Scary? How? Besides wait till you're inside the full-body scanner. Talk about scary. It looks something like an early prototype of Star Trek transporters... you know from long before Scotty was born or something.

BTW you really should get there before March 3rd...

Thanks

Well this seems to be a .jnlp problem. Any body has any idea on how to solve this? It needs JRE 1.5.x but will not run on 1.6, hence using "1.5+" is not doable. But writing "1.5" in the .jnlp seems to initiate a re-install to some other 1.5 minor update.

ericd: To be honest I don't know what the problem is. I was not involved in the development of this project...

The application doesn't run on Java 6. That's why the jnlp was written the way it was to start with. Sorry for the inconvenience.

Copy & Paste from the press release, hence the marketing language. It's a cool art thingy though...

---

At the exhibition “From Reality and Back” an interactive 3D art, denoted shadowspace, is showcased by Jens Evaldsson, an art student. His unique art piece reaches over all geographical limitations.

Be part of the artwork
Jens Evaldsson is a student at the Swedish Royal University College of Fine Arts. His art piece “shadowspace” is exhibited at the ongoing exhibition “From Reality and Back”. The exhibition will continue at Mejan Labs in Stockholm till March 4th.

Evaldsson has together with the Swedish 3D company Agency9 created a large virtual 3D room. The room is available on the Internet for all visitors. However if you visit the exhibition in person you have the chance to step inside the full-body laser scanner. The result will appear in the virtual room and you will be given the opportunity to position yourself in the room and be part of the art creation process.

All this happens as the whole world can interact and move around in the three-dimensional space, where newly scanned persons pop up continuously.

First on the market
Shadowspace uses an advanced web-deployable 3D-engine, called AgentFX. AgentFX makes it possible to create huge three-dimensional environments on the Internet. Unlike already existing technology on the market, AgentFX-based applications don’t require previous download and install. Everything runs from your web browser, making the user experience truly online while remaining 3D.

“Shadowspace has given us the possibility to take a step closer to realisation of our vision, to make three-dimensional scenes, environments and objects as web-accessible as video-clips are today.” Said Khashayar Farmanbar, CEO at Agency9.
Visit shadowspace:
URL: www.shadowspace.se

IRL: Mejan Labs
Akadmigränd 3
Stockholm
Sweden

Hi folks,

Next week (April 5th) there's a workshop on "Game development technologies and networking" in Brussels. I'm one of the speakers and will be in Brussels from the evening April 4th. Drop me a line if you're gonna go and we can get a beer.

http://cordis.europa.eu.int/ist/audiovisual/neweve/e/ws050406/ws050406.htm
Registration is free.

Greate work and congrats to Oddlabs. You've really earned this.

All the Best,
Khashayar

The new webstart exporter wizard for creating .jnlp manifests and signing .jars is a very useful feature. I've been looking for such an app and even been prepared to pay for it...

Well these ragdolls have proven to be some hardcore guys. I mean they've been blown away with explosives, swept away buy a block of the wall, thrown from the skys... well I wouldn't be surprised if they can take some more beeting and still keep on moving ;-)

Hi guys,

Another demo with ragdoll skeleton physics in AgentFX is out now. Ragdolls Reloaded.

Also check out the demo promo-movie (don't be afraid to turn up the volume) ;-)

http://www.agency9.se/demo

Have fun
Khashayar

I believe you mean AgentFX.

Well all the tools are there (and has been for a while). 2-3 years ago, the previous version of AgentFX was running Quake III levels at the same frame rate as the Q3-eninge. This was before JOGL, LWJGL and other fancy bindings :-)

I must say though that the "real" game market is one of the most conservative segments to reach. We're still loosing potential clientes on the gaming market, mainly because of Java's bad reputation, even if we can show Megacorps Online which is a cool tech-demo (in Java).

/Khashayar

New update is available. This March 30th update was showcased at Game Developers Conference and includes a new self-re-charging laser gun, particle effects, smoke and some other features.

Have fun

/Khashayar

Gotta say Halo1.  

The game not only sold itself to me it also made me buy the Xbox, which makes it the most expensive game I've ever bought. And I don't even regret it.

