原作者：Raul Otaolea 译者：Willow Wu

Raul Otaolea是网页平台WiMi5的合作创始人和CEO。

在之前的文章中，我回顾了一下前10年网页技术领域的里程碑式进展。

目的就是来评估这些技术的成熟度，尝试着预测如果它要演化为游戏平台的话，未来几年要怎么发展。

这一次，我打算来谈谈我个人是如何看待HTML5的未来。显然，这样做有点不自量力，但我相信时间会证明我的对错。但是对我来说它感觉像是个建构性活动，好吧，把自己当做是先知，让我们一起来看看手中的水晶球能告诉我们什么。

我把这篇文章分成了4个部分，文中叙述了网页游戏行业升级最有可能的走向，还有对其他平台的产生的影响。

全新的网络平台

随着移动商店逐渐兴起，先是App Store，然后是Google Play，一个基于移动平台的新行业就这样诞生了，而且众所周知它发展势头正猛。

自那以后，网游行业就遭受了不小的冲击，衰落程度都能和移动平台的增长程度持平了。

虽说二者提供的游戏类型都很相似，但是手机用户数量庞大，使用频率也高，对他们来说新的用户体验也很容易就接受了。结果就是大量玩家从网页平台转移到移动平台。

网页平台无法和移动平台竞争，因为web标准并不是相当成熟并且它主要面向的是桌面式浏览器。

在那段时期，移动平台遇到的最大阻碍就是它没办法像桌面浏览器那样功能强大，意味着无法将网游植入到移动平台。为移动平台定制的网游？这个不存在。

但是我们生活在一个无法预测的网络技术如何发展的时代，如今看来，天平要倾向另外一边了。

15年过去了，几乎没有什么东西可以做到一成不变，在过去两年内所有的Web标准技术都更新了。在我看来，这项技术转变带来了翻天覆地的变革，个人总结如下：

新标准能够让开发人员制作出旧版不可能实现的内容，提升了移动设备本身的性能表现，例如2D、3D效果，外围设置、专业音效、硬件接入等等。

新标准适用于所有浏览器，包括移动版本。这就意味着，开发者们可以制作出在所有设备上都能顺利运行的游戏，对20多亿的手机和平板用户开放了通道，这是历史上的首次突破。

随着新标准的出台，那些非标准的技术，尤其是Flash，这种目前还在游戏开发中广泛使用的技术，已经不再是必需品。网页浏览器开发者们已经决定屏蔽那些非标准的内容。这就迫使上千个还在使用Flash做游戏的网站不得不更新他们的所有作品。

网页不再局限于浏览器上。多亏了标准实施中的开放性，开发者们可以基于开放源代码项目（游戏邦注：例如Chromium, V8, Chakra, JavaScriptCore, SpiderMonkey, NodeJS等等），利用这些Web标准的优势所在制作app。

因此，我在这一节标题中所用的“新”是个至关重要的特性。现在我们需要摆脱对网游老印象了,把它们上升到另外一个新类别，它们不再是所谓的二流或者是三流产品。

现在开始，网游进入一流领域，将会给人们带来顶级的内容体验。兼具单人和多人模式，拥有高质量音效和画面，在所有设备运行顺畅，这样的2D和3D游戏问世也只是时间问题了。

实际上，主流的网游站点已经注意到这个变革了，你可以从Kongregate公司的CEO，Emily Greer的近期推文中得知。

HTML5这么多年来都被认为是网游的将来时态，而如今它终于成了现在时。

— Emily Greer (@EmilyG) 3月7日, 2017

另一个重点就是更新网页的过程有了很大改变。从现在开始，Web标准的更新将会变得更加频繁，会和技术提升齐头并进。

不用再等上15年我们就能看到这些新特性了。事实上，新版本已经出现了：HTML5.1, ES7和ES8。这次更新提升了网页的速度，精简了体积，因此开发者们能够制作出更加优秀的游戏，丰富游戏的种类。

