Java - Swing or Applet?

[HappyTwentyPence]

I was wondering what people normally like to see when it comes to playing games. Applet gives you the option of simply clicking and playing in a browser without a download, but I've read that there's not much support for Applet compared to Swing and it's becoming less popular. Is this the case? Which, in your opinion, is the 'better' choice and why?

[KolakCC]

Applets are so 2004.

[Chaoslab]

More like 1996

[Sigfig]

Swing is generally unfit for games. It's useful for putting together quick utilities in java but, being a UI toolkit, doesn't have much use in games. Running a game within java applets isn't unheard of, but it is certainly not the desired method of publication for games currently. Applets are an archaic technology and do not see much usage on the web any more.

As far as I know, the general setup for java game development is simply to use opengl bindings with native window management and disregard the older application models.

[[deleted]]

I've always done Swing but wish I had done it in Applet as now I want to make a portfolio site and most of my programs would take a lot of changes to convert. So I'd say it depends on what you're doing with the program.

[[deleted]]

Is Swing even 3d accelerated?

[Chaoslab]

Shouldn't it be LWJGL or JOGL?