Recently, I have been experimenting with writing 3D games – mainly for mobile Virtual Reality. Today I though I might want to have a go at writing a desktop 3D game, and played with Electron, NodeJS and BabylonJS so I can write my code in JavaScript and use HTML5 to develop my own cross-platform 3D game engine.

Electron is a tool for building cross desktop applications in JavaScript, HTML5 and CSS. