html5 | | atractivoquenobello

This past Monday Mozilla opened their very first “GameOn” competition, as a way to promote their own products (how about Firefox and their upcoming Firefox OS) but also as a way to promote web-based games and the technologies that make it possible…. HTML, CSS, JavaScript, but also other open options like WebGL and WebRTC.

A competition divided in three categories:

– Best hackable game (where any player can remix game mechanics, fork code, or use assets from the web to create their own version.

– Best Multi-Device game … to “explore” concepts like asymmetric gaming, alternate reality games, and companion apps

– And best Web-only Game (for games that can only be played on the web).

And what do winners get? Besides grabbing get a Nvidia GeForce GTX670 if you’re one of the 3 category winners there will be a special prize for the “Grand Champion”… an all expense paid trip to San Francisco for GDC 2013 with hotel accommodation, tickets to the GDC …and a large etc. Sounds about fair.

You’ll have to submit your playable prototype by Feb 24 built using open web technologies and the game should run plug-in free on the browser of course. And to get things started properly they’re organising 2 simultaneous game jams in New York and London this weekend (apparently more are coming later on) so if you’re around…. (more info here).

Rules and more info on the GameOn website.

HTML5 has been the next best thing for the past 3 years, and will keep being the next best web standard until it’s fully developed & integrated by all web browser developers (ejem M$ ejem), until developers truly understand the potential of webapps and the ecosystem truly flourishes (although with OS maker’s opposition and device manufacturer’s challenges it’s nowhere near).

In the meanwhile Google, Mozilla & co can keep demonstrating the wonders of 3D graphics, Canvas, multimedia management and performance as much as they can. It is needed though. One of those masters of joining art + technology is Alexander Chen, a creative from Google Labs (and not the Chinese master of hyper realism…).

You could think of him as a “technologist” (which is so used these days) although he is more like a musician with a passion for web technology. Since recording his first album back in 2004 he hasn’t stopped creating and probably you may remember his “Conductor” NY-subway work which became so popular earlier on this year…

All of this to talk you about his latest contribution: Baroque.me which as you’ll experience is a nice attempt at visualizing the first Prelude from Bach’s Cello Suites using a set of strings and4 orbiting nodes that rotate like a music box. To do so Alexander (which everything has to be said… developed the idea while a resident at NY’s Eyebeam center) went for some Pythagorean tuning calculation to calibrate string lengths prior to the Javascript and HTML5 coding. Easy peasy right?

Full explanation on his blog, and while visiting baroque.me go on and have a look at his prior works.… oh and you should know all this is a massive conspiracy against Internet Explorer… poor them.

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