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Mozilla Develops Gladius 3D Game Engine

Posted by Soulskill on from the new-versions-every-six-hours dept.

An anonymous reader writes "Mozilla is developing its own 3D engine called Gladius as part of a wider Paladin project whose aim it is to bring 3D to the web. As all programmers know, the best way to learn is to experiment, and that's exactly what Mozilla is doing. In order to develop Gladius the team decided to create a game called RescueFox (best played in Firefox). It's a very basic prototype, and Mozilla has no interest in taking it further, but the purpose it served was to highlight what still needs to be done to make Gladius a solid web browser 3D engine solution."

112 comments

  1. Oh goodie... by SwedishChef · · Score: 0

    Just what we need... an annoying technology that manufacturers can use to try to convince us to "upgrade" all of our laptops and monitors.

    --
    No one ever had to evacuate a city because the solar panels broke!
    1. Re:Oh goodie... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 4, Insightful

      Just what we need... an annoying technology that manufacturers can use to try to convince us to "upgrade" all of our laptops and monitors.

      Yeah, I wish there were more stories on Slashdot about how to live in harmony with nature away from all the trappings of modern society. I don't come here for all this news about "upgrades" and "technology" and stuff.

    2. Re:Oh goodie... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

      Well those graphics are about 1998 level, so unless you're running really old hardware it shouldn't be that taxing.

      Still though who needs this? We have 3d game engines, have for years, and sticking in in a one size fits all browser is a step back for any good technology pushing game.

      Its like 15 years later everyone forgot how completely useless and crappy VRML was and they want to do it all over again.

      Know what I want my web browser to do? Render HTML, correctly, and quickly. Do javascript if I allow it from that site, and play HTML5 video since that's what half the web is now... and allow me to filter ads, although if it didn't I'd just use the filter list in a firewall.

      There is absolutely no reason it should need to render 3d anything on my video card nor do browsers need to add that bloat.

    3. Re:Oh goodie... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      It has nothing to do with stereoscopy, stereoscopic glasses or monitors... it's a game engine with 3D images.

    4. Re:Oh goodie... by hairyfeet · · Score: 1

      Don't forget the nightmare that will be security. what is the one driver that really needs to be bare metal? Which driver on a system is the most likely to be flaky? That would be graphics. Personally i'm glad i moved to Comodo Dragon after Moz went nuts with their upgrade schedule.

      --
      ACs don't waste your time replying, your posts are never seen by me.
    5. Re:Oh goodie... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

      [quote]Still though who needs this? We have 3d game engines, have for years, and sticking in in a one size fits all browser is a step back for any good technology pushing game.[/quote]

      This isn't for "good technology pushing games." This is for Minecraft, Facebook games, etc. They are actually becoming quite popular, though probably not among the Slashdot crowd. Even though these games look like they're from 1998, they're currently done in Flash, so they still run slow as hell on integrated video.

      So there is actually a niche for this thing. People who want to play 3D Flash games on the web, and don't have a gaming rig. However, these people are also the least likely to jump on mozilla.org and download some obscure plugin when they already have Flash. So, I doubt that Adobe has anything to worry about.

    6. Re:Oh goodie... by sg_oneill · · Score: 1

      That boat sailed long ago. This is just a bunch of javascript.

      WebGL is pretty much in every browser (Well maybe not IE, not sure) , and has been for a while now.

      --
      Excuse the Unicode crap in my posts. That's an apostrophe, and slashdot is busted.
    7. Re:Oh goodie... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

      what gp is trying to say is that we are sick to the death of webgl, html5 and suchlike crap.

      it aint gonna take off, no matter how much the whiney idiots that promote this crap carry on.

      for one, we don't want to go back to the days of "best played in Firefox [or insert favorite browser here]"

    8. Re:Oh goodie... by MechaStreisand · · Score: 1

      Set sail for browser exploits. Over and over and over again.

      --
      Disclaimer: IANAL. This post is, however, legal advice, and creates an attorney-client relationship.
    9. Re:Oh goodie... by hairyfeet · · Score: 1

      If it is hardware accelerated then by the very definition it has to have access to the hardware. Again which driver is the most likely to be out of date, flaky, and which bypasses pretty much ALL security because that would slow the living hell out of the hardware? Why that would be the GPU.

      Think about it friend, the modern GPU is 500Mhz with anywhere from 256Mb to 1Gb of RAM. That is a hell of a lot more power than most of us had when the nasties were spreading through the systems of the 90s. Now what can a malware writer do if he has access to that amount of hardware? hell most GPUs today are based on only two vendors, ATI or Nvidia, and have firmware which allows features to be flipped on and off. Write the nasty to the firmware? You own the machine and the only way to remove will brick the device.

