Writing games in interpreted languages

[Christoph Reichenbach <jameson@linuxgames.com>]

Hi,

On Mon, 27 Dec 1999, Davis, Daniel wrote:

> Perl isn't a compiled language and therefore not suitable for gaming.

I disagree. The fact that Perl (or Python, Scheme, etc) code is 
interpreted in software rather than being executed on an actual processor
just means that this particular piece of code will need a few more
processor cycles to be executed. On the other hand, it will give you all
the advantages of sand-boxed development, like powerful in-game 
debugging, increased stability, and portability (if done right).
Of course, it's too slow for doing high-performance graphics "manually".
But running the actual game logic in an interpreter makes a lot of sense
and has been done in many historic games (All of Sierra's AGI and SCI
games, LucasArts SCUMM games, Quake 1 and 3, and IIRC all Infocom
adventures).

(Binary compatibility is another reason for interpreting code. But Binary
compatibility is a kludge, and hardly worth mentioning).

llap,
 Christoph