Macromedia Shockwave

[Cobra!]

So this is a platform I've been delving into recently. So in the late 90s and early 2000s, there was Flash, but there was also Shockwave, which is actually pretty different.

Flash was used for stuff like 2D web graphics and fancy menus, but as far as I know, Shockwave was for games, 3D stuff, and more advanced graphics. (On a side note, SWF is a Flash format, not Shockwave, contrary to popular belief. It actually stands for "Small Web Format")

You needed different programs to make Flash or Shockwave software. You needed Macromedia Flash and Macromedia Director respectively.

They also use different programming languages, instead of Actionscript, Shockwave used a language called "Lingo". I've been learning how to use it, and it's kind of fun, even if the interface of the program itself has shown it's age.

The only way to use Shockwave on modern machines is through Windows or Wine, installing the last version of Shocwave and using the 32-bit version of Pale Moon (64-bit doesn't support it): http://andkon.com/arcade/faq.php#shockwave

It would be nice to see this format make a comeback, if only so we don't have to use Pale Moon.

There are a few games I loved back in the day that used Shockwave, such as Robot Rage, and the Cartoon Cartoon Summer Resort games, both of which have their revival movements.

Anyone else remember Shockwave? You ever made anything with it?

[myleszey]

BlueMaxima's Flashpoint Archive has the tools to sandbox local Shockwave files as well as a whole bunch of other formats that aren't supported by a lot of current browsers. I wasn't able to find Robot Rage in the list of archived software but the other thing is there.

[Cobra!]

BlueMaxima's Flashpoint Archive has the tools to sandbox local Shockwave files as well as a whole bunch of other formats that aren't supported by a lot of current browsers. I wasn't able to find Robot Rage in the list of archived software but the other thing is there.

I can't get Flashpoint working on Linux. They have a frontend, but I can't get it to do much of anything.

[Kallistero]

The games & 3D worlds on MaidMarian were originally made with Shockwave, long ago!   

I spent some time on Sherwood Dungeon, but Tank Ball 2 was my go-to for that site. It was just a 4-team open-map kart battler, like the battle modes in Mario Kart, but it was free-to-play with online multiplayer & simplified gameplay. Looking at the code on the game's page, it also looks like Tank Ball 2 was never moved over from Shockwave; it's forever calling for an "InsertShockwave12" JavaScript function that just hasn't moved for years.    I do wonder if the game would load up with the appropriate software, but since it's a multiplayer game, it would just load into an empty world.   

You can check out Tank Ball 2 gameplay right here:

The site's creator also made 3D worlds out of some of his pages, and that sort of cements it as a predecessor to WebGL.

Now, if my passion was directed toward Shockwave, I'd totally consider at least helping build a ramp for a proper browser emulator to exist. People have at least LOOKED at Shockwave emulation to put it back into the browser, but it seems like there's an entire vertical of technologies that would go into an embeddable Shockwave emulator. Not that it's stopped people from making browser emulators for everything from DOS to the PlayStation 1. Some forms of media even find new life once they're more accessible, like the burgeoning ROM hack community for Mario 64. It all suggests to me that the medium can be revived something proper!