这个改变也会导致手机应用市场过于拥挤，商家在营销和宣传方面投入了很多，用尽各种方法让玩家接触到自家的游戏。

我个人认为，近期的Web标准升级不仅仅是更新，而更像是一次颠覆性变革，因为这次的新性能跟之前根本就不在一个等级上。

你不能忽略他们是把15年的软件研究过程一次搞定啊。这就是为什么我说网页正在转变为下一个游戏平台，这种想法比以往更加坚定。这是将来一定会发生的事，但是这个新行业现阶段还需继续探索。

如何能让网页端流量快速增长，开拓它的跨平台性能，最大的挑战就是如何能够普及手机用户，让他们接受在浏览器中玩游戏。

这是个非常重要的瓶颈，因为就目前来说，要玩游戏的唯一途径就是进入商店，搜索找到它，然后下载。实际上，这个过程也体现了手机app的生命周期，还有移动平台的原生运作方式。这种模式已经在用户中扎根，形成了习惯，要改变是一件很难的事。

然而，新的应用程序编程接口比如说谷歌的添加到主界面功能，能够恰当地引导用户接受改变。这个应用程序编程接口允许页面向用户发出询问，是否想要在手机桌面建立一个快捷方式。

如果用户同意，那么系统就会在桌面创建一个和系统自带图标类似的图标，点击它就会出现全屏式浏览器，甚至连网站地址栏都隐藏了，跟普通app没什么不同。

因此，用户体验跟使用系统自带的app很相似。我们只能拭目以待，看看其他浏览器会不会也这样。

超级app成为平台

Web标准最主要的特征就是它能跨平台使用。大家最为熟知的跨平台游戏方法就是通过浏览器。然而，这并不是唯一的途径。

超级app巧妙地利用了网页的跨平台特性掀起了一股新潮流。超级app就是普通的app升级演变成他们自己的平台。意思就是这些超级app可以在应用内安装其他服务程序，这要由第三方设计。

这种新模式提供的第一批应用服务就是聊天机器人和游戏。难就难在选择一个足够强大、灵活、热门的技术，能在所有操作系统中运行的，能够通杀那么多种设备的技术就是网页了。

第一批在应用内嵌入HTML5游戏的通讯app有Telegram, Kik和Messenger，这些游戏还是由第三方开发。

最有趣的事情是他们这些通讯应用其实是利用游戏来增加用户参与率。

令人无法忽视的是，这三个超级app随便挑出一个每个月都有20多亿的用户在使用。这样开发者们的游戏就有走红的机会，利用这些app的社交功能比如向朋友发起挑战，分享成就，排名等等让更多人知道这游戏。

另一方面，这些通讯应用的用户发现在app内直接就可以玩游戏，这是一种全新的用户体验。由因及果，这样就有了一种双赢的局面，app，开发团队还有用户，大家都有受益。

我们需要密切关注这几个超级app，同时也要留心其他超级app，看看它们是否会再次聚合成另一个游戏平台。

App成为游戏接口（游戏邦注：当然大部分的超级应用都没做好成为入口的工作）

还有另一种有趣的趋势就是利用这些超级app的相同特征，但是聚焦的部分有所不同，这些人关注的是它能成为游戏接入口。

在HTML5中开发游戏时，这些app可以混合游戏的原有特性。就像超级app一样，这些web技术能让开发人员对他的所有作品进行动态更新，而且速度非常快，也不用经过手机商店的一系列的审核。

另外一个优势就是由于我们制作的是网页内容，在那些传统的网站上也可以提供，可以在超级app中发布，甚至也可以把他们的app提供给第三方发行，自成一个超级app。

这样做的话，他们就能充分利用大多数渠道。举个最好的例子，Gamee，它刚刚又完成了一轮集资，资金合计达220万美元。

这个类型里还有两家有趣的新兴公司，Blackstorm和PlatoApp，但是他们关注点不同。

Blackstorm的首轮集资达到3300万美元，他们打算利用这笔资金把自己打造成app stores的替代平台。EverWing，这个公司也是Messenger选择的首批HTML5游戏开发者之一。

