Wiley.Games.on.Symbian.OS.A.Handbook.for.Mobile.Development.Apr.2008 (779888), страница 41
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All web servicedata is centralized for use by game applications. The web servicesare the backbone of the Arena community features. Standard portsand protocols are used for flexibility and portability, for example, toenable multiplatform games to communicate.If you’ve already taken a look at Chapter 9, you’ll see a similardiagram in section 9.10, where Sam talks about the use of SNAP formultiplayer games. The Arena client API for N-Gage games is the C++equivalent of the public SNAP SDK for Java ME developers. Arena andSNAP share the same backend framework, but the Java ME SNAP clientuses an Apache-based proxy, while native clients contact the serverbackend directly.A more significant difference is that the Java ME SNAP SDK is availablefor general use, and works on almost any mobile device supporting JavaME, not just Symbian OS smartphones delivered by Nokia. The APIs toaccess the Arena client are available only to N-Gage developers and aresupported only on S60 3rd Edition smartphones.The backend Arena services are hosted by Nokia on server clusters inseveral locations worldwide.
It is expected that all N-Gage game titles willsupport a common minimum set of N-Gage Arena features, such as thein-game notifications discussed in Chapter 8. Some games will supportreal-time online multiplayer features, while others will use turn-basedplay or other innovative ways to create games that take advantage of thenatural connectivity inherent in a mobile phone. A good example of anew type of mobile multiplayer game that exploits the N-Gage ArenaAPIs is Project White Rock which was briefly described in the section onmultiplatform games in Chapter 1, section 1.5.3.N-Gage games can also use custom game servers which run on thebackend to provide additional, game-specific enhancements.
Examplesinclude:• interaction with third-party software to share data between a gameand, for example, a website• community enhancements, such as the constant evolution of a virtualworld required by a MMORPG• faster data processing. The custom game server can perform processingtasks that would be inefficient or impractical if carried out on thephone handset.A separate custom game server SDK is provided with the N-Gage SDK,for server creation.
Custom servers can be written in C/C++, and Pythonbindings are also available for the game server client.174MULTIPLAYER GAMES5.6 Other Online Multiplayer SolutionsOther solutions are available for mobile games to integrate support foronline multiplayer functionality. For example, Terraplay provides theGlobal Gaming Network, which is an ASP service that enables gamedevelopers to tie their games to a network community, and to providemultiplayer gameplay. The Global Gaming Network supports mobileconnected gameplay on all platforms, and also includes community andpurchasing support, including billing.SDKs are available for Symbian OS, BREW, and Java ME, and, at thetime of writing, Terraplay reports that over 40 games, from 15 studios,have used their SDK.7Exit Games Neutron 4.0 is another platform for development, deployment and hosting of mobile multiplayer games.8 However, at the time ofwriting, the platforms supported included Java ME, BREW and Flash, butnot native Symbian OS.5.7 Further ReadingFor additional information about communications programming on Symbian OS, we recommend Iain Campbell’s Communications ProgrammingOn Symbian OS (Second Edition), published by Symbian Press, 2007.
Thebook includes a useful section on the development setup necessary toget you started debugging code that uses Bluetooth wireless technologyusing the Symbian OS emulator on Windows.Forum Nokia has a selection of papers and examples about usingBluetooth wireless technology on S60 smartphones. These can be foundat www.forum.nokia.com but have URLs far too long to type in manually.Please use the site search for the documents titled S60 Platform: BluetoothAPI Developer’s Guide and S60 Platform: Bluetooth Point-to-MultipointExample or check the wiki site for this book, which will maintain a set oflinks to the relevant examples and papers available on the Internet.Forum Nokia also has a number of legacy papers about mobilemultiplayer game design, some of which are still very relevant at a highlevel.
We recommend Overview of Multiplayer Mobile Game Design andIntroduction to Mobile Games Development, both of which can be foundby using the search option on the main page at www.forum.nokia.com.78Please see www.terraplay.com for more information.Further details can be found at www.exitgames.com.6Exploiting the Phone HardwarePaul Coulton and Fadi Chehimi(www.mobileradicals.com)6.1 IntroductionThe standard game playing configuration has a game displayed on ascreen and one or more players either standing or seated around it,interacting through a joystick and/or button interface.