      So to me this is just another case of someone deciding they COULD do something without thinking about whether they SHOULD do something. I mean who in the hell wants to do heavy 3D gaming in a fricking browser? the game will run much faster being installed natively, and the farmville type couldn't give a rat's ass if its 3D or not. Just another dumb idea from the company that seems to be determined to run off all their users, why am I not surprised?

      --
      ACs don't waste your time replying, your posts are never seen by me.
    10. Re:Oh goodie... by Nikker · · Score: 1

      I would play 3D games anyway really. If the game is fun and fluid then what really is the difference if I click a link or a desktop icon?

      From a distributor's standpoint, they already know people will play games regardless of it being distributed by web/steam/physical CD/DVD. Sure most people here will cringe when someone clicks on web game links because of how slow it will run or the ability to spread malware but we also know most of the millions will do it just the same.

      What would really be cool is more easily attainable gaming. Hey most people will download virus laden software just in the hopes of being entertained for an afternoon how are we all supposed to hate on something that could eventually pan out for developers who wish to add 3D features to their websites?

      Most IGPs today are capable of much more than they actually do on a daily basis, it might even be possible that if this catches on the GPU manufacturers will offer more hardware VM features that allows the OS to manage states more efficiently.

      --
      A loop, by its nature, continues. If that didn't make sense, start reading this sentence again.
    11. Re:Oh goodie... by georgesdev · · Score: 1

      back in 95 the "true computer engineers" said they did not need 2D graphics, command-line was better than any GUI could ever become, Internet was a useless toy. They've been proved wrong since. in 2011 some think 3D in a browser will always be useless. but we're all seeing software starting to move the cloud (cloud storage, gmail, salesforce, etc ...), and we're all using 3D. let's talk again in 2027!!!

    12. Re:Oh goodie... by Canazza · · Score: 1

      umm... HTML5 is here, and it's in every modern browser. Has been for some time.

      And as for 3D in the browser, there are only two ways around the "Best played in X".
      1) Each browser performs at the same speed (frankly impossible)
      2) Plugins, like Flash, or Unity3D, of which people here seem to be allergic to.

      so what you're wanting, really, is to go back to using Mosaic.

      --
      It pays to be obvious, especially if you have a reputation for being subtle.
    13. Re:Oh goodie... by hairyfeet · · Score: 1

      Uhhh...you DO know we have these things called app stores, yes?Hell my new Asus came with over a dozen games and the Asus app store if I want more. Then there is Steam, GOG, D2D, tons of places you can get games for little cost without opening your machine to the world which is exactly what we are talking about here.

      Those of us old enough remember these same claims made by a similar product, a little thing called ActiveX. it had games, could do work, all kinds of really neat stuff....until it became such a virus laden whore everyone was afraid to go anywhere near the crap. that is what i predict will happen here as well.

      As I said to have hardware acceleration you have to have access to the hardware, and the only driver on a modern system that is really low level anymore is the GPU because every frame counts. that will allow Mr Malware vendor to punch yet more holes, it'll be nasty. Just you watch friend, just you watch.

      --
      ACs don't waste your time replying, your posts are never seen by me.
  2. Insensitive clods by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    I only have one eye!

    1. Re:Insensitive clods by keitosama · · Score: 3, Informative

      This is about making a game engine to ease development with WebGL, not the shit-flying-in-your-face kind of 3D.

  3. I cannot wait.. by will_die · · Score: 2

    I wonder what projects pila, pugio and plumbatae will be.

  4. There's no stinking fox by Saija · · Score: 2

    That page only shows empty, ahem, space...

    --
    Slashdot ya no es que lo era! ;)
    1. Re:There's no stinking fox by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

      White eagle on a white background. The flag of the French military.

    2. Re:There's no stinking fox by nzac · · Score: 3, Informative

      Disable noscript... (nothing came up before I did that)

      Its a tech demo still pretty cool though.
      Find the fox and double click on it to win.

    3. Re:There's no stinking fox by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Wait for it to be finished loading, would ya?

      But 2-4 FPS? On something that would be bad graphics on a modern mobile phone or a game from 10 years agoâ¦

      I will make a Minecraft clone in it, so I can build a CPU in it so I can boot Linux in it so I can run Emacs in it so I can browse the web in it so I can run JSLinux so I can run VMWare in it so I ca#%.Ä$ERROR: OUT OF RESOURCES!

    4. Re:There's no stinking fox by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      disabled, and what do you know? Nothing. Guess 3.6 isn't good enough.

    5. Re:There's no stinking fox by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      I have 7 and still nothing.
      I guess it *is* just an experiment. (that failed?)

    6. Re:There's no stinking fox by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      9 and (almost) nothing as well.
      White text in the middle of the the page can be highlighted and the credits in lower right (guess they wanted thanks for nothing).