大概就在一周以前，我们听到了消息，有一家名为RGames的新公司成立了，而且他们还联手了日本巨头游戏公司Rakuten。其目的就是给日本，乃至整个亚洲市场提供一个HTML5游戏的入口。

类似的，PlatoApp正在策划将通讯app和经典的联机游戏结合起来。尽管他们首轮融资只有3百万美元，但是带领他们的也是一个巨头公司：雅虎。游戏这个东西，肯定是以趣味为目的。

在我看来，之后我们将会看到越来越多采用这种方法的新兴公司崛地而起，他们充分利用了web技术当下所提供的选项，把这些优势融入到游戏中。

混合平台

电子游戏平台由三个主要部分组成：一个自带操作系统的设备来运行游戏，一个可以继续开发它的工具，还有一个可以分销的市场。

在网页平台，由于它的开放性，还没有任何一个程序可以同时提供这三个元素，但是这样也在行业内提供了更多的机会。

如此一来，网页就不会仅仅局限在一种开发工具上了，而是拥有更多选择。市场也不是只有一个，还有很多。而且它们也不是只限于某一种类型的设备或者某一类操作系统，而是全部通用。

另外，它不像其他平台，一定是基于设备或者是操作系统，例如Xbox, PlayStation, Switch,手机上的安卓和iOS,网页不需要针对特定的设备或者操作系统，但是需要基于web标准制作。

换句话说，它是一个软件平台，最常见的网页浏览器。然而，就像我之前所说的，科技迭代更新很快的，浏览器只是众多贯彻这种标准的例子之一。

这种特意设计以适应不同设备、不同操作系统的技术也在为其他平台搭建了桥梁。

由此，不仅仅是能增加平台的灵活性，也能让世界范围内的更多用户参与进来。实际上，我认为所有人都会想要进入这个平台。而且他们会通过以下三种技术进入：

Emscripten

它支持用C++语言开发电子游戏，还有其他可以移植到JavaScript的语言。实际上，它转换成了JavaScript的子集，称为asm。现实中有很多运用这种技术的例子。

WebAssembly

虽然还处于开发阶段，但是它是网游制作史上的一座里程碑。可以这么说，WebAssembly是Emscripten的升级版本。

而且，它也能让用其它编程语言开发的游戏移植到WebAssembly，开发出通用的高度优化模块。浏览器将会安全地运行WebAssembly，性能会接近原生版。

所有的专业游戏引擎，例如Unity, Unreal等等，已经在着手把他们的游戏输出到WebAssembly。这也是为什么说这些新类型的网游在其他平台也会和它们的原生同胞融洽相处的原因。

相同的游戏在不同平台上会有什么发展，还有不同营销团队针对不同平台会怎样设计无线自组网（ad hoc），这都是很有意思的。由于网络营销的成本并不高，我个人认为网游的势头在未来几年会越来越好。

混合模式移动应用

这类app实际上是利用伪浏览器（pseudo-browser）运行游戏。App的外观和用户体验跟传统app是完全一样的，在大多数时候它们之间难以区分。很多公司都在用这种方式，不仅仅只应用在游戏中，各种类型的app也有用到，因为它能够帮助这些应用更顺利地移植到其他平台上。

不要忘记这些，还有网络已经向世人展现了一个跨设备式平台，显然，在不久的将来，网页的概念不会再局限于电脑桌面式浏览器，会对所有类型的浏览器开放，包括那些在移动平台、电视端还有其他设备上的。

其他平台的游戏能够一键移植到网页端，这样就会增加市场的竞争性，冲击网页的优势，导致一个游戏平台走向衰败。

网页变成大众目标平台，这种时代会来临的；到时候的流程会是先开发手游然后把它移植到网页上，举个例子：设计游戏的时候，从一开始就要考虑到这游戏会移植到移动端和网页端。

