5 ms·

Lobster is a game programming language

75 points by albertzeyer 12y ago

jeffreyrogers 12y ago
I wonder how fast it is? A lot of game programmers hate C/C++ but feel like they can't use anything else, since they don't have the same control. Edit: I reread the page and it says about as fast as non-JIT Lua, so probably good for a hobbyist, but not a production quality game.
albertzeyer 12y ago
Another source code example: http://i.imgur.com/ZZWFkXn.jpg http://i.imgur.com/ZZWFkXn.jpg Its entire source code fits in the screenshot. From here: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8659273 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8659273
bananaoomarang 12y ago
Strikes me as a nice idea, but why not just build for/use an already built library for a pre-existing language? It does look nice, I'm just not sure the tradeoffs of building in a unique language are worth it, since it doesn't seem to add all that much.
- jamesu 12y ago
  The author has a history of creating programming languages, so It's really no surprise he's made another. As for why, it seems likely based on the introduction text he was aiming to make a portable language specifically designed with game developers in mind.
emiljbs 12y ago
Considering the feature list, doesn't Common Lisp also qualify as a game programming language then?
swah 12y ago
Jonathan Blow is also writing his own language for games: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TH9VCN6UkyQ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TH9VCN6UkyQ I think this is great (more languages). Note that this is not by @strlen (Alex Feinberg)
- jeffreyrogers 12y ago
  Jonathan Blow has a whole series on YouTube discussing the language, and at one point there is even a demo of the language and the compiler! The whole thing is really exciting and the language looks well thought out. It's nice to see a system programming language where the focus is more on getting things done than on making the type system pretty.
  - swah 12y ago
    Yep. And his demo is a little game... :) There's not enough time for seeing all those videos though.
dirkk0 12y ago
Oh - this was done by the author of the Cube Engines a.k.a Sauerbraten. Wouter van Oortmerssen is not exactly a Newbie. He is at Google now. This might be more interesting than I initially thought.
segmondy 12y ago
Every language is a game programming language.
- hellbanner 12y ago
  "Lobster is a general purpose stand-alone programming language that comes with a built-in library suitable for making games and other graphical things. It is therefore not very suitable for non-programmers."
  - Dewie 12y ago
    What's the significance of it being "built-in"? How is that an advantage over a language with a reasonable package/module system, so that any game-making libraries can be used as easily as the standard library (after downloading it etc.).
    - Jach 12y ago
      The same benefits that PHP has or strives for (for better or worse) in making many web-programming-related functions always available in the global scope (it looks like Lobster does require includes however), plus first-party support from the language itself rather than relying on multiple libraries and authors (the language author gets to deal with that), plus a consistent API for all those things shoved onto the language author instead of the program writer. More interesting things you could do would be to add special syntax to support some domain-specific task, but looking from a language with macros that sort of thing comes across as cute... For instance the gl_ functions in this language create a control flow visible at the source level: gl_translate(playerpos): gl_rotate_z(tomouse): gl_polygon([ [ -0.5, 0.5 ], vec_x, [ -0.5, -0.5 ] ])
      - duaneb 12y ago
        > For instance the gl_ functions in this language create a control flow visible at the source level: How is this superior to exposing control-structure like object (e.g. closures) and implementing the GL dsls as libraries? The above isn't any more readable, with an increased maintenance cost for the writers of Lobster. I would say that available libraries is by far the most limiting factor for most languages, including (I'm assuming) Lobster.
Jach 12y ago
Worth reading the philosophy page: http://strlen.com/files/lang/lobster/philosophy.html http://strlen.com/files/lang/lobster/philosophy.html "The most important over-arching reason behind everything in Lobster was to make it a pleasant language to use for one single person: me, the author." When these sorts of personal side projects come up on HN, it seems inevitable that people question whether anyone should want to use them... You probably don't most of the time. They're cool to look at, but I think the judgment of being cool comes more from a PL designer viewpoint than an end-user viewpoint...
peapicker 12y ago
This looks like tons of fun. I know what I'll be playing with over Thanksgiving break... it will be interesting to see if this could be a reasonable platform for playing with digital synthesis and spectrogram analysis and the like.
chipsy 12y ago
I'm a bit late to comment, but I think this language is very promising for "batteries-included hacking," much like PHP or Basic. Just, it's not a woefully primitive or erroneous design like those languages. Wouter advertises the interesting high-level features up front, but the productive appeal of any language of this style is in the easing story, and I bet this can satisfy that perfectly well.

