Micro Java™ Game Development [Paperback]

David Fox (Author), Roman Verhovsek (Author)

Book Description

ISBN-10: 0672323427 | ISBN-13: 978-0672323423 | Publication Date: April 28, 2002 | Edition: 1

Micro Java Games Development explains game development for devices that support J2ME MIDP. The six parts cover a full range of topics, from a tour of all available micro-devices (Palms, cell phones and pagers), a discussion of software standards apart from J2ME (cell phones, messaging, I-mode and wireless enhancements such as Bluetooth), and available J2ME extensions (Siemans, Ericcson, Nokia), development tools and restrictions, to the creation of a meaty J2ME game!

Editorial Reviews

About the Author

David Fox works for Next Game, Inc., creating Web and wirelessmultiplayer games. Prior to that, his design and development credits includeMichael Crichton's "Westworld 2000," Fox Interactive's"X-Files: Unauthorized Access," and PlayLink's real-time strategy"Citizen 01." He is the author of several best-selling books aboutInternet technologies, and his writing frequently appears in publications suchas Salon.com, Gamasutra, and Developer.com. David has presented topics in Javagaming at Sun Microsytem's JavaOne conference for the past three years, andhas been the winner of the Motorola-Nextel Developer Challenge for the past twoyears.

Roman Verhovsek is CEO and co-founder of Cocoasoft Ltd., where he isleading a team of J2ME developers. He holds a bachelor's degree inelectrical engineering from the University of Ljubljana, and is working on hismaster's degree of computer science. Since early 1996, he has focusedprimarily on Java technologies, and for last two years in particular onJava-enabled small devices. In 2001 he held a lecture on J2ME game developmentat the JavaOne conference. In his other life, Roman enjoys cooking,mountaineering, jogging, and traveling with his girlfriend, Lina.

0672323427AB04222002

Excerpt. © Reprinted by permission. All rights reserved.

Everything I Wanted to Know About Micro Java Gaming But Was Afraid to Ask

A New Era of Gaming

Ah, games.

Games have almost a religious, ritual aspect to them. They allow people to enter together into a higher state of being, pushing skills to new limits and experiences to new heights. 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.

Now all this might sound like a bit of a heavy-handed way to describe Frogger, but it's fair to say that games transport us and amuse us in ways that no other form of entertainment can.

A Brief History of Games

Games have been with humanity since the beginning. A 5000-year-old Mancala-like game board, carved from stone, was recently unearthed in the Sahara. The game of Go, popular in Oriental countries, has reportedly been around since 2000 B.C. Backgammon-like games such as Tabula and Nard are talked about in ancient Roman scripts, and even in the Bible. And Tarot decks, initially used to help predict the future, evolved into today's Bicycle playing cards.

A decade or two ago, the only games that people spent much time with were professional sports, board games like Monopoly and Chess, paper and dice games such as Dungeons and Dragons, and card games like Poker or Hearts. Some games were for heavy money, some were bone-jarringly competitive, but most were just about good clean fun.

With the advent of computers, games entered a new era. Games became one of the main reasons many people brought these strange beige boxes called computers into their homes. Whether battling through a simple graphical tennis game such as Pong, or a rich, text-only world such as Zork, these were wholly new types of games that could be played anytime against a most formidable opponent: a game designer who had programmed your computer, long ago, showing it how to defeat you.

The arcade wave of the '70s and '80s, led by hits such as Pac-Man, captured the hearts and ate the quarters of millions of youths. Console systems such as the Magnavox Odyssey, the Atari 2600, Mattel Intellivision, and ColecoVision brought the fun of the arcade to the players' own living rooms. Then, in 1985, a box known as the Nintendo Entertainment System blew people away with stunning graphics and intricate gameworlds, typified by such hits as Super Mario Brothers.

Computer gaming entered a whole new stratum of mass popularity and acceptance with bestsellers such as Doom, followed by Quake, and later Tomb Raider. Clearly, ultra-realistic 3D worlds were a hit. The more a game made a player feel as if she were actually inside another reality, the better.Graphics became richer and richer as 3D cards and engines doubled in speed and performance with each passing year. Super Nintendo gave way to the Sony PlayStation, and currently the Nintendo GameCube faces off against the PlayStation 2, not to mention Microsoft's daunting new Xbox.

Multiplayer Mania

A funny thing happened on the way to virtual reality-ville. In the late '90s and early 2000s, with games like Ultima Online, Everquest, and Age of Empires II, not to mention the spread of casual game Web sites such as Pogo, Yahoo Games, and Microsoft's MSN Gaming Zone, it became clear that what mattered to a whole slew of gamers wasn't only the richness of graphics or the detail of blood and gore--but the presence of other, real people. Multiplayer gaming, long popular with the geek crowd, had entered the mainstream.

In a way, games had come full circle. Once again, games were serving a social purpose, becoming a way for two or more people to enter new worlds and test new skills together, relating to each other in entirely new ways.

Micro Devices, Micro Lifestyles

While multiplayer gaming continues to grow in popularity, another big paradigm shift is happening.

