Customer Reviews

Java 1.4 Game Programming (Wordware Game and Graphics Library)

5 star:		(2)
4 star:		(3)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(6)

 

 

Let's see, int the book's preface, one author mentions that he hopes "this book makes me as much money as possible." That certainly should have been edited out, as it set the tone for the rest of book.

This (18 chapter, 647 pg) book is unfortunately another overpriced and disappointing attempt at cashing-in on the burgeoning game programming book industry.

The first 10 chapters, 338 pgs (yes HALF the book!) describe mere introductory Java -- Types, Classes, Arrays, Packages, Stream I/O, Threads, Applets, AWT, Keyboard/Mouse listeners -- nothing game programming-specific. Any decent Java tutorial book will cover this material. You don't need this book for that. I thought we were going to cover Game Programming, not intro Java?

The next 3 chapters, 162 pages, are devoted to slightly more advanced material (if you've never programmed in Java before) -- 2d animation, 1.4 Image I/O, MediaTracker, Java Sound API, Playing MIDI music, Garbage Collection, Object Creation, primitive Collision detection (via bounded circles and boxes), Swing -- Nothing extraordinary, but at least more related to game programming.

The following 3 chapters, 68 pages, discuss databases -- DB Intro, Using SQL with MySQL via command-line, JDBC.

The last 2 chapters, 70 pages, cover intro Java Networking and an brief intro to Jdk 1.4 NIO package: TCP Echo Server/Client, UDP Echo Server/Client, and of the 70 pages in this section, 16 pages are on JDK 1.4 NIO: channels, ByteBuffer, Blocking/Non-Blocking Buffers.

Yeah, just 16 pages on NIO. That and a bit mentioned on the 1.4 ImageI/O API's earlier in Java 2D section the book seemed to be the only Java 1.4 material in the book. Was that all for 1.4? If so, then the title "Java 1.4 Game Programming" was sure misleading.

The index is 9 pages long.

Java 3D programming isn't covered.

There are code snippets and many references on what would go in a "Game Framework" but where's the cool final showcase game to display it? As their final "I'm a Circle!" game in chapter 17 left much to be desired. What a let down.

Even the dated book "Java Game Programming for Dummies" had more usuable games than this book.

I felt cheated by this book. I was looking for more Java 1.4 game programming "meat", yet all I found was overpriced, rehashed, introductory Java gristle that can easily be found online, for free.

I don't recommend this book if you already know introductory Java and are ready to move to game development. You'll be disappointed by the first half of the book.

Unfortunately, until a good new Java Game programming book comes out, you'll find better Java code examples on the net ...Maybe the title "A Game Programming Introduction for Java beginners" would have been more appropriate.

I hope the author certainly doesn't make "alot of money" with this piece, as it really wasn't worth it. Keep looking elsewhere. A good Java game programming book will emerge, some day.

This book is nothing more than a rehash introduction to Java programming. You can find cheaper books on this subject as well as free tutorials on the web. There is very little of this book dedicated to actual game programming that can be used in today's game development. Some of the material covered on gaming I have seen in early and I mean earlier books. To have a book released in 2003 and not cover or even mention Java 3D or OpenGL is shameful. I don't know what the reason for releasing a Game Programming book without covering modern material is beyond me but perhaps the comments by one of the authors that the primary reason for the book was to make money is the clue. Come on guys.....that should have been edited out of the book.

While not THE worst Java game programming book I have seen, it certainly is one of them. This is a 2003 title which adds practically nothing that hasn't been available for free on the net since '98. If you are looking for a legitimate guide on Java game dev, the book these two jokers have written is certainly NOT it. Short and sweet, this is a complete and utter waste of time.

I must agree with other reviewers that this is one of the worst Java game programming books I have ever read. I love programming, game programming, and Java (and have done all three for a living). I struggled to read this book from cover to cover:

- There was no editing to speak of.

- The authors make almost no use of Java 1.4 features; for example they mention javax.imageio but then spend five or six pages avoiding using it. Then they repeat their entire MediaTracker example using ImageIO.

- Chapters on Introduction to Databases, MySQL, and JDBC seem pasted in from some other text (so look out for anything from these authors and keep your money in your wallet as it might well be a rehash of this)

- They spend the chapter on GUI systems developing their own set of widgets. This may well be an interesting learning experience (implementing a button using a square and some mouse-event listeners is a cool exercise) but the authors fail to use this as a teaching vehicle, instead burdening the reader with their partially implemented system ("While it's fresh in your mind, now would be a good time to start trying to add extra components to the custom GUI system. In no time, you will have your own powerful GUI library, which will serve you far better for games programming than Swing.")