75 points by albertzeyer 12y ago

I wonder how fast it is? A lot of game programmers hate C/C++ but feel like they can't use anything else, since they don't have the same control. Edit: I reread the page and it says about as fast as non-JIT Lua, so probably good for a hobbyist, but not a production quality game.

albertzeyer 12y ago

Another source code example: http://i.imgur.com/ZZWFkXn.jpg http://i.imgur.com/ZZWFkXn.jpg Its entire source code fits in the screenshot. From here: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8659273 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8659273

bananaoomarang 12y ago

Strikes me as a nice idea, but why not just build for/use an already built library for a pre-existing language? It does look nice, I'm just not sure the tradeoffs of building in a unique language are worth it, since it doesn't seem to add all that much.

jamesu 12y ago
The author has a history of creating programming languages, so It's really no surprise he's made another. As for why, it seems likely based on the introduction text he was aiming to make a portable language specifically designed with game developers in mind.

emiljbs 12y ago

Considering the feature list, doesn't Common Lisp also qualify as a game programming language then?

swah 12y ago

Jonathan Blow is also writing his own language for games: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TH9VCN6UkyQ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TH9VCN6UkyQ I think this is great (more languages). Note that this is not by @strlen (Alex Feinberg)

jeffreyrogers 12y ago
Jonathan Blow has a whole series on YouTube discussing the language, and at one point there is even a demo of the language and the compiler! The whole thing is really exciting and the language looks well thought out. It's nice to see a system programming language where the focus is more on getting things done than on making the type system pretty.
- swah 12y ago
  Yep. And his demo is a little game... :) There's not enough time for seeing all those videos though.

dirkk0 12y ago

Oh - this was done by the author of the Cube Engines a.k.a Sauerbraten. Wouter van Oortmerssen is not exactly a Newbie. He is at Google now. This might be more interesting than I initially thought.

segmondy 12y ago

Every language is a game programming language.

hellbanner 12y ago
"Lobster is a general purpose stand-alone programming language that comes with a built-in library suitable for making games and other graphical things. It is therefore not very suitable for non-programmers."
- Dewie 12y ago
  What's the significance of it being "built-in"? How is that an advantage over a language with a reasonable package/module system, so that any game-making libraries can be used as easily as the standard library (after downloading it etc.).
  - Jach 12y ago
    The same benefits that PHP has or strives for (for better or worse) in making many web-programming-related functions always available in the global scope (it looks like Lobster does require includes however), plus first-party support from the language itself rather than relying on multiple libraries and authors (the language author gets to deal with that), plus a consistent API for all those things shoved onto the language author instead of the program writer. More interesting things you could do would be to add special syntax to support some domain-specific task, but looking from a language with macros that sort of thing comes across as cute... For instance the gl_ functions in this language create a control flow visible at the source level: gl_translate(playerpos): gl_rotate_z(tomouse): gl_polygon([ [ -0.5, 0.5 ], vec_x, [ -0.5, -0.5 ] ])
    - duaneb 12y ago
      > For instance the gl_ functions in this language create a control flow visible at the source level: How is this superior to exposing control-structure like object (e.g. closures) and implementing the GL dsls as libraries? The above isn't any more readable, with an increased maintenance cost for the writers of Lobster. I would say that available libraries is by far the most limiting factor for most languages, including (I'm assuming) Lobster.

Jach 12y ago

Worth reading the philosophy page: http://strlen.com/files/lang/lobster/philosophy.html http://strlen.com/files/lang/lobster/philosophy.html "The most important over-arching reason behind everything in Lobster was to make it a pleasant language to use for one single person: me, the author." When these sorts of personal side projects come up on HN, it seems inevitable that people question whether anyone should want to use them... You probably don't most of the time. They're cool to look at, but I think the judgment of being cool comes more from a PL designer viewpoint than an end-user viewpoint...

peapicker 12y ago

This looks like tons of fun. I know what I'll be playing with over Thanksgiving break... it will be interesting to see if this could be a reasonable platform for playing with digital synthesis and spectrogram analysis and the like.

chipsy 12y ago

I'm a bit late to comment, but I think this language is very promising for "batteries-included hacking," much like PHP or Basic. Just, it's not a woefully primitive or erroneous design like those languages. Wouter advertises the interesting high-level features up front, but the productive appeal of any language of this style is in the easing story, and I bet this can satisfy that perfectly well.