Java gaming engine

Is it the art work? The programmer has to pay closer attention to memory usage to avoud dangling pointers and so on. In games programming garbage collection is not an advantage. Also, for graphics intensive tasks Java is not very appropriate, as there are many things that are considered unsafe by the runtime, and thus are forbidden like casting pointers to reinterpret data.

Another important matter is the already settled know how in the industry. Having a large developer pool to hire from lessens one of the management hazards that is key people leaving the company. But despite that, there have been some successful games with some parts written in Java, like Vampire: The Masquerade - Redemption.

A more recent game like Minecraft is written completely in Java; but it does not feature state of the art graphics, as the emphasis is put more into the dynamic nature of the virtual environment.

Generally everything said here was a reason not to port to Java for game development; was. The gaming industry is currently hitting a paradigm shift. Three things have changed or are currently changing the gaming industry:. A game is not entirely dependent on itself anymore. The key advantages that existed in the former low level languages are slowing being out weighed by the advantages that exist within languages such as C and Java high level languages. Two crude but undeniable examples are games that work on Facebook , and remote medias such as phones, tablets, etc.

It is important to state that in all two scenarios, all three concerns listed above are dissolved. A game that can not work without a server need not worry about being copy infringed private hosting through reverse engineering not included. IMO, while it may be too early to state which language be the preferred, I'm putting my bets on Java for three key reasons.

It is important to note that only Microsoft Windows uses DirectX, as good as it may be, it has but one draw back. Virtually every OS that can run games will be capable of rendering in OpenGL and modular design is pushing on this like never before. Please note, Microsoft is trying to deviate this issue through monopolizing on the distribution of Windows 8. Currently, this is a handicap for all other languages especially ones developed for phones.

While the JVM does pose a latency concern, it should be noted that such concerns could be expunged through threading. I also wouldn't be too worried about Windows 8 and the push of Microsoft.

While Apple is likely to be effected by Microsoft's push mainly due to using C , Google on the other hand is likely to profit from it. I wanted to address just one side topic of this question, but garbage collection is not necessary helpful for creating the low-level, performance-critical aspects of an AAA-type game engine. In fact, avoiding that kind of referencing and collection system for objects is helpful.

You want even user-defined types to be contiguous in memory and fit adjacent objects in the cache, etc. Aside from the performance issues of collecting garbage at periodic intervals and of scattering objects in memory, games can't afford to be leaky with their bulkier resources, and the garbage collector hinders things there. Yes, I just said that GC hinders the ability to avoid leaks.

As counter-intuitive as it sounds, look at the leakiest apps out there today: the ones where the longer you use them, the more and more the memory usage continues to rise.

Those leaky ones are far more often programmed in languages with garbage collection. For example, take Flash games. There are many out there, and not just complete amateur software, that use more and more resources and get slower and slower the longer you play the game, forcing you to sometimes restart your browser to get the game fast again. Yet they're coded in ActionScript, a language that has garbage collection.

In theory garbage collection should reduce leaks. What are some of the best open-source Game Engine projects in Java? This list will help you:. LibHunt Java. Trending Popularity Index About. AndEngine 0 3, 0. SonarLint www. FXGL 16 2, 9. Project mention: Is it worth learning javafx?? Project mention: The XMage Draft Historical Society is the place to be if you love to draft - and it's completely free!

Project mention: Box2D physics toy I started working on reddit. LGame 0 1. Litiengine 5 9. Project mention: GC Progress from Java 8 to 17 news. Scout APM scoutapm.

VTerminal 4 54 6. Browse our plentiful documentation, follow in-depth tutorials, or look up specific parts of the library in our API reference. Performantly render an environment, sprites, images, shapes, and text in a simplistic Java AWT-based rendering process. Simultaneously stream multiple audio sources distributed in 2D space, as well as static background music.

Rely on basic game infrastructure such as a GameLoop, Configuration files, Resource Management, Logging, Localization, Networking, and much, much more. Make use of many pre-implemented map object types or define custom objects with all the properties you need. Create in-game UI and menus with buttons, sliders, checkboxes, scrollable lists, spinners, and more.

If you want to support us living our dream, please consider helping us out with a one time donation or by becoming our sponsor. Skip to content. Java games made simple. Java Game Engine Features. Apply forces to entities. Move entities with acceleration respecting friction and weight. Convey three-dimensionality with distinct render layers.