Java 4K Game Development Contest 43
mrseigen writes "Java Unlimited has been running a contest since Dec 1 to develop a game in Java using only four kilobytes of bytecode and resources. You have until March 1 to finish your entries, and it's worth looking at the entries for last years' contest."
Uh.... (Score:2, Interesting)
I sense productivity will reach all time highs ...
So who won last year's contest? (Score:2, Informative)
Anyone know where that is?
Re:So who won last year's contest? (Score:1, Informative)
This would mean that Dungeon 4K would have won. It has far more DLs than any other game (1600 compared to 900 to the second "best")
Re:So who won last year's contest? (Score:3, Informative)
Be nice to the poor server, please.
Re:So who won last year's contest? (Score:2)
Re:So who won last year's contest? (Score:1, Offtopic)
Re:So who won last year's contest? (Score:3, Insightful)
this year I will make sure the winners list is on the site itself (it would be nice to sort it by final placing after judging anyway)
Re:So who won last year's contest? (Score:2)
Hi! I'm having fun playing some of these games... but it would be really nice if all 50 of the 2005 4KB games were available for download in a single .ZIP file. If I missed such a thing, please give the URL. Otherwise, could you please add this to the site and let us know what its URL is?
Thanks!
- Marty
SCREENSHOTS (Score:3, Informative)
And... (Score:2)
New Demo Scene? (Score:1)
Having moved to the Mac a few years back, I haven't found many demos which run natively on my machine. I feel like I've been missing out. Demos like the product [theproduct.de] are great.
Is this a sign the demo scene may just kick off big time for J2SE? I wonder if anyone has thought about J2ME.
With such a rich API available, we're going to see some great (playable!) demos.
Re:New Demo Scene? (Score:5, Informative)
Try Robotron 4096. It was developed on a Mac, then tested on Windows.
Is this a sign the demo scene may just kick off big time for J2SE?
This contest is currently running into its fourth year. It garnered quite a bit of attention the first year, but the quality of the entries was pretty low. The second year two competitors really tore up the contest with full graphics, sound support, and full screen applications. The third year gained attention from many professional game developers. taking the contest into 3D, real-time raytracing, and other areas that it had never been before.
The fourth year is shaping up to be even bigger and badder than ever before. Visit JavaGaming.org [javagaming.org] for more info.
Re:New Demo Scene? (Score:2)
God, I love that name.
Re:New Demo Scene? (Score:2)
Yes, but what about the game?
Re:New Demo Scene? (Score:2)
I think I like the name more than I think I'll like the game.
Re:New Demo Scene? (Score:2)
How sad. You might find you're missing a great little game. Not to mention many of the other good ones like T4XI and Hunters4K.
Well, at least you might get some amusement out of the manual:
http://java.dnsalias.com/4k/robotron/readme.txt [dnsalias.com]
It contains an entire story about how Robotron ends up in 4096.
Re:New Demo Scene? (Score:2)
One mistake in the manual: the robots themselves were the Robotrons. You're just a human with mutant blasting powers.
Useful... (Score:4, Funny)
Re:Useful... (Score:4, Informative)
Re:Useful... (Score:2)
On small machines the JVM is just an interpreter, like any other (but don't let facts stop Slashdot anti-Java bias).
There is an advantage of Java bytecodes is that they tend to be smaller than the equivalent machine code instructions for something like X86. This is one reason why Java is so popular for embedded systems.
Re:About what you would expect (Score:2, Interesting)
He does have a point. I have a version of tetris for my TI-86 calculator. I have no idea how to tell how much RAM it uses, but the calculator only has something like 120K. One 4K version of tetris on that page uses almost 40 MB of RAM after a few minutes, and after playing for a while there's occasional, noticeable pauses for garbage collection (yes, I verified it was from garbage collection), which doesn't happen on the calculator.
Java's great for some tasks, it's almost like a cross-platform VB. B
Re:About what you would expect (Score:2)
It is possible to write bad code in any language. This sounds like a good example.
Re:About what you would expect (Score:1, Insightful)
Markus, you're very good at desktop gaming and 3D technology. But J2ME often runs in 64K or less. So you're not helping anybody with sweeping statements like this. Let's make sure we're comparing apples to apples (desktop games to desktop gamss) and not apples to cucumbers (desktop games to calculator/cell phone/PDA games). Shall we?
-jbanes
Re:About what you would expect (Score:2)
You can't generalise. There is no reason why Java can't be used for games, and work well. Garbage collection should not be a problem for well-written applications (indeed, Java can be used for real-time work). There is the Quake clone, Jake, and there are commercial games, and even game platform emulators:
http://www.millstone.demon.co.uk/download/javaboy/ [demon.co.uk]
Re:About what you would expect (Score:2)
people can come up with benchmarks both for and against java much as people can come up with TCO studies both for and against linux. but my experiance is that java stuff is either slow, memory hogging or both.
Re:About what you would expect (Score:2)
Others have commented that it is fine.
but my experiance is that java stuff is either slow, memory hogging or both.
The same can be said about badly written C or C++ programs. The point is that there is nothing now about the Java language itself, or the most common implementations of it, that means that applications are necessarily large or slow.
Re:About what you would expect (Score:4, Informative)
Did you consider that the memory you're seeing may be JVM overhead combined with pre-allocation? In smaller devices (like Cell Phones), the JVM is built into the device. So there's no real overhead for Java. The pre-allocation is also smaller to compensate for the smaller device. Considering that many of these devices have barely 64K available (never mind 120K), I'd say that Java fits just fine.
and after playing for a while there's occasional, noticeable pauses for garbage collection (yes, I verified it was from garbage collection)
I find it interesting that you singled out such an example without looking at many of the more interesting examples like T4XI, Robotron 4096, and Hunters 4K. Also, you may find Tetris 4K to be a much better version than the first item on the list.
Java's great for some tasks, it's almost like a cross-platform VB. But the language, or more likely the way the language is most commonly used, isn't optimal for some things. Games happen to be one of those things.
You don't [wurmonline.com] know [puppygames.net] what [bytonic.de] you're [mycgiserver.com] talking [datadino.com] about [getjar.com].
At one point I could have pointed to the poor performance and massive memory usage of VegaStrike [sourceforge.net]. Does that mean that C/C++ is a "bad" langauge? NO! It means that it was poorly coded and still needed lots of work done. The developers worked on improving their codebase, and low-and-behold, the game got better. Perhaps it wasn't the language after all?
quick downloads (Score:2)
No FAQ on .JNIP extension file (Score:3, Interesting)
Just how does one go about getting JNIP file to execute from a 'single-click' standpoint of view?
When one clicks on the website's 'Run Webstart', an open dialog box indicating that this JNIP file extension is identified as a 'Java Network Launched Application', but offers no executable for this...
What is the correct executable for this?
Re:No FAQ on .JNIP extension file (Score:2, Insightful)
4k? (Score:2, Informative)
Re:4k? (Score:1)
"As those of you following the saga at home will know, the 5k has been in flux for a long time on account of the people who organize it are too busy and stressed. But that will not be the case for long: the infinite resource known as SIGGRAPH will soon take it over, to the betterment of all."
So who knows...
Re:4k? (Score:1)
-- yeoz
p.s.: yo
Re:4k? (Score:1)
ta yeoz