Halo is also one of the few games that I've played to the end without getting bored enough to quit... even though I was closed to quit when the "flood" came up...   What is it with action game developers and their never-ending love for lots of easy-to-kill-monsters anyway?  

PS1. I bougth Halo2 but havn't had time to play it for more than 5 minutes yet...

PS2. Why two Halo1 options to vote for?

Nicer indeed. I must say I very much await the new forums, the screenshots are awsome...

Someone should fix the two things about the AgentFX 2.1.1 feature...

The link is wrong-spelled and the game is called "Megacorps Online".

Sounds like a plan Good luck and bring lots of friends with you to the wonderful pointer-less world of Java

I would start out the way "TheAnalogKid" did, with good sides of Java. Then looking at different sectors of game development:

• Graphics programming
  APIs for accessing OpenGL (ie JOGL, LWJGL)
  Rendering engines using JOGL/LWJGL to offer scene graphs... and 3D engines with features for advanced gaming i.e. lights, bone animations, shader support etc.
  
• Networking
  
• Input (Jinput etc)
  
• Game play (No need for separate scripting language)
  
• etc

You can also demo Megacorps Online if you like. It is a little more demanding on the hardware side though... Perhaps it can be encouraging to see that you can do games with high-end graphical features, yet still keep the platform independence that Java offers and benefit from Internet as a distribution channel (that is more than just downloads)

Hi everybody

After a lot of work I'm really glad to announce that the new version AgentFX 2.1 is released.

Some words about this release:

• Major update and rewrite of the scene graph and the rendering engine.
  
• Improved vertex- and pixel- shader support using Cg-language.
  
• Resource-based input/output for use with Java Webstart.
  
• A new input system *new feature* (beta on Mac)
  
• Better documentation
  
• A setof tutorials so you can get started right away...

Also the licensing model is totally new and allows even really small companies to start using AgentFX (with all its' cool features like real-time shadows-doom3-style, dynamic lights etc) commercially:

• Commercial version: 1295 Euro
  
• Education version: 295 Euro
  
• Non-commercial version: Free !

The commercial version include what you might call a "run-time license". A small company with for example two developers can buy two commercial licenses (one for each computer they develop on), and after that they can sell, distribute and use their game as commercially as they like...

The Non-commercial version can be used by individuals and the resulting game/app can be distributed as long as the game/app itself and it's distribution channel is non-commercial. It includes all features available in the Commercial version. A small AgentFX logo will be visible in the lower right corner... It's small though

Download and start developing now!!!  We're waiting for your feedback and questions

/Khashayar

Thanks for the breaking news  

Using a 3D technology doesn't make a game 3D. The gameplay and the choice of perspective however does. It is a 2D game and the gameplay is really fun because of that.

Nice. I like this oldish-looking arcade kind of game. To be honest I like it more than both super elvis and alienflux...

I guess that some kind of games are better off without any 3D :-)

Along with the new release January 15 we'll announce a new pricing model to make it easier for small developers to take advantage of AgentFX. The PLE license will be available for non-commercial use. Hopefully we'll manage to rewrite the EULA till January 15... else it will be updated soon

Well you are right in that. JOGL/LWJGL etc does more than just "header-filish" stuff to bring the OpenGL API to Java. However we probably have different views on where "magic" starts and ends. But that's a matter of taste I guess

I perceive JODE as a "magical" non-java package. All the calculations regarding the functionality of that package (physics) are done in C/C++ code and the JNI offers an interface to that package. Most of Java-games and engines that I've seen have their functionality written in Java. Take AgentFX 2 for example. All lighting, octree, portals, etc etc etc are written in Java. The only functionality that JOGL offers is to be just an interface for using the OpenGL API. Behind the scenes JOGL/LWJGL may do what is necessary to deliver the "interface functionality".
Who knows... In the future maybe Sun will include JOGL in the base VM package and everything's gonna be alright

Anyway... Gotta go try the Christmas lunch, and maybe have some "Gammeldansk"... But I guess that's a matter of taste too Merry Christmas folks

I understand how you see it. And to that extent I can agree with you that jnis are not completely comparable with header files. At least IF using "Fat code" in a jni. However I don't know about any projects seeing themselves as pure java projects, using the jni the way you describe it.

