Book Image

Going the Distance with Babylon.js

By : Josh Elster
Book Image

Going the Distance with Babylon.js

By: Josh Elster

Overview of this book

Babylon.js allows anyone to effortlessly create and render 3D content in a web browser using the power of WebGL and JavaScript. 3D games and apps accessible via the web open numerous opportunities for both entertainment and profit. Developers working with Babylon.js will be able to put their knowledge to work with this guide to building a fully featured 3D game. The book provides a hands-on approach to implementation and associated methodologies that will have you up and running, and productive in no time. Complete with step-by-step explanations of essential concepts, practical examples, and links to fully working self-contained code snippets, you’ll start by learning about Babylon.js and the finished Space-Truckers game. You’ll also explore the development workflows involved in making the game. Focusing on a wide range of features in Babylon.js, you’ll iteratively add pieces of functionality and assets to the application being built. Once you’ve built out the basic game mechanics, you’ll learn how to bring the Space-Truckers environment to life with cut scenes, particle systems, animations, shadows, PBR materials, and more. By the end of this book, you’ll have learned how to structure your code, organize your workflow processes, and continuously deploy to a static website/PWA a game limited only by bandwidth and your imagination.
Table of Contents (20 chapters)
1
Part 1: Building the Application
7
Part 2: Constructing the Game
13
Part 3: Going the Distance

Summary

In a whirlwind of Webpack, ES6 Imports, and CSS shenanigans, we’ve completed a key process that started with a simple PG snippet and finished with an animated landing page. Along the way, we set up our local development scripts so we can take advantage of modern JavaScript features such as tree-shaking to optimize our package bundle sizes, while still being able to quickly integrate and view changes into the application.

What’s next from here should be fairly obvious to anyone who has ever stood in front of a Big Red Button labeled “Launch”. It’s time to Push the Button, and make it do interesting things! Yes, we will be implementing our application’s Launch-time experience, which involves establishing some mechanics of state in the application. Don’t worry if you’re not through with this section yet, there’s more to be done!