Wave Issue 9610 10/11/96 Article 7-01

***Online Developer's Conference: SFO September
by David Lohse

Held in San Francisco from Sept. 18 - 20, Jupiter Communications' Online
Developers III Conference explored issues and technologies in developing
software for both the Internet and online services. The conference
featured keynotes from industry giants such as Marc Andreeson and Trip
Hawkins, as well as panelists from a number of companies involved with
online development and infrastructure.

The first day of the conference was devoted to online games, with a focus
on 3D games. The keynote was given by Trip Hawkins, the Chairman of 3DO
and industry luminary, who stressed the importance of the Internet while
displaying Meridian 59, 3DO's new online gaming environment.

Multiplayer online games will be _the next big thing_ , at least
according to the companies at the conference pushing them. This may in
fact be true; apply the incredible success of DOOM to the world-wide
Internet. Two different approaches to online gaming exist: client-side
and server-side. Client-side games provide all of the "world" content
locally to the player, most likely on CD-ROM, with only relatively small
messages passing back and forth over the network. This allows high-
quality 3D graphics and detailed worlds along with high-speed gameplay,
at the expense of flexibility: no permanent changes can be made in the
world (i.e., only very little or no state can be maintained on a server)
without distributing new CD-ROMs to all of the users. Another benefit of
this architecture is that conventional consumer 3D games can be "enabled"
to play over the Internet, an approach being taken by companies such as
TEN and Mpath.

Server-side games, on the other hand, base all of their content on the
server. They have the important benefit of allowing worlds to be altered
and built on, and are (so far at least) primarily VRML-based. Client-side
applications have more immediate potential for games, while server-side
applications will better support social environments. Examples of server-
side environments worlds from Black Sun and Oz Interactive.

www.jup.com