    7. Re:There's no stinking fox by Waccoon · · Score: 2

      Welcome to the future of the Internet. A bold, dynamic, exciting frontier where if you don't have the latest browser technology, you'll get a blank page. I'm reliving the years of looking at a spinning hourglass for minutes at a time and wondering if the computer will ever actually do anything.

      Seriously, even for a tech demo, why isn't there some kind of notification that your browser can't handle the demo? Couldn't they print a placeholder what the demo is and what is required, and then erase the message once the demo code kicks in? This gives a really bad impression if you ask me, and that is not what a demo is supposed to do.

      Fail.

    8. Re:There's no stinking fox by nzac · · Score: 1

      That's the fault to the Slashdot Editors.
      If they had of directed you though the lead in page their might be been warnings.

    9. Re:There's no stinking fox by Waccoon · · Score: 1

      No, it's definitely the deveopers' fault. The RescueFox game has its own sub-domain, so there really isn't a lead-in page. The developer blog provides no easy way to link directly to the project, and states that it "works" in Firefox, but doesn't say what versions. It's just bad design all around, and we all know how much of that is in web pages.

    10. Re:There's no stinking fox by AmiMoJo · · Score: 1

      Unfortunately there does seem to be an easy way of blocking this type of content in AdBlock, for those of us who don't use NoScript. When it loads Firefox hangs for about 10 seconds, and this on a quad core machine with 6GB RAM, and naturally I want to block ads using it.

      --
      const int one = 65536; (Silvermoon, Texture.cs)
      SJW, n: "Someone I don't like, and by the way I'm a fuckwit" - AC
    11. Re:There's no stinking fox by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      You can disable WebGL (about:config, look for webgl)

    12. Re:There's no stinking fox by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Obviously if the article mentions it's testing out an upcoming 3d engine, one would assume you would have the latest version of Firefox. You are forgetting that this is a demonstration and not an actual game. There is no polish, It's only a proof of concept.

  5. Already slashdotted. by slimjim8094 · · Score: 1

    Oh well. Was actually pretty impressive, smooth animation and everything.

    --
    I have developed a truly marvelous proof of this comment, which this signature is too narrow to contain.
    1. Re:Already slashdotted. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      ...It's slightly less impressive than the super nintendo. Which puts it on par with everything Mozilla has shat out in the last few years. What a sad way for a once great company to end up.

  6. Hasn't this been done before? by msobkow · · Score: 1

    I seem to recall several attempts at 3D plugins and interfaces over the years, all of which withered and blew away in the winds of "who gives a shit."

    Games are one of those areas where the web will not be able to compete with local processing power for a very, very long time. Sure you can do some primitive demos, but the sheer bandwidth required to transfer the textures for modern video games are way beyond the capabilities of current internet technology.

    Even Second Life with it's shading instead of textures still uses a native client.

    --
    I do not fail; I succeed at finding out what does not work.
    1. Re:Hasn't this been done before? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

      I seem to recall several attempts at 3D plugins and interfaces over the years VRML needs brains! BRAAAAAINNNNSSS!

    2. Re:Hasn't this been done before? by aztracker1 · · Score: 1

      I worked on an early project that used VRML, very simple models for event layouts... tables, podiums, chairs etc. Worked pretty well, and am somewhat surprised VRML never made it farther... though it was really slow on some of the computers still in use at the time, around 1997 iirc.

      --
      Michael J. Ryan - tracker1.info
    3. Re:Hasn't this been done before? by ultranova · · Score: 1

      Sure you can do some primitive demos, but the sheer bandwidth required to transfer the textures for modern video games are way beyond the capabilities of current internet technology.

      You could use SVG for textures. Then it's the actual detail, not resolution, that determines their size. Also, since you can render SVG to any resolution, you get nice and sharp textures independent of your monitor resolution.

      --

      Forget magic. Any technology distinguishable from divine power is insufficiently advanced.

  7. Wrong way by Billly+Gates · · Score: 1

    We do not need plugins.

    We need next generation webGL and CSS 3D. If Mozilla wants to contribute they should make an alternative to DirectWrite as non exists in Linux. OpenGL has some features of Direct3D, but it lacks in many areas outside of 3D rendering for accelerated 2D.

    The dying of flash also shows the market is moving to pen standards.

    --
    http://saveie6.com/
    1. Re:Wrong way by shutdown+-p+now · · Score: 1

      they should make an alternative to DirectWrite as non exists in Linux

      I can't say I am particularly familiar with DirectWrite - can you explain what it does that's missing in Linux, compared to e.g. Pango/FreeType in the latter?