Any way... In this case, JOGL doesn't do any "magic tricks", neither did our previous set of binding that we wrote ourselves. All it does is simply translating com.agency9...A9GLVertex to GLVertex for use by the graphics driver. This is exactly what the OpenGL header files do for a C/C++ application.

And I might say that we don't really have a clue which language nvidia or ATI has used for writing their OpenGL drivers. So the "native" language in this case can be anything (although they are probably written in C). All we get is a C/C++ header pointing to the driver's object code (machine code).

Following this logical thread of discussion... It doesn't really matter if the OpenGL API is pre-shipped with the core packages of C/C++, Java or Delphi. It doesn't make the final application less Delphi, or less Java or even less C.

Well. I've heard these arguments before

As I see it...

• OpenGL is a third party API.
  
• A third party API can be available for a VM or a language.
  
• So, OpenGL API is available for a variety of languages including for Java, C/C++ and Delphi. The OpenGL API is available for these languages without any regards to what language the OpenGL driver, for that specific hardware, is implemented in (Assembler, or some other hardware customized language*)
  
  For example neither OpenGL nor DirectX are distributed in any languages' "core packages". Let's take C/C++ as an example. The OpenGL API is an external API that is available for C through headers (in Object Oriented notation usually called interfaces). The same way the OpenGL API is available for Java through jni.
  
  That's why the guys at OpenGL are so meticulous on using the notation: "Written in C using OpenGL API" or "Written in Java using OpenGL API".
  
  [size=1]* Hardware customized languages are not that unusual in specialized hardware i.e. Set top boxes, mobile phones (Ericsson at least), etc
  [/size]
  

Yes, that is correct. AgentFX is developed in 100% pure Java.

The OpenGL API is available in Java through JOGL, LWJGL and maybe other projects. From the begining we used our own set of bindings. Currently we're using JOGL (offered by SUN). In the future we might use something else.

BTW Chris, thanks for mentioning Agency9.

/Khashayar

Hi everybody,

Some happy news for the Java community.

AgentFX 3D engine and Megacorps Online, received a bronze position in 2004 years Golden Polygon Awards.

The Golden Polygon Awards recognize excellence in Real-time & interactive 3D contents. More than 150 3D contents were submitted to the Golden Polygon Awards 2004 Edition. The members of the organization selected 20 nominees in 4 categories.

I'm proud to say that Megacorps Online was awarded with a bronze position in the category for Rich Media / Entertainment.

Take care and play on

/Khashayar

Hey all

Just want to let you know that Agency9 we'll be showcasing AgentFX and Megacorps Online at this year's Brussels Eureka - World Exhibition of Innovation, Research and New Technology. If you've got the opportunity you're more than welcome to visit us at the expo. After all it would be fun to actually meet some of you guys as an addition to reading your posts :-)

The exhibition will take place at hall 11 of Brussels Expo (Heyzel), from 16 up to and including 21 November 2004.

CU
/Khashayar

PS. While you're here you could also go visit the "Linux Everywhere" exhibition, I know, we'll do

I just downloaded the new version "JOGL 1.1 b06" Mac OSX natives and there is only libjogl.jnilib and no libjogl_cg.jnilib

Are the jogl Cg parts incorporated in the libjogl.jnilib or is the other Cg-lib still missing in the distribution?

/Khsahayar
Eager to run javabased Cg-stuff on mac...

Hi

We at Agency9, really like the idea behind the JGF initiative and would of course like to do our share to support it.

We could donate a whole server with a static IP in our server park, running your OS of choice (Linux or BSD I guess :-) ). That way you can maintain and run javagamesfactory.

The physical place of the server would be in our server park, actually next to the one running agency9.se and megacorpsonline.com

Bandwidth limit is 30Mbit/s, which should be satisfactory. No traffic limits.

Let us know if this sounds interesting.

/Khashayar Farmanbar
CEO Agency9

Comming right up...
Just give me some hours and I'll get it to you

/Khashayar