It's becoming harder and harder to find people who don't carry network-enabled embedded devices with them wherever they go. Whether it's a PDA such as a Palm device or iPaq, or a mobile phone such as those crafted by companies like Nokia or Motorola, people are getting used to connecting and communicating with each other anytime, anyplace, and anywhere.

Today, there are more than 600 million mobile-phone users worldwide. In the United States and Europe, mobile phone users generally tend to be affluent, educated, and they often have lots of time on their hands. The picture is different on different continents. In Africa, Asia, and South America the masses have flocked to mobile phones because land-line access and Internet service are too expensive.

According to the Yankee Group, people in the United States spend 50% more time commuting than in any other country. This is the perfect time to pull out a mobile phone and play some quick games.

Additionally, Datamonitor has researched people's game-playing behaviors in Asia, Europe, and the United States, and has concluded that most people like to play wireless games on evenings and weekends.

In the near future, we will likely see micro devices become even smaller and more specialized. Phones the size of earplugs, voice-activated assistants on wristwatches, and smart chips on credit cards are all becoming a reality.This is a continuation of the paradigm shift that began in the 1970s, with microcomputers taking the power away from huge, monolithic mainframes. Clearly, millions of small devices working together yields much more distributed power than one big, central device.

Unsurprisingly, games are keeping up and even helping to lead this paradigm. While it might seem silly to try to achieve a rich, meaningful immersion on a tiny 100Yen100 pixel screen, there's one thing mobile phone games give you that even the best consoles can't provide: They're always with you, and can be played anywhere you go. This not only means that games can now be more convenient, but wholly new types of games can be designed that take advantage of new lifestyles.

Enter Micro Java

The Java language, created by Sun Microsystems, is another example of a paradigm shift. As a language that had no pointers or complicated memory operations, was object-oriented, secure, and could run on most any browser or platform, application development suddenly opened up to the masses in a way that never seemed possible before. Java made it possible for millions of programmers to create quality applications in record time and quantities.

The Java 2 Micro Edition (J2ME), or Micro Java, as we'll call it in this book, is an attempt to take the best aspects of Java and pare them down for smaller devices such as mobile phones; set-top boxes that add interactivity to television, pagers, handheld organizers and personal data assistants (PDAs); as well as embedded chips that you find in devices such as refrigerators, microwaves, "smart" credit cards, and automobiles.

Most every major mobile phone and handheld device manufacturer immediately realized the potential of J2ME: If Java were to be placed on the gadget, hundreds of thousands of developers would immediately be able to create applications and add value. Furthermore, because it's Java, a program written for one device would be able to run on another device with little or no modifications. That certainly makes more sense than trying to force developers to learn a native language and API in order to create programs for your phone.Seeing the opportunity for Java on the handset, almost every major mobile phone manufacturer joined with Sun to create something called the CLDC: The Connected, Limited Device Configuration, along with the MIDP: The Mobile Information Device Profile. In later chapters, we'll get into greater detail about what all these wacky acronyms really mean. But the point to remember here is that mobile phone manufacturers have embraced Java in a way that not even PC manufacturers and browser makers have. Java is clearly the future platform of choice for mobile devices, and an ideal platform for mobile games.

This Book's Mission

We have attempted to write the most in-depth guide showing you how to craft the most cutting-edge Micro Java games possible.

Whether you are a professional game designer hoping to expand your knowledge of various platforms, a game programmer who wants to port a game to a smaller device, a Micro Java enthusiast looking for a more entertaining book about more entertaining apps, or just a micro gamer hoping to catch a glimpse of what goes on behind the scenes, this book is for you.

The Game Plan

This book is divided into six sections:

Part I: Small Devices

The book begins with a tour of current Java-enabled devices, showing the full canvas upon which you'll be able to paint. These devices include powerful, full-featured computer systems, set-top television boxes, and tiny, smart credit cards.

Next, we'll look at the current state of micro gaming. We'll go on a whirlwind tour of some of the most popular and revolutionary games out there. Because most of these games are not written in Java, we'll try to distill the most successful element of these games so that you can take the best ideas and run with them.

Part II: Before, Between, and Beyond J2ME

In many cases, handheld games will not be written in Java alone. Rather, games will be built atop older mobile phone technologies. In the second section of this book we'll look at the technologies that surround and support J2ME gaming, such as the Wireless Application Protocol (WAP) and Standard Messaging System (SMS). Furthermore, we'll cover specific enhancements to the current crop of phones from brands such as Nokia, Siemens, Motorola, Ericsson, and NTT DoCoMo, allowing you to take games to a new level no matter what your target platform happens to be.

For example, some carriers provide location-based information. This is an extremely exciting and relevant tie-in to gaming. This will allow people to literally use their mobile phones to hunt down or otherwise play with each other ...