结论

不要忘记上诉所讲的内容，毫无疑问，在接下来的几年我们将会看到：开发者们利用这种对所有设备通用的web技术来制作游戏；游戏会嵌入到app内；游戏的目标app是通讯类应用；用其它编程语言开发游戏然后植入到网页端，这些现象统统都会一起出现。它们都是网页游戏。

在短时间内我们将会见证许多变革，这会对电子游戏的整个行业产生有趣的影响。

可以确定的是网页端会成为下一个游戏平台，一个全新的特殊平台，和那些现有的平台都不同，网页端利用了它们的潜能同时也与它们相辅相成。

这样岂不美哉？

本文由游戏邦编译，转载请注明来源，或咨询微信zhengjintiao

Raul Otaolea is Co-Founder and CEO of web platform WiMi5.

This article was originally published on LinkedIn.

In a previous article, I went over the most relevant advances in the area of web technologies of the last decade.

The objective was to measure the level of maturity of these technologies, to look at them from the perspective of trying to predict how the web will evolve as a gaming platform in the next few years.

On this occasion, I’m going to talk about my view of the future. Obviously, this is a bit daring on my part, and time will prove me right or wrong. However, it seems like a constructive activity to me, so with crystal ball in hand, here I go.

I’ve divided this article into four sections, which represent the most important possibilities for revolutionising the web game industry, as well as the implications of this for other platforms.

New web platform

With the opening of mobile stores, first the App Store and then Google Play, a new industry was created, based on the mobile platform, which we all know has grown exponentially.

Since then, web games have suffered a considerable decline that parallels the growth of the mobile platform.

With a similar offer in terms of type of games, mobiles, with their massive deployment and constant use, can offer a new user experience that is incredibly accessible. The result has been a substantial migration of players from the web to mobile devices.

The web, as a platform, couldn’t compete with mobiles, since web standards were still very immature and aimed mainly at desktop browsers.

The biggest obstacle in that time period was that mobile browsers didn’t have the same abilities that desktop browsers did, meaning it wasn’t possible to develop web games. Web games for the mobile simply didn’t exist.

Now, however, we’re living in an unprecedented time in the history of the web, which looks like it might change the balance.

After 15 years of little to no evolution, practically all standard technologies that make up the web have been updated in the last two years. In my opinion, this technological transition is having a radical impact, which I summarise below:

The new standards allow for the creation of content that was impossible with the older versions, rivaling in capacity and performance what mobiles offer natively (2D, 3D, peripherals, professional sound, access to hardware, etc.).

The standards are applied to all browsers, including mobile versions. This means that, for the first time in history, it’s possible to develop video games that work on all devices, opening access to more than two billion mobiles and tablets.

With the new standards, non-standard technologies, especially Flash, which were in massive use up to now in video game development, are no longer necessary. Web browser developers have decided to block non-standard content. This is forcing thousands of websites still running Flash games to update their entire portfolio.

The web transcends browsers. Thanks to the open nature of the implementation of standards, it’s possible to develop solutions based on open-source code projects (Chromium, V8, Chakra, JavaScriptCore, SpiderMonkey, NodeJS, etc.), which allows apps that exploit the advantages of these web standards to be created.

Therefore, the word “new” that I used in the title of this section is of vital importance. We are now in a position to re-imagine web games, hoisting them up into a new category, leaving behind the belief that they can only be second or third-rate products.

From now on, web games will be first-class citizens that offer top-quality content. It’s only a matter of time before we see 2D and 3D games, in single-player and multiplayer, with high quality sound and graphics, working smoothly on all devices.

In fact, the main web game sites are already noticing this change, as can be seen in a recent tweet from Emily Greer, the CEO of Kongregate.

