- They allow ordinary people to experience extraordinary emotions—the emotions of the warrior, the king, the spy, and the lover—while remaining protected in a safe environment..
- But pretty much everybody, at some point, needs to use regular pen and paper (or Microsoft Word) and just spell out the story of the game—the feel, the depth, the breadth, and the intent..
- What are the limitations of the game?.
- Toys—This is the rarest category of games, but also one of the most interesting.
- The most important part of the game design process is to know the limitations of the medium.
- This is a symphony concert performed entirely though the ringing of the audience's mobile phones! Visit http://www.flong.com/telesymphony/ for more information and sample songs..
- The next step is to actually define the rules of the game.
- Some of the best resources can be found online:.
- Typical engines include some of the following:.
- Get ready for a tour of the micro device world.
- Some features of the latest PersonalJava 3.0 include the following:.
- One of the most popular categories of PDA apps is, of course, games..
- Jeode has created one of the fastest virtual machines out there..
- Kittyhawk is similar to some of the older versions of MIDP.
- This is Matsushita's version of the 503 line of DoCoMo phones.
- Because it works with a third-generation mobile network, it is capable of real-time video conferencing! FOMA, by the way, stands for Freedom of Mobile Multimedia Access.The display is full, startling color.
- Rather, APIs can be configured depending on the target platform and the needs of the platform..
- Aren't some of these devices cool? And this is only the beginning… The rest of this book will show you how to actually program games that support all of these devices, and look their best on various types of screens.
- Clarity of visuals—The graphics should be as large as possible.
- Simplicity of gameplay—The gameplay itself should use a few keys and be very clear and easy to understand..
- Jamdat has become one of the most successful wireless game companies in the world.
- One of the most popular WAP games in the world is Gladiator.
- With each hole, you can choose your club, angle of swing, and the power of the swing.
- Some of the more unusual offerings include.
- Word Trader is one of the most original WAP games out there.
- Some of the most popular wireless games in the world can be found here..
- The results of the duel will be shown, as in Figure 3.20..
- The game will connect to a server and keep track of the top 100 players.
- Slightly different versions of the games are available for different phones.
- Different versions of the game work on MIDP, iAppli, Personal Java, and KittyHawk (LG Electronics' i-Book phone).
- Whoever is caught loses that round of the game..
- Both a Palm and MIDP version of the game are available..
- This game boasts some of the most impressive graphics to ever reach the small screen, as shown in Figure 3.31..
- One of the most interesting is called Let Me Alone, shown in Figure 3.38.
- You can use your mobile phone offline to train your samurai in the art of the sword, and then log in to the gameworld to do real-time battle.
- Chess—The strategic game of kings, shown in Figure 3.43..
- Snake—This game, shown in Figure 3.47, is a much more graphically advanced version of the black and white Snake game found on many Nokia phones.
- Reversi—The classic black and white checkers game..
- Try to arrange three bubbles of the same color to make them pop..
- In the Unites States, VoiceStream Wireless is one of the biggest GSM carriers..
- Some of the major standards supporting 3G networks include the following:.
- WAP's primary technology—the Wireless Markup Language (WML)—is based on HDML and was developed by Unwired Planet (which became Phone.com and is now Openwave), Motorola, Nokia, and Ericsson.
- An application layer—The actual application used to display things to the user.
- In the world of the desktop Internet browser, there are Web sites and Web pages.
- The id attribute refers to the name of the card.
- Wow! This is one of the world's most simple WML files!.
- You can use many of the same input elements that you'll find in an HTML form..
- name — The name of the field, which will become a variable name you can access later or send to the server..
- maxlength — The maximum length of characters that a user can enter..
- size — The width of the field, indicated in number of characters..
- format — The type of data that can be entered in the field.
- Only one of the options can be selected.
- value — Set the default value of the variable to be set..
- The command will usually appear in the soft-key menus at the bottom of the mobile phone's display.
- unknown — A special type, not one of the preceding types..
- Simply use the name of the element preceded by a dollar sign.
- Set the ontimer attribute of the <card>.
- In addition, some versions of WMLScript allow you to access special features of the user agent, such as the following:.
- If the message isn't null, add it to the top of the queue if (mymsg.
- SOFT1 — The first softkey is pressed..
- SOFT2 — The second softkey is pressed..
- This action deletes the character to the left of the cursor..
- Messaging can be part of the game itself.
- You can then set the captain of the station to notify you if it is being attacked.
- One of the most important tags is the <A>.
- Some of the major categories of Location Based Services include the following:.
- Location Based Information—The most useful for games.
- Postpaid—The mobile carrier keeps a detailed record of every call made or packet of data that passes through the handset.
- Many of the latest WAP implementations support WTAI..
- A J2ME profile is a layer on top of the configuration.
- The MIDP is designed to run on top of the CLDC.
- Give your project a simple name (with no spaces), and type in the name of the main MIDlet class.
- Listing 9.1 shows the structure of the world's simplest (and most useless) Java MIDlet:.
- The following classes are subclasses of the Screen class:.
- Gets the title of the Screen.
- Sets the title of the Screen .
- In general, any subclass of the Item class can be contained within a Form.
- Listing 9.3 The StartForm Class.
- The size of the Form grows by one.
- A command's type specifies the intent of the command.
- The first command, Play, will appear in the bottom row of the screen, linked to the first soft key.
- Returns the type of the alert..
- This method sets the type of the alert..
- microedition.locale — Returns the current locale of the device (for example, en- US for United States English)..
- Listing 9.7 The Cache Class.
- This maximum is usually dictated by the frame rate of the game.
- Processors of the Future.
- Working memory—Where the device stores data needed only during the lifetime of the game.
- It occupies part of the memory and stays there as long as the game lives..
- Screen resolution is one of the largest problems for game developers.
- A frame rate is exactly what it sounds like—the rate at which one still frame flashes by, creating the appearance of motion.
- Each letter in the name of the class adds an additional byte to the execution code..
- Each letter in the name of the public method adds an additional byte to the execution code..
- Each letter in the name of the public variable adds an additional byte to the execution code.
- Protected and private variables don't have any influence on the size of the class..
- Every letter in the name of the constructor adds an additional byte to the class file..
- The size of the reduction is based on the number of classes, methods, and variables..
- Some of the biggest power-eating problems in games are.
- This method changes the priority of the thread..
- Listing 12.1 The GameCanvas Thread Example