    2. Re:Wrong way by msobkow · · Score: 1

      Just a windows developer that doesn't want to learn OpenGL.

      --
      I do not fail; I succeed at finding out what does not work.
    3. Re:Wrong way by shutdown+-p+now · · Score: 1

      What does it have to do with OpenGL? Do you know what DirectWrite is?

  8. cool by mewsenews · · Score: 5, Interesting

    this is definitely what mozilla needs rather than a stable release cycle and MSI packages for enterprise

    1. Re:cool by Tridus · · Score: 4, Insightful

      Pfft. Stability? Easy deployability? Who needs that stuff? Mozilla's target audience isn't the enterprise or the home. It's a magical land of make believe.

      --
      -- "So they told me that using the download page to download something was not something they anticipated." - Bill Gates
    2. Re:cool by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

      End users don't want stability. What they want is truly massive version numbers.
      Version number ftw!

    3. Re:cool by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Yes, why don't they take their 3D developers and put them on MSI development. I'm sure they know lots about MSI installers.
      Can you manage my project for me, too?

      Slashdot: news for nerds. Stuffed with retards.

    4. Re:cool by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

      Why are they hiring 3d developers in the first place?

    5. Re:cool by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Yep, the magical land of graphic artists and hipsters.

    6. Re:cool by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      What, do these developers just materialize in a chair, and set to work? You'd almost think they were being hired and paid to do this crap in a lot of cases, and in those where they're not there are still managers and directors to push the community towards the managements goals for the project.

      But hey, if you've got bozos like Asa Dotzler in charge, what do you expect?
      "Asa Dotzler, director of Firefox, has made it clear he doesn't consider enterprise users worth supporting. In several comments added to a follow-up post by Kaply, Dotzler did not mince words. "Enterprise has never been (and I'll argue, shouldn't be) a focus of ours," Dotzler said. "I can't imagine why we'd focus at all on the kinds of environments you care so much about.""
      Heaven forbid I have a browser which works for a week straight.

    7. Re:cool by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      oh I am soooo hoping for a fork away from whoever is 'guiding' mozilla atm

  9. Plugins are the best at this time by msobkow · · Score: 1

    3D support is not and will not be a common requirement for a long time, so it makes sense to use an optional plugin rather than bloating the browser with crap most people will never need.

    --
    I do not fail; I succeed at finding out what does not work.
    1. Re:Plugins are the best at this time by Billly+Gates · · Score: 3, Insightful

      Have you seen the Firefox demo's when Firefox 4 came out? All 3D rendered with webgl. Accelerated html 5 is coming and has many uses. I already see the HP add in 3D on slashdot if I use Firefox or IE 9. It is not in Chrome yet as the canvas is not accelerated by default yet.

      With decent integrated GPUs that actually do not suck in AMDs and now Intels latest offerings it is certainly doable and coming. MS has demos including a game of scrabble. Mostly 3D is for games, children love Flash games these days and that is turning to HTML 5 as I type this.

      In 2 years it will be quite mainstream. My guess is even less. Browsers are being updated very quickly now and even IE now has an annual update. Since IE follows standards in the later releases, many businesses can upgrade with ease annually once their crappy IE 6 intranet sites are updated.

      True World of Warcraft in HTML 5 with CSS 3D is not going to happen anytime soon, but many games already do advanced mmos in javascript that are impressive. We will see but my guess is it will be here sooner than you think.

      --
      http://saveie6.com/
    2. Re:Plugins are the best at this time by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      "...and that is turning to HTML 5 as I type this"

      way to go with the delusional crap buddy - you html5 idiots are getting more and more hilarious!

    3. Re:Plugins are the best at this time by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Something like World of Warcraft will never be done in Javascript even if the performance is there. The problem is that anything and everything you do in HTML5 in open-source, you have no choice.

      So, you do a kick-ass game in HTML5, in a week there will be a dozen copies running off Chinese servers with someone else collecting money from your hard work.

      Good luck.

    4. Re:Plugins are the best at this time by msobkow · · Score: 1

      ...anything and everything you do in HTML 5 in open source...

      Whatever in the world gives you the idea that you have to open source HTML5 applications?

      --
      I do not fail; I succeed at finding out what does not work.
    5. Re:Plugins are the best at this time by Raumkraut · · Score: 1

      I guess they mean that all the HTML/CSS/Javscript must necessarily be client-readable, so the user will be able to see all the client code. Not the same thing as it using an open license, of course, but few people care to actually understand copyright before spouting off.
      And the argument entirely ignores any server-side code anyway.

  10. Engrish by EdZ · · Score: 1

    I can't be the only one to wonder why Mozilla would be making a Gradius game.

  11. Just following in chrome's footsteps... by stretch0611 · · Score: 1, Insightful

    It started with the UI... eliminating status bars and minimizing the ui to an extreme.