Product Details

• Paperback: 576 pages
• Publisher: Addison-Wesley Professional; 1 edition (April 28, 2002)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0672323427
• ISBN-13: 978-0672323423
• Product Dimensions: 9.1 x 7.4 x 1.3 inches
• Shipping Weight: 2.1 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.2 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (9 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #2,414,469 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

Discover books, learn about writers, read author blogs, and more.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

19 of 19 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars Good but 50% of it is way too general, June 19, 2002

By 

"falcon7000" (Poland) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Micro Java™ Game Development (Paperback)

This is a good, very readable book. Its main drawback, though, is that the first 260 pages present information which in my opinion everyone interested in MIDP games development already knows.

Chapters 1-5 & 7 are a light discussion on mobile networks, available handsets, some common services such as SMS, EMS, WAP and MIDP games currently on the market. This is quite interesting but not very deep and it doesn't correspond with the title of the book very much.
Chapter 6 focuses on the Japanese market and until you want to create products in this language version and sell them there, it won't be too interesting for you either.

So the first half of the book disappointed me because it wasn't what I paid for.

Chapters 8-13 discuss the very basics of J2ME. If you have any skills in java and if you looked through the J2ME specifications which can be found on various web sites (Sun/Borland/Nokia) or if you at least have gone through some tutorials you won't find anything new in these chapters. They are well written, but this is rather the beginners' stuff. The whole MIDP API is so simple that you can get used to it in one day and in my opinion such a long introductory discussion is obsolete.

What is really valuable in this book are the next 180 pages on which the authors present the complete process of creating a sophisticated, very well-written, multiplayer MIDP game. This is really worth the money and this is what this book should start with. Even if you have some experience in game development you should read these chapters thoroughly because of the many tips&tricks which you simply have to know to be able to use. I was very satisfied with this part of the book, mainly because the resulting code was condensed and clear and the results were better than expected.

The last part of the book presents various J2ME APIs and is enclosed by the index.

So to summarize: This is a good, very well written & worth reading book but the hardcore programmers might feel disappointed becasue of the amount of the basic to intermediate material. It's also a pity that there is no CD-ROM accompanying the book so unless the publisher posts the source code on its web site you'l have to type it yourself.

7 of 7 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Excellent book, September 30, 2002

By 

Vaibhav Gowadia (Columbia, SC) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Micro Java™ Game Development (Paperback)

I started reading this book, because I did not see any other good options around. Probably it is the first book on game programming in J2ME. Other books are limited to either games or J2Me. I read the book and found it very useful. Even if you are new to all this, you will not have trouble with this book (assuming familiarity with Java). This book is divided into 6 main sections. The book starts with an introduction to the java enabled mobile devices. Thus, if you are new in the field, the sections might be very useful. Else you can easily skip over to J2ME section. The authors discuss some available programming tools and then describe programming techniques for using less memory, optimization and multithreaded programming.

Part 4 of the book is the real core about game programming. The book covers development of Graphical User Interfaces, Audio basics and wireless networking. It does an excellent job in explaining the mechanics of game programming. The working can be understood even if you are not a J2ME guru.

In latter parts, they cover personal java APIs, iAppLi, Siemens Game API. You will learn neat stuff about accessing Phone Books, making calls, sending SMS messages etc. At end, they put together all tricks to develop the micro-racer game. A nice project to learn it all.

Highly recommended for readers of Beginner/Intermediate level in areas of game programming and J2ME.

7 of 7 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars High-quality, thorough, well-written... with a few flaws, May 16, 2002

By 

Max Hrabrov "funny gamer" (NY, NY, USA) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Micro Java™ Game Development (Paperback)

Great book! Some highlights:

- well written
- good level of detail - not too wordy, yet clear and descriptive
- forward-thinking - hits on many important, yet frequently overlooked topics like future market outlook, related industry initiatives, publishing options, third party extensions and APIs, available devices, etc. This includes information from around the world, not just US.
- includes a thorough listing/overview of existing games in the marketplace that the author considers to be top of the crop. I found this extremely helpful, both as a guide for setting my level of expectation and as a real life view on what's out there, what works, what's popular, what's missing, etc.
- highlights the importance of good game design, playtesting, preproduction. This is a real guide to game development, not just a J2ME programming primer.
- a full-blown game, with networking support and all, is created during the course of the book.

5/23/02 - An update, having gone through about 60% of the book:

Most of my expectations (as described above) were met and even exceeded in many cases, however, there are also a couple of minuses to the book:
1. There is a large amount of typos, some fairly serious (read: in the source code). This can take you off track every once in a while as you try and fail to align the text and the code in your head.
2. As there is no CD with the book, you have to re-type all the code yourself if you want to use it. Of couse, given the typos, that's probably a good thing. I emailed the publisher about being able to download the code from the web, no response yet.
3. Some of the code is not as well commented/explained as it could be, and assumes a higher level of expertise with Java that one would initially think. You should be quite comfortable with most aspects of J2SE, especially Swing and Threads in order to navigate through the code smoothly.

Because of these, keeping the rating at 4 stars. Still, it's a great book, and a highly recommended read if you are interested in J2ME, games, or both.