Move on. This is NOT the book you were looking for.

This book is completely mislabeled. Out of 18 chapters, only three have anything to say that I believe would be remotely interesting to Java programmers who want to write games - chapters 9, 10, and 12. Chapter nine, entitled Graphics, is actually about Swing-based animation. Chapter 10, "Using the Mouse and Keyboard" is mainly about building a custom event queue to handle any lack of synchronization that might occur between the mouse and keyboard and the main animation thread. Chapter 12, "Game Programming Techniques", shows a few simple interactive animation examples which are built upon the author's animation engine. None of these examples is complete or complex enough that it could really be considered a game. If you removed chapters 9, 10, and 12 and tried to guess the title I imagine you would come up with something like "A Shallow Introduction to Java...Done Poorly". The book skims over enough details so that it could never be helpful to a novice trying to learn Java, and a programmer that already knows Java will learn nothing new. Plus their covering of topics is puzzling. The book has an all too brief overview of absolute Java basics, then skips to the three chapters on games, and the rest of the book has to do with enterprise Java topics.

If you already know Java and wish to apply that knowledge to the writing of game programs, might I suggest both "Developing Games in Java" by David Brackeen and "Killer Game Programming in Java" by Andrew Davison. Both books are packed with good information Java game programmers need to know. I notice that Amazon does not show a table of contents. I therefore show that here for the purpose of completeness:

Chapter 1 Introduction to Java 1.4

Chapter 2 Basics of Java Programming

Chapter 3 Arrays and Strings

Chapter 4 Multiple Classes

Chapter 5 Packages, Utilities, and Error Handling

Chapter 6 Stream I/O

Chapter 7 Threads

Chapter 8 Applications and Applets

Chapter 9 Graphics

Chapter 10 Using the Mouse and Keyboard

Chapter 11 Using Sound and Music

Chapter 12 Game Programming Techniques

Chapter 13 Introduction to GUI

Chapter 14 Introduction to Databases

Chapter 15 Using SQL with MySQL

Chapter 16 Using the JDBC

Chapter 17 Introduction to Networking

Chapter 18 Introduction to NIO Networking

This is a preliminary review. I just got the book yesterday and have been looking through it and haven't had time to test it's consistency, in-depth content, and accuracy of code samples.

The first thing to note is although the book is about 650 pages including index & etc., it's not a 'full-size' computer book. Your average computer book is ~7" wide and ~9" tall. This one is exactly 6" by 9", so it's the first thing you'll notice when you open the box (Oh, I thought it would be bigger). This of course is purely cosmetic, but I thought I'd make everyone aware of it. Type is reasonably small size and takes up most of the pages, so don't worry about too much 'decoration' or white space. It's still a pretty packed book.

But here's the kicker - it's packed with basic Java 1.4 programming. I'll type in the TOC in a sec, but note that Graphics topics aren't introduced until Ch 9 on pg 211, and Ch 14 on pg 503 until the end of the book is about databases, JDBC, networking, and index (short). The networking includes a simple sample game client and server. Anyway, this leaves about 200 pages to talk about graphics, GUIs, keyboard/mouse, and sound, and one really good long almost 100-page chapter 12 on meat & potatoes Game Programming Techniques. The sample game is a 2D top-down tile-based scroller.

The chapters are: 1) Intro to Java 1.4, 2) Basics of Java Programming, 3) Arrays and Strings, 4) Multiple Classes, 5) Packages, Utilities, and Error Handling, 6) Stream I/O, 7) Threads, 8) Applications and Applets, 9) Graphics, 10) Using the Mouse and Keyboard, 11) Using Sound and Music, 12) Game Programming Techniques, 13) Introduction to GUI, 14) Introduction to Datbases, 15) Using SQL and mySQL, 16) Using the JDBC, 17) Introduction to Networking, and 18) Introduction to NIO Networking.

All in all the book seems well-organized and very sequential in getting you up-to-speed with Java 1.4 before jumping into game programming, then covers advanced topics like using a database to save game data and creating a network-enabled game. There's no color in the book, but there are a fair number of screenshots of what they're trying to show you. There aren't very many diagrams, and none of the ones that I spotted were UML but were still understandable.

The text-to-code ratio is quite reasonable - this book isn't just a printout of some program they wrote, but good descriptive text and short relevant examples to the topic at hand. The authors write clearly, are practical, and give explanations to their decisions and odd situations encountered in using the JDK. The CD seems to have a pretty good collection of java tools and includes the book's source code and a bonus chapter (PDF) specifically about Swing components.

