71–80 of 141 posts
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As the video shows, this is not just about the highest-end AAA games, there is a 2D platformer there too. But the important thing in working to port the highest-end games is to push the limits of the web platform, so it can be better optimized. Before UE3 was ported, people were - rightfully! - skeptical any such engine would work well on the web at all, and that port helped get to that point (and now to UE4). Also,…
Most games these days (with a few exceptions) are GPU bound. Battlefield, Far Cry, Assassins Creed, etc are all GPU bound. You can't get away with a completely awful CPU but you don't need a great one for these. For other games, like Starcraft, or Kerbal Space Program, the GPU isn't your limiting factor, but your CPU's performance. Skyrim, for example, will perform vastly different with the same graphics card with di…
This is very nice indeed, except it does not work on mobile devices.
Curious why you say so? Have you tested it? WebGL works on mobile devices, not all browsers have caught up yet, but there is progress.
On Android, only the users that install Chrome besides the native browser, have very up to date version of Android and a device that isn't blacklisted can see WebGL.
WP is still not there.
Most casual users don't install third party browsers like FF.
Why bother with WebGL on mobile, when native allows for using the handset resources properly, not drain battery and have a bigger deployment target?
This is very exciting. I've had the chance to meet Brendan Eich a couple of times at Moz conferences, and he never fails to strike me as a visionary and a super nice guy. Between the asm.js stuff and Rust (which I actually had the privilege of witnessing the much-anticipated unveilling several years ago. Honestly I thought it was an overly-ambitious fools errand but that's why I'm not cto of mozilla), he really seems…
For example, it's widely understood today that Firefox has a much smaller share of the market now than it did a few years ago. Most measures I've seen show a drop from somewhere in the mid 30%'s down to under 20% today. Proportionally fewer Firefox users means less influence over the future direction of the web, of course.
SeaMonkey never really had that much penetration to begin with, and still remains basically irrelevant.
Firefox OS doesn't really seem to be taking off. While it may sound nice from an ideological standpoint in terms of openness and standards and all of that, in practice it doesn't sound very enjoyable or practical to use. I've seen enough people show displeasure over the low-end devices it's commonly used with, with the highly restrictive development environment (being forced to essentially use JavaScript/HTML5/CSS for apps), with a lack of features, and a lack of apps. Those are very serious and fundamental shortcomings.
Thunderbird and Persona have both been "turned over to the community". That appears to be a polite way of saying that Mozilla has given up on them.
Asm.js is pretty unremarkable. It's a human-unfriendly subset of JavaScript. NaCl is a much better approach that would ideally be adopted by the major browsers. Unfortunately, we've seen nothing but hostility toward it from Mozilla.
Rust sounds appealing, but it's not really usable today. We keep hearing that there will be a stable release sometime later this year, but we'll need to see that actually happen first before it'll have any chance at being widely adopted. Even then, it's doubtful Rust alone will have any major impact on the web any time soon. Servo may, but that's clearly very much also an unusable work in progress at this point.
So overall, I don't see Mozilla as heading in a very positive direction. They really haven't had any wildly successful new offerings in quite some time now, and what they have been working on lately doesn't seem to be getting all that much adoption. Without a large base of users, their influence over the development of the web will just get weaker and weaker.
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Curious why you say so? Have you tested it? WebGL works on mobile devices, not all browsers have caught up yet, but there is progress.
Apple does not allow WebGL except for iAds. On Android, only the users that install Chrome besides the native browser, have very up to date version of Android and a device that isn't blacklisted can see WebGL. WP is still not there. Most casual users don't install third party browsers like FF. Why bother with WebGL on mobile, when native allows for using the handset resources properly, not drain battery and have a bi…
But, beta versions of browsers on the same devices show good performance. I think it's just a matter of time.
But again, right now, of course native on mobile is the way to go.
I just bought Titanfall yesterday. I run this on a watercooled PC, dual GPU setup. I wouldn't have bought such a PC setup just to run at 60% of system performance. I think Mozilla is marketing this wrong. Triple-AAA titles go for squeezing every last ounce of system performance. I don't think there is anything to be gained to putting a game like Titanfall, which has 5 gigabytes of assets (some UE titles are much bigg…
You can cache the assets locally, just like on any other game. These tech demos are about pushing the envelope, which is needed to make the web a better platform for high-end games.