    Then they changed the numbering on releases.

    Now they are copying the game engine. (another feature that chrome already has)

    Why innovate for yourselves if you can just copy everything that chrome has done already?!?

    Of course copying Chrome is counter-productive... If I want my browser to be like Chrome I am going to use Chrome. Hey mozilla team: If you want people to use your browser you have to innovate on your own and give people reasons why your browser is better. Ask any sled dog, the one that leads has a much better view than the ones that follow the leader.

    You(mozilla) started to lead when everyone else thought the browser market was dead. You rapidly gained market share and people started using Firefox. However this year you appear to have no drive, leadership or innovation and people are starting to leave your browser for others. How difficult is it for you to get the clue to start your own ideas instead of copying someone else?

    --
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    DON'T USE TUNAREZ!!!
    1. Re:Just following in chrome's footsteps... by supersloshy · · Score: 1

      I'm sure that you think that video game consoles that use analog sticks, rumble and touch technology are ripping off the competition, too...

      If Chrome has a feature that puts it at an advantage, why shouldn't Firefox have a similar feature?

      --
      "Our country is not nearly so overrun with the bigoted as it is overrun with the broadminded." -Archbishop Fulton Sheen
    2. Re:Just following in chrome's footsteps... by phizi0n · · Score: 1, Insightful

      The UI was minimized because of netbooks, not because of Chrome.

      Numbering is artificial and of little significance. Mozilla's plan is to eventually remove it entirely.

      It seems you're confusing a javascript game engine that uses the WebGL API and the WebGL API itself? All major browsers are implementing WebGL which allows browsers to render 3D. The article is about a javascript game engine that uses WebGL and will run on any WebGL capable browser. Many people will be writing javascript/WebGL game engines and all major browsers support both, so I'm not sure what you think Mozilla is copying but they're not.

    3. Re:Just following in chrome's footsteps... by kripkenstein · · Score: 1

      Now they are copying the game engine. (another feature that chrome already has)

      Why innovate for yourselves if you can just copy everything that chrome has done already?!?

      Neither Firefox nor Chrome has a full game engine. They both have WebGL though..

      Paladin/Gladius is just a game engine for WebGL - not a new thing that will be part of the browser itself. So it will run in both Firefox and Chrome. There are plenty of such game engines, hopefully this new one will be useful too.

    4. Re:Just following in chrome's footsteps... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      How difficult is it for you to get the clue to start your own ideas instead of copying someone else?

      And Opera wept.

  12. I welcome this effort ... by BeforeCoffee · · Score: 2

    Speed the death of Flash and speed the adoption of HTML5+JS as the goto client-side software development platform for most things. The Joystick API is amongst the greatest things coming out of this effort:

    https://wiki.mozilla.org/JoystickAPI

    Mozilla is doing good stuff here, buck up ppl!

    1. Re:I welcome this effort ... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      You think creating Firefox dependent features like this is "Mozilla doing good"? Really?

      Lets speed the death of Flash which runs everywhere and replace it with features that only run in Firefox!

      Brilliant, Mozilla, Brilliant! Way to keep to the standards for everyone's benefit!

    2. Re:I welcome this effort ... by BeforeCoffee · · Score: 1

      ok, I know it's fashionable to pile on mozilla these days, however, in this case, I hope you'll be pleasantly surprised to find that mozilla is working with the w3c and google to standardize the concept. The eventual api they have just started to work on is currently being called the "gamepad" api.

  13. Hella slow by loufoque · · Score: 1

    I've got a ridiculously powerful graphics card (Nvidia GTX 560 TI) and the "game" is hella slow.
    Maybe it runs better on windows...

    1. Re:Hella slow by Osgeld · · Score: 1

      yea how dare mozilla not optimize a demo game on a unreleased engine, and yes its fairly fast here, just a little jittery on a 9600GT and windows

    2. Re:Hella slow by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Not on XP. I get about 2 fps and the camera movement is not very responsive. It says I'm out of air before I can do anything.

    3. Re:Hella slow by BZ · · Score: 1

      Chances are, it does. The state of hardware acceleration of graphics on Windows is way better in all browsers right now than on non-Windows platforms...

  14. Prototype... by shutdown+-p+now · · Score: 2

    It's a very basic prototype, and Mozilla has no interest in taking it further, but the purpose it served was to highlight what still needs to be done to make Gladius a solid web browser 3D engine solution.

    From history, the most successful game engines are those which are written first for a specific game that is sold (Quake and Unreal are two prominent examples, but there are many more). Which makes sense - how else do you find out what a real game needs? I'm not sure a simplistic prototype is going to cut it here...

