouse, assuming you have the GPU power to render all those screens. EA has also made it clear that they'd like to take their military shooter franchise to a subscription-based service, and this sort of setup would also make sense there -- tight controls on players, no patches/updates, no griefing/hacking/cheating, etc.
We maybe aren't there yet, but games will eventually be so detailed and complex, both in terms of graphics and simulation, that it will actually be less bandwidth-intensive just to ship over a video feed. I view this as an eventuality, rather than an open question.
As others have said, HTML5 has defined most of what's needed to do high-performance games. What we still need are broad support for current features, and to fill in a few key areas, like defining a better sound API (with minimum requirements for number and type of voices supported simultaneously) or broadly-supported fullscreen API.
I think Freemium MMOs and their ilk will be the first to go HTML5.
Another possibility for subscription-based games will be to use streaming technology similar to OnLive, which, while not perfect, has soundly proven to work better than most people ever thought it could. For say, large-scale MMORPGs there is a real benefit to centralizing the games processing at the server cluster -- it becomes easier to stay in sync when you don't have to deal with "rich clients" -- it would simplify the whole system if each player were simply a dumb video terminal with keyboard and mouse, assuming you have the GPU power to render all those screens. EA has also made it clear that they'd like to take their military shooter franchise to a subscription-based service, and this sort of setup would also make sense there -- tight controls on players, no patches/updates, no griefing/hacking/cheating, etc.
We maybe aren't there yet, but games will eventually be so detailed and complex, both in terms of graphics and simulation, that it will actually be less bandwidth-intensive just to ship over a video feed. I view this as an eventuality, rather than an open question.
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