After years of being the future of browser games, HTML5 is finally the present. pic.twitter.com/EPwnxytwBj

— Emily Greer (@EmilyG) March 7, 2017

Another relevant aspect is that the process of updating the web has radically changed. From now on, updates to web standards will be much more frequent, and will parallel the advancement of technology.

No longer will we have to wait 15 years to see new features. In fact, the next versions are already popping up: HTML5.1, ES7, ES8. This ensures a much more agile evolution of the web, and therefore more possibilities to create better and different types of games.

This change is also arriving in a moment of severe overcrowding on mobile app stores, where large investments in marketing and publicity are needed in order to have any kind of visibility and reach users.

My opinion is that the recent evolution of web standards isn’t just a mere update, but rather a disruptive change, since it offers new capabilities that are in a completely different order of magnitude.

You have to keep in mind that they’re cramming 15 years of software progress in at once. That’s why my view, now more than ever, is that the web is turning into the next gaming platform, and that it will, as such, open up a new industry that’s still to be explored.

The main challenge for the web to experience exponential growth and exploit its multi-platform capability is for mobile users to willingly accept playing on a browser.

This is an important bottleneck, because up to now, the only way to play a video game was to go to the store, find it and download it. In fact, this process represented the life cycle of the app, and the native way of working in the mobile platform. This model has created a habit in users that will be hard to modify.

However, new APIs like Google’s Add to Homescreen are channeled right at proposing an alternative. This API allows a web page to ask the user if they’d like to create a shortcut on the mobile desktop.

If the user agrees to do so, an icon, indistinguishable from that of a classic app’s icon, will be created, and when tapped, the icon will open the browser in full screen, even hiding the browser’s address bar, again making it indistinguishable from an app.

So, the user’s experience will be very similar to that when using a native app. We’ll have to wait and see if other browsers implement this feature.

Super-apps as platforms

The most important feature of web standards is their multi-platform nature. The most obvious way of consuming multi-platform video games is the browser. However, it’s not the only one.

Super-apps are creating a new trend that intelligently exploits the multi-platform nature of the web. Super-apps are normal apps that have evolved into becoming their own platforms. This means that they offer the possibility of installing other services, designed by third-parties, in the app itself.

The first services offered in this new mode were bots and video games. The challenge was to select a sufficiently powerful, flexible, and popular technology that would work on all operating systems, and obviously, the best-adapted technology to working on a large number devices is the web.

The first super-apps to offer HTML5 games developed by third-parties and embedded in their platform were messaging apps Telegram, Kik and Messenger.

The most interesting thing about these messaging apps is that they’re actually social networks that use video games as a tool for increasing user engagement.

You have to keep in mind that between these three super-apps, there are more than two billion monthly users. This allows developers to get the chance to have their games go viral, exploiting the social characteristics of these apps like challenging friends, sharing achievements, creating rankings, etc.

On the other hand, messaging app users find an instant entertainment option without having to leave the app, which is a new user experience. A priori, this is a win-win situation, because the app, the developer community, and finally users all benefit.

We’ll have to keep a close eye on the evolution of these and other super-apps to see if they can consolidate as yet another gaming platform.

Apps as game portals

Another interesting trend that is exploiting the same feature as super-apps, but with a different focus, is that of apps that act as game portals.

These are apps that can mix native features with games developed in HTML5. Like super-apps, web technologies allow them to update their game portfolio dynamically and instantaneously, that is, without having to go through all the approval steps in stores.

Another advantage is that since we’re dealing with web content, they can also offer the same games via conventional websites, publish them in super-apps, or even turn themselves into super-apps by offering their app to third-parties for publishing.

This way, they can make the most of all channels. An excellent example of this type of app is Gamee, which just raised another round of financing totaling $2.2 million.

Also in this category, but with different focuses, are two other interesting startups: Blackstorm and PlatoApp.

Blackstorm raised $33 million in their first round of financing, which they’re going to use to try to become the alternative to app stores. The company has also been one of those chosen to create one of the first HTML5 games for Messenger, called EverWing.

