Dad Encourages Gaming

June 26, 2007
I enjoyed your article on gaming, and I've wondered this myself with my almost-10-year-old, who says he wants to be an engieer like Dad

Hi Mark: I enjoyed your article on gaming, and I've wondered this myself with my almost-10-year-old, who says he wants to be an engieer like Dad, and so I've selfishly thought of some ways to keep him interested in technology. My thoughts are that he may be a bit young to get into the hardware like the Parallax Hydra kit, but he may be able to tackle some "game" programming, if the graphics are "simple enough". Where I may lead him is to play with some VRML coding, since: (1) the graphics are as simple or as complicated as you want, since you can imbed other folk's geometry or build your own; (2) there are scripting capabilities (Javascript), making it react to events as you see fit; (3) plug-ins to browsers for viewing 3D stuff is a free download; (4) any old text editor is your programming tool, since the ASCII files are read into the plug-in for viewing. We use this approach quite a bit for graphics rendering at work, and my thoughts are to work with him on creating a flight sim plus shoot-em-up, which he could expand into a multiplayer game his friends could play when they come over. If it materializes, I'll let you know. The key thing, though, is the investment cost is your time and zero cash. Bob McKillip
Senior Associate
Continuum Dynamics, Inc.
Ewing, New Jersey

Sponsored Recommendations

Highly Integrated 20A Digital Power Module for High Current Applications

March 20, 2024
Renesas latest power module delivers the highest efficiency (up to 94% peak) and fast time-to-market solution in an extremely small footprint. The RRM12120 is ideal for space...

Empowering Innovation: Your Power Partner for Tomorrow's Challenges

March 20, 2024
Discover how innovation, quality, and reliability are embedded into every aspect of Renesas' power products.

Article: Meeting the challenges of power conversion in e-bikes

March 18, 2024
Managing electrical noise in a compact and lightweight vehicle is a perpetual obstacle

Power modules provide high-efficiency conversion between 400V and 800V systems for electric vehicles

March 18, 2024
Porsche, Hyundai and GMC all are converting 400 – 800V today in very different ways. Learn more about how power modules stack up to these discrete designs.

Comments

To join the conversation, and become an exclusive member of Electronic Design, create an account today!