Although muchargument reigns around who developed the first, of what were originallytermed video games, this particular configuration became firmly established in the arcades of the late 1970s and early 1980s through classicgame such as Space Invaders (1978 Taito), Galaxian (1979 Namco),Pacman (1979 Namco), and Donkey Kong (1981 Nintendo) to name buta few of our personal favorites. Whilst a mobile phone can be used forplaying games in this manner, the very nature of the device, the wide userdemographic, and its ever expanding feature set and capabilities, meanthat developers can explore innovative interaction modalities and gameplaying experiences. It is to this premise that this chapter is dedicated.In terms of game playing experience, Chapter 1 has already discussedthe fact that the mobile phone gamer demographic is much more variedthan that of console games, which means that developers should beencouraged to explore games outside the traditional genres. Mobilephones have literally become smartphones – sophisticated multimediacommunications devices that we carry with us at all times and areintegrated into very fabric of our daily activities.
With these devices, wehave the opportunity to create games that break out of a purely virtualexperience and integrate readily into real world activities. Although forsome of us, the mobile phone seems the ideal platform for these types ofgame experiences, it is not exclusively used, and more general definitionshave arisen, such as mixed reality, augmented reality, alternate reality,and pervasive games. Before proceeding with this chapter, it is worthwhileexploring some of these areas.176EXPLOITING THE PHONE HARDWARE6.1.1 Mixed RealityMixed reality games link the physical and digital worlds to create newexperiences. The games often incorporate knowledge of their physicallocation and landscape, and then provide players with the ability tointeract with both real and virtual objects within both the physical anddigital worlds.1 An example of a mobile phone mixed reality gameis that of PAC-LAN shown in Figure 6.1 which is a version of thevideo game Pacman in which human players play the game on a mazebased around the Alexandra Park accommodation complex at LancasterUniversity.2 One player takes the role of the main PAC-LAN characterand collects game pills (using a Nokia 5140 mobile phone equippedwith a Nokia Xpress-on radio frequency identification (RFID)/near fieldcommunications (NFC) reader shell).
The pills are in the form of yellowplastic discs fitted with stick-on RFID tags placed around the maze andare a direct physical manifestation of the virtual game pills on the mobilescreen, placed at the real location corresponding to the virtual maze. Fourother players take the role of the ‘ghosts’ who attempt to hunt down thePAC-LAN player. The game uses a Java ME application, running on theFigure 6.1PAC-LAN mixed reality mobile game1Rashid O., Mullins I., Coulton P., and Edwards R. Extending Cyberspace: LocationBased Games Using Cellular Phones, ACM Computers in Entertainment, Vol 4, Issue 1,January, 2006.2Rashid O., Bamford W., Coulton P., Edwards R, and Scheible J.
PAC-LAN: Mixedreality gaming with RFID enabled mobile phones, ACM Computers in Entertainment, Vol 4,Issue 4, October, 2006, pp 1–17.INTRODUCTION177mobile phone, connected to a central server using a GPRS connection.The server relays to the PAC-LAN character his/her current position alongwith the position of all ghosts, based on the pills collected.6.1.2 Augmented RealityAugmented reality games again mix a combination of real world andcomputer generated data although it is principally associated with theuse of live video images which are processed and ‘augmented’ bythe addition of computer generated graphics.
In terms of mobile, wewill deal with many aspects of this concept in section 6.2. But, as anexample, consider Figure 6.2, which illustrates the mobile phone gameMobiLazer.3 The game uses specially designed colored-tags, which areworn by the players, and advanced color tracking software runningon a camera phone, to create a novel first person shoot ’em up withinnovative game interactions and play. The game is written in C++ forS60 smartphones and is controlled by a central server communicating viaTCP/IP over GPRS.Figure 6.2MobiLazer augmented reality mobile game6.1.3 Alternate RealityAlternate reality games use interactive narratives with the real world asa platform to tell a story that may be affected by participants’ ideas oractions and are often associated with theories of collective intelligence.The genre is typified by intense player involvement in real-time andevolves according to participants’ responses.
Characters are activelycontrolled by the game’s designers, as opposed to being controlled byartificial intelligence (AI), as in a typical computer game.Alternate reality games are increasing in popularity. They tend to befree to play, with costs absorbed either through supporting products3Chehimi F., Coulton P., and Edwards R., Augmented Reality 3D Interactive Advertisements on Smartphones, The Sixth International Conference on Mobile Business, Ontario,Canada, 9th–11th July 2007.178EXPLOITING THE PHONE HARDWARE(for example, Perplex City is funded by collectible puzzle cards, seewww.perplexcity.com for more information) or through promotionalrelationships with existing products.6.1.4 Pervasive GamesPervasive games is another term often used to describe the types of gamesthat are interwoven with our everyday lives through the items, devices,and people that surround us, and the places we inhabit.
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