And just a week ago, we heard about the opening of a company called RGames along with Japanese giant Rakuten. The goal is to launch an HTML5 video games portal for the Japanese and Asian markets.

Similarly, PlatoApp is proposing a combination between a messaging app and classic multiplayer games. Although their first round of financing raised a more modest $3 million, Plato is led by the creators of Yahoo! Games, which will certainly lead to interesting proposals.

My opinion is that we’ll soon see more startups based on this approach, as they can make the most of all the options that web technologies currently offer when it comes to video games.

Hybridisation of platforms

Video game platforms are made up of three pillars: a device with an operating system that runs the game, a tool to develop it with, and a marketplace to distribute it.

In the web platform, thanks to its open nature, there isn’t a single entity that offers these three elements, but rather delegates these roles to the industry.

This way, the web doesn’t have one development tool, but rather many. There isn’t just one marketplace, but many. And they’re not limited to one type of device and one operating system, but rather they can work on all of them.

Plus, unlike other platforms whose main axis is a device and/or operating system like Xbox, PlayStation, Switch, Android and iOS on mobiles, the web doesn’t have a destined device/operating system combo, but rather an implementation of the standard.

That is to say, it’s a software platform, most commonly a web browser. However, as I commented earlier, this is changing quickly, and the browser is just one of the many examples of the implementation of this standard.

This technology, expressly designed to adapt to many devices and operating systems with different characteristics, is also building bridges to other platforms.

With this, not only is the platform more flexible, but it’s also evolving to a platform where the whole world can be. In fact, my opinion is that it’s a platform where everyone will want to be. And they’ll do so by using three technologies:

Emscripten

This allows video games developed in C++ and other languages to be ported to JavaScript. Actually, it translates it to a subset of JavaScript called asm. There are many examples out there of the use of this technology.

WebAssembly

This is still in development, but it represents a milestone in the production of web games. We could say that WebAssembly is the optimised and official evolution of Emscripten.

It also lets games developed in other programming languages to be ported to WebAssembly, and develop general purpose highly optimised modules. Browsers will be able to run WebAssembly safely and with a performance that is near native.

All the professional game tools, such as Unity, Unreal, etc., are already working to be able to export their games to WebAssembly. That is why this will mean the launch of a new category of web games, which will coexist with their native brethren on other platforms.

It’s going to be very interesting to see how the same game will evolve on different platforms, with different marketing campaigns designed ad hoc for each platform. Since web marketing is so much more affordable that native platforms, my opinion is that the presence of web games will grow well in the next few years.

Hybrid apps

These are apps that actually include a pseudo-browser that runs the game. The appearance and the user’s experience is the same as a conventional app, making them indistinguishable from conventional apps most of the time. Many companies are taking this approach, not just for games, but also for all types of apps, because it allows them to port them easily to other platforms.

Bearing all this in mind, and that the web already represents a multi-device platform, it’s clear that soon, the concept of web will transcend the desktop browser and open up to include all browsers, including those on mobiles, televisions and other devices.

The fact that games on other platforms can be ported to the web with one click will make the rivalries and the lack of confidence of the web as a gaming platform diminish.

The time will come when the web is a normal target platform; the process will go from developing a mobile game and porting it to the web, to design a game taking into account from scratch that it will be ported to the mobile and the web, for example.

Conclusion

Keeping all the above in mind, it’s clear that in the next few years, we’re going to see video games developed with web technologies designed for browser for all devices; video games embedded in apps; video games aimed at messaging apps; and video games developed in other languages and ported to the web all living together. And they’ll all be web games.

There will be a lot of changes in a short amount of time, and this will have an interesting affect on the video game industry as a whole.

What’s clear is that the web is the next gaming platform, a new and special platform, different to the existing ones, but which leverages their potential and at the same time complements them.

Isn’t it wonderful?（source：pocketgamer.biz ）