The actual game-focused parts of the book look really good, and the main example game appears to be quite relevant to mainstream interests, but note that it's 2D only. 3D is not covered anywhere in this book, despite one of the author bios saying he has at least some OpenGL and DirectX 3D experience. This exclusion really hurts as anymore you can't think about games not not think about 3D. Even if the authors had good reason to exclude 3D, as far as I can tell they didn't explain why they left it out.

For those that are curious and follow Java game programming on the net more than just casually, you'll be glad to know that full-screen mode, volatile images, timers, and NIO are all covered, as is a brief discussion of JNI in the timers section to get a high-res Windows timer.

I was certainly hoping for a discussion of 3D in Java, but also advanced topics such as AI (esp. pathfinding), graphics effects like particle systems/shadows/lens flare/etc, JNI for calling non-java libaries if needed, efficient data storage and structures (objects), etc.

Don't get me wrong, it's a good book, but it's more of a primer than an advanced techniques & theory book (the authors say so in their intro, 'Who Is This Book For?'), and anyone who doesn't know Java at all would probably do well using this book to learn with, regardless if they're interested in games or not. It appears to be very thorough on the topics it does cover and I'm certain to get a lot out of the later chapters, but I can't give it a top rating because I felt it just didn't have enough 'game programming' in it. A better title for this book would have been 'Learning Java 1.4 with Game Programming'. I look forward to these authors writing an Advanced Java Game Programming book in the near future (Please!!).

As a conclusion I'll have to say that if you don't know Java and want to learn how to write games in Java then this book is for you. For those of us that know all the Java basics already, be forewarned that you'll end up skipping quite a few chapters before you get to the really good stuff.

Hopefully everyone who's reading this has read the Java Developer's Journal article about the Meat Fighter game (do a web search). If you understood everything in the article and messed around with the code and moved on from there, you probably don't need this book. If you read the article and didn't understand all of it or it was over your head or you feel you have too many 'gaps' in your Java knowledge, then this book is definitely for you.

BTW, an alternative book to this one is Java 2 Game Programming. It has some flaws and I only gave it 3 stars, but if you have that one and the Meat Fighter article/code then this book won't get you much further if you're looking for advanced topics like I mentioned earlier, but it could help if you need more info about databases or 2D tile-based games. If you don't have Java 2 Game Programming, don't get it - get this one instead. Okay, 'nuff said.

I own every Java game book printed. This one was worthless.

What little material that the authors devoted to genuine game development seems to start with the assumption that none of Java's native facilities are sufficient and therefore, in the book, they attempt to re-invent the facilities. As you try and follow the coding pitfalls that the authors get themselves into, the emerging code appears to be based upon a programming model that was lifted from classroom-provided C++ code and techniques.

This book is very useful for programmers with a little experience even though it was written for complete beginners (skip this book if you feel confident programming 2D games in Java). I enjoy the author's writing style and organization. Keep in mind that it's written for Java 1.4 (now two versions old). It's new enough to be oriented around Swing, with use of BufferStrategy and active rendering through full-screen exclusive mode, all of which are important in game programming.

This is NOT a book that will let you jump right in to programming. It builds a solid and exceedingly thorough foundation.

As a computer science minor, I've had a few classes in Java, and I was a TA for an introductory class. Because of my experience, I skipped the first seven chapters. However, since my academic-leaning classes skirted over game and graphics issues, I'm finding much of the rest of the book meets my needs perfectly.

Most of the information in this book can be found online for free (as other reviewers note), but I haven't found it with such thorough explanations.

I highly recommend this book for people who've never programmed a game before and want to start in 2D.

This book is a very good introduction to Java and game programming with Java. The authors were students in the Computer Games Technology program at the University of Abertay in Scotland when they wrote the book, and their enthusiastic expostulation of game programming principles make this book an easy read. In addition to a good coverage of Java (about half the book) with a slant toward concepts that are crucial to game programming, they cover everything you need to know to write a Java-based game which can be run in a window, full-screen, or as an applet delivered over the web. This book is a useful addition to any game-programmer's reference library.

While Java is now at version 1.5, the coverage in this book of Java 1.4 is still germane. Replete with guidelines on how to design your game and the facilities offered in Java.

Of these, multithreading is one of the most important. Any practical game is likely to need it, and not just for graphics. While the Java Media Framework lets you integrate audio and video easily into your program. Though it is primitive compared to programs dedicated to this task.

The book's weakness is in avoiding discussing why you should use Java at all. Unless it is as a learning experience. In which case, the free nature of Java and its rich set of classes are nice. But for reflex games, Java tends to be too slow.