    1. Re:Prototype... by carou · · Score: 1

      The other feature of successful game engines is that they, generally speaking, don't pin a core i7 at 100% usage drawing half a dozen objects at 15fps with a lighting model which would have looked dated in 2001.

    2. Re:Prototype... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      The other feature of successful game engines is that they, generally speaking, don't pin a core i7 at 100% usage drawing half a dozen objects at 15fps with a lighting model which would have looked dated in 2001.

      Most of them run the event loop as fast as possible. The above is possibly expected, except for the frame rate.

    3. Re:Prototype... by drinkypoo · · Score: 1

      The same code was iterated through Mechwarrior 2 (all of them), Interstate 76 and 83, and Heavy Gear. Having played all those games I can see the resemblance but it totally eluded me at the time.

      --
      "You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
  15. Gladius by rossdee · · Score: 0

    I am sure that many Firefox users would like to get the opportunity to use a Gladius on the Mozilla management team
    Until the invention of the machine gun, the roman short sword was the weapon that had killed the most people in history.

  16. Nice Name... Yeesh by darkwyrm76 · · Score: 1

    How thoughtful of them to choose a project name without at least googling for conflicts. :/

    https://sourceforge.net/projects/paladin/

    Any ideas on who to contact? I can't find anything on Mozilla's project pages.

    1. Re:Nice Name... Yeesh by An+Onerous+Coward · · Score: 1

      They really should have named it glubziclou. No hits for that one.

      --

      You want the truthiness? You can't handle the truthiness!

  17. time to switch by Tom · · Score: 5, Interesting

    Between the version number / release cycle insanity and this, I think it's finally time to switch. What a shame, I've been using Firefox since it was called Phoenix. But the update today broke another extension, and building 3D into the browser is a sign of insanity that I thought we had wiped out with the demise of VMRL.

    Dear Mozilla developers: If it's not something the majority of your users are going to actually use, it belongs into an extension or a plugin. Also, there are already several 3D engines with Firefox plugins, with years of experience in the field, because you don't build a good engine in a lazy summer. So with all due respect, what the fuck are you thinking?

    I'm afraid you've fallen into the way-too-common bloatware trap: Not realizing when your product is feature complete and what it needs is polishing, not more stuff bolted on. There's enough CSS3 and HTML5 support still missing, for example.

    Time to take a serious look at Chrome. :-(

    --
    Assorted stuff I do sometimes: Lemuria.org
    1. Re:time to switch by phizi0n · · Score: 1

      FYI every major browser supports WebGL for 3D and this article is about a javascript game engine. They are not adding this engine to Firefox, it is just a javascript game engine that allows web developers to create WebGL games easier.

      So with all due respect, what the fuck are you ranting about?

    2. Re:time to switch by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

      So you're bitching about Firefox's rapid release cycle and WebGL support, but you want to remedy that by looking seriously at Chrome? Uh, hello?

    3. Re:time to switch by Goaway · · Score: 2

      Did you get this far down the thread without already noticing that Slashdot is dumb as toast nowadays? Nobody posting in this thread has even the tiniest sliver of a clue what they are talking about.

    4. Re:time to switch by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      at least they're not as stupid as the dailyKos folks, who think political talking points are enough and don't even try to think about what they're saying

    5. Re:time to switch by Waccoon · · Score: 2

      Time to take a serious look at Chrome.

      At least consider Iron, where the full source is available and it doesn't force you to have Google Update and its friends.

      First time I tried Chrome, it read 20GB and wrote 4GB of data. I don't know what it was doing, but it sure looks suspicious to me, and I'm not too thrilled that every cold start of the browser unnecessarily tortures my SSD.

    6. Re:time to switch by phantomfive · · Score: 1

      This is javascript. It's not something they built into Firefox, it's a game engine they wrote in Javascript, specifically so they could test and make their browser more efficient.

      --
      "First they came for the slanderers and i said nothing."
    7. Re:time to switch by antdude · · Score: 1

      Why upgrade? Just stick with the stable version for now, v3.6.xx, until Mozilla stops supporting it. That is what I am doing.

      --
      Ant(Dude) @ Quality Foraged Links (AQFL.net) & The Ant Farm (antfarm.ma.cx / antfarm.home.dhs.org).
    8. Re:time to switch by Tom · · Score: 1

      That's a good link, thanks a lot. Mod parent up (I can't because I already commented on this story, obviously).

      --
      Assorted stuff I do sometimes: Lemuria.org
    9. Re:time to switch by Tom · · Score: 1

      I withdraw my point about including it in the browser.

      I sustain my points about there being a lot more important things and on the Mozilla team having lost sight of what really matters.

