2004 Web and Downloadable Games White Paper 

IGDA Online Games SIG 

strong candidate for mid tier 3D game development in competition with other environments such as 

Shockwave3D. Until Java 3D becomes a core component of the Java platform, however, it is 

necessary to ensure that customers install the Java 3D extensions alongside any Java 3D based 

games. 

c) 

Java Delivery Mechanisms 

A variety of delivery mechanisms exist for packaging and delivering Java based content to your 

audience. These include: 

Applets 

The Java Plug in 

Java Web start 

Prepackaged applications (with and without the JRE) 

Many commercial and open source browsers include built in support for Java content in the form of 

applets. Unfortunately, these platforms tend to support earlier Java specifications and are 

inconsistent and often buggy in their implementations. This makes this platform unstable and largely 

unsuitable for the production deployment of games. 

The Java Plug in

40

  from Sun gets around this problem by providing a plug in for these modern 

browser platforms that allows applets embedded in web pages to be executed using a locally installed 

Java 2 JRE. The Java Plug in software forces the browser to use Sun 

s Java 2 JRE instead of its 

default Java virtual machine. The Java Plug in therefore provides a suitable platform for deploying 

game content via web pages but leaves developers in the position of requiring the JRE to be installed 

on client desktops. The current JRE download weighs in at almost 8 MBs. However, once installed, 

the player may play any Java games and will only have to download the content of the games they 

wish to play. 

Java Web Start

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  is a similar technology from Sun that is also bundled with the Java 2 JRE. Web 

Start is similar to the Java Plug in in that its purpose is to allow Java content accessed via the web to 

run in a controlled Java 2 environment independent of the browser platform. It enables application 

launching by clicking on a Web page link. For example, if the game program is not present on the 

end user's computer, Java Web Start automatically downloads all necessary files and then caches 

them on the computer to ensure that the application may be relaunched at anytime. Web Start 

initiated Java applications run in their own virtual machine sandbox and are not bound to the 

originating web page as applets are. As such, the browser may be closed once the application has 

started. Web Start provides support for managing downloaded applications locally and is a strong tool 

for deploying games where the JRE download is not perceived to be too much of a barrier.  

Another option for delivering Java applications is to use one of the many commercial and open 

source tools for packaging a Java application as a native platform installer. These installer tools even 

permit developers to include the JRE in the installation process, making for a simpler and improved 

user experience. 

d) 

Additional Java Gaming Links 

Micro Java Network   www.microjava.com 

Java Gaming   www.javagaming.org  

Midlet.org   www.midlet.org  

4. 

Wild Tangent 

WildTangent

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  is a plug in framework that is programmable in a variety of languages. It consists of a high 

level API for Java, JavaScript, and other COM enabled languages such as C, C++ and Visual Basic, and 

40

 http://java.sun.com/products/plugin/ 

41

 http://java.sun.com/products/javawebstart/ 

42

 http://www.wildtangent.com/ 

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