Running existing software in some convoluted browser-based environment, and giving a worse experience in most ways, doesn't really seem like innovation to me.
I think we could say it was pushing the envelope if the browser experience was superior to the native experience in every or almost every way. But that just isn't what we're seeing with these demos.
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You can cache the assets locally, just like on any other game. These tech demos are about pushing the envelope, which is needed to make the web a better platform for high-end games.
How is this "pushing the envelope"? Running existing software in some convoluted browser-based environment, and giving a worse experience in most ways, doesn't really seem like innovation to me. I think we could say it was pushing the envelope if the browser experience was superior to the native experience in every or almost every way. But that just isn't what we're seeing with these demos.
Of course, on the other hand it is inferior in many ways. It's just another option for game creators (and other apps too). For some it will be useful, for others it will not, just like consoles are useful for some but not for all, tablets are useful for some but not for all, etc. etc.
This is very exciting. I've had the chance to meet Brendan Eich a couple of times at Moz conferences, and he never fails to strike me as a visionary and a super nice guy. Between the asm.js stuff and Rust (which I actually had the privilege of witnessing the much-anticipated unveilling several years ago. Honestly I thought it was an overly-ambitious fools errand but that's why I'm not cto of mozilla), he really seems…
From what I can see, Mozilla is generally going in a direction that's alienating existing users, without necessarily bringing in any new ones. For example, it's widely understood today that Firefox has a much smaller share of the market now than it did a few years ago. Most measures I've seen show a drop from somewhere in the mid 30%'s down to under 20% today. Proportionally fewer Firefox users means less influence o…
I installed Firefox on all of their computers, taking favorites from IE. They all use Chrome today. You know why? They don't know. It was just there. Suddenly. Already set as preferred browser application. Every time I come by, I uninstall it. Every time I come back, it's there again. Installed with some regular update. (If someone has an idea how I could prevent it being installed at all, I would be very thankful)
After testing it for some months I saw absolutely no reason to switch. After some more months now, I see is as an annoying piece of crapware I started to hate.
So even if it may lead in marked share, it doesn't mean that people likes or wants it..
I see the style and feature growth within FF as a problem. I liked the old school application I could modify with stuff I need. Less is more. Today I have the feeling using a tool that has features I'll never find or use at all with a look I don't like and need to style-down. But still: I can style it down. It has all the Add-Ons I need and it works more stable and less resource hungry then Chrome. If anything happens, there is ONE process. I kill it, restart, works again.
I stay where I am.
Thanks for the great job!
I just bought Titanfall yesterday. I run this on a watercooled PC, dual GPU setup. I wouldn't have bought such a PC setup just to run at 60% of system performance. I think Mozilla is marketing this wrong. Triple-AAA titles go for squeezing every last ounce of system performance. I don't think there is anything to be gained to putting a game like Titanfall, which has 5 gigabytes of assets (some UE titles are much bigg…
5 GB is about one or two hours at not-unusually-high speeds. You can probably start and run the game with much less assets. Having the assets available at multiple quality levels -- chances are that's the case already -- would shave off more time. And by the sound of it, 60% of your computer is still about as fast as the just-launched console generation. Not big issues, I think. The big issue is having a robust ecosy…
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A game like this is a singular and extreme case. I can see a really big win for lots of business software. With browser deployment, lots of logistical problems just disappear. Heck, the notion of traditional corporate structure starts to disappear: Corporations exist because they can provide lowered transaction costs in specific contexts of production. I'm not sure I see the win. Even if it gets to 100% of "native."…
How does this accomplish anything that Steam isn't already accomplishing, though? I have only bought humble bundles, and I already have a couple of hundred games on Steam. Tempted to buy more. And I don't own a windows machine.
Browser based distribution has the potential to have better security than Steam currently has. Of course, Steam could implement those things as well. It could well be that Steam or something like it will win over the browser.