      --
      Assorted stuff I do sometimes: Lemuria.org
    10. Re:time to switch by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      I've noticed this as well. I have to wonder if most of the people who comment on this site are trolls or if they really are just that dumb.

    11. Re:time to switch by kripkenstein · · Score: 1

      Between the version number / release cycle insanity and this, I think it's finally time to switch. What a shame, I've been using Firefox since it was called Phoenix. But the update today broke another extension, and building 3D into the browser is a sign of insanity that I thought we had wiped out with the demise of VMRL.

      Dear Mozilla developers: If it's not something the majority of your users are going to actually use, it belongs into an extension or a plugin. Also, there are already several 3D engines with Firefox plugins, with years of experience in the field, because you don't build a good engine in a lazy summer. So with all due respect, what the fuck are you thinking?

      I'm afraid you've fallen into the way-too-common bloatware trap: Not realizing when your product is feature complete and what it needs is polishing, not more stuff bolted on. There's enough CSS3 and HTML5 support still missing, for example.

      Time to take a serious look at Chrome. :-(

      Both Firefox and Chrome use the same 3D API: WebGL. Firefox is not adding any new browser components here. The Slashdot summary is a little misleading - Paladin/Gladius is just a game engine written in JS/HTML5/WebGL, not something new being included in the browser. So there is nothing being bolted on here. (Or are you saying that WebGL is unneeded bloat? That's a separate argument, but with Firefox, Chrome, Safari and Opera all supporting it or close to releasing support for it, that is a done deal I think.)

      Regarding the update problems, I am a Firefox dev, and all I can say is that we realize there is a big problem, and are working very hard on it. There is no quick fix though. But the upcoming updates will improve things quite a lot, you will have far fewer incompatible addons. And yes, we fully realize that polish and so forth is much more important than new shiny things, and labs projects like this new game engine. We have far, far more people working on polish than any of those other things. But no Slashdot stories on those ;)

    12. Re:time to switch by bgarcia · · Score: 2
      Iron was basically a joke for the paranoid:

      Is Iron a Scam? Yes

      The article title appears to be too harsh, but basically somebody compared the Iron source code to the Chromium source code and found that the only real changes were to disable 3 items that were already user-configurable within Chromium.

      Here's another article that suggests that the actual reason for the Iron fork was just to make money (using Google ads on their website) by taking advantage of peoples' fears about Google: The story of Iron

      So if you really are worried about Google, you should also worry about the misinformation being spread by the creators of Iron. If you want to have access to the full source, I suggest installing Chromium instead of Iron.

      --
      I'm a leaf on the wind. Watch how I soar.
    13. Re:time to switch by Waccoon · · Score: 2

      The primary reason for using Iron, despite "only 3 real changes" is the fact that the project is already built. Google makes it hard to get the official Chromium builds by repeatedly moving around the binaries. Do you see any binaries downloadable from the page you just linked? You have to hunt for them, and you have to do that every time you want to update. No thanks.

      Linux people may be thrilled to compile their own code, but most people just want to download it and go. To a lot of people, having a build that's very easy to install and update can be a major feature in itself.

      You might as well say that all Linux distros are the same because they generally all come with the same packages.

      Iron also comes pre-configured with a few extensions. They're minor, but nevertheless they are there. It's not about the code, it's the packaging.

      "The story of Iron"

      The general gyst of that article is that there is no need to make a fork because you could just modify a few lines yourself and get the same result. Well, why should I have to do it myself? Plus, the comments about contributing to Chromium and having the changes made "official" are completely stupid. Google is under no obligation to have just a few 3rd-party changes included into the official build.

      If you want to have access to the full source...

      Do forks really cause that much disdain within the open source community? Does a project really have to have hundreds of changes to justify an alternative build? I find it rather unfortunate that Iron gets so much hate from people because it's just not different enough from Chromium.

      Iron was basically a joke for the paranoid.

      Those paranoid of Chrome, yes. I'd just use Chromium if Google actually didn't make me jump through hoops to get it. So long as all the criticism for Iron revolves around it being "just a fork", rather than doing something really bad, I see no reason to call it a scam. The fact that someone actually made a diff and found nothing evil in the Iron source makes me feel even better about the project, so I'll continue using it as a backup browser to Firefox.

      Gee, I wonder what would happen if someone made a fork of Firefox and only changed the config file so the GUI behaved like 3.6 again. Would people slam it as a scam, or herald it as a major convenience?

      Sometimes, I feel that the open source community is just a bit too egotistical to remember what open source is all about.

  18. Not GPU bound by DrYak · · Score: 1

    A lot less powerful GT218 here, but the game is more or less still playable.
    I think in it's current state, the game isn't GPU bound. Probably, no matter the humongous GPU you throw at it, you'll still see slow downs due to CPU-bound limiting factors (like javascript).

    --
    "Sufficiently advanced satire is indistinguishable from reality." - [Tips: 1DrYakQDKCQ6y52z6QbnkxHXAocMZJE61o ]
  19. Of for fuck's sake. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Mozilla. Just shut up shop now. We don't like what you're doing to the internet.

    1. Re:Of for fuck's sake. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Yes, please stop creating standards-compatible 3D engines. They give my mother a headache and they broke my sister's legs.

  20. heh heh heh... by mr_bigmouth_502 · · Score: 0

    LOL @ all the butthurt Linux users complaining about the slow framerate. Linux is crap for 3D acceleration support, ya know?

  21. Versions by II+Xion+II · · Score: 1

    Will there be a new version every week that makes obsolete all scripts you created in the old engine?

  22. What Version will this be in? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Firefox 287.1

    Which on their current cycle should be out by Christmas.

  23. They should have made a game called "Shark Jump" by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Or "Swan Song".

  24. chrome is better by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    I felt Mozilla was slow and had more bugs than it used to a year ago. Opera was nice, but had weird bugs. I switched to Chrome, and I think it was worth it.

  25. 1996 called, they want their 3D browser back by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

    http://news.cnet.com/Netscape-buys-3D-vendor-Paper-Software/2100-1033_3-204692.html

    "Netscape Communications yesterday moved to bolster its 3D technology for its Navigator browser with the acquisition of Paper Software. ... Separately, Netscape yesterday announced Live3D technology for adding VRML capabilities to its browser. A test version of a Navigator plug-in based on the new technology is available now to let users created and read VRML Web pages."

    1. Re:1996 called, they want their 3D browser back by Samantha+Wright · · Score: 1

      Tuned into a radio lately? It's called the retro/nostalgia cycle. Everything nineties is new again! Of course, anyone who wants a 3D web experience is already married to Second Life, but the rest of us can pretend.

      --
      Bio questions? Ask me to start a Q&A journal. Computer analogies available for most topics!
  26. Re:Great, just what the web DOESN'T need... by JorDan+Clock · · Score: 1

    I don't know, it seemed to run just fine in Chrome.

  27. Mozilla... by icongorilla · · Score: 1

    DO YOU THINK THIS IS A GAME!?

    --
    The thought of hanging myself at my student loan organization doesn't bug me as much when I think it might make a differ
  28. Why, why, why!? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    It's like 3D movies. The novelty will wear off after the 2nd website. Then it'll become an annoyance/hindrance. Eventually it'll be dumped.

    Real 3D video games already exist in a much better form.

    Crazy idea, work on making Firefox more efficient.

  29. My favorite game genre by CBob · · Score: 1

    Nothing like trying to rescue a polar bear cub in a snowstorm

  30. Mission Creep by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    This is another fine example of why FOSS projects fail. Instead of focussing on making a good, fast, and secure browser, they're wasting energy worrying about silly vanity projects like this.

  31. Very bad press by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    The problem with RescueFox is that it is not obvious what needs to be done. There is just this lone astronaut surrounded by some rocks. It's possibe to rotate the view and click around a little. But nothing much happens until the counter runs dow to zero and the all air is depleted.

  32. HTML5 audio control is not enough for good quality by Assmasher · · Score: 1

    ...game development.

    WebGL is great, canvas is great, web sockets are great, Audio support is terrible.

    If it becomes possible to feed samples into an audio player (or other more complicated synchronization methods) in HTML5, then you're pretty much set.

    --
    Loading...
  33. Hardware acceleration? by ElusiveJoe · · Score: 1

    Does it have one? Because it's a slideshow on my notebook.

    Also, I thought 3D with h/w acceleration was available in Flash for several years now. Didn't see anyone use it though, except technical demos.

  34. What's the problem? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    In my universe Firefox 7 takes 400MB for 30 tabs, runs things like it's supposed to, has native tab groups and doesn't break my extensions... I am quite satisfied!

  35. Bwahahahaha by msobkow · · Score: 1

    SVG is graphics done in XML. Do you have any idea how much bigger SVG files would be than textures if you tried to do that, in order to get the same level of image detail.

    Thanks for the laugh. That was the funniest thing I've read in days.

    --
    I do not fail; I succeed at finding out what does not work.
    1. Re:Bwahahahaha by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Do you have any idea how much bigger textures would be to get the same level of detail SVG can have? Hint: The answer is too large to type in a lifetime.

      They have different strengths. Each is better in certain ways. Don't jump to conclusions and think the one scenario you've envisioned covers all cases.

  36. Automatic updates by tepples · · Score: 1

    states that it "works" in Firefox, but doesn't say what versions.

    It probably means it works in whatever version of Firefox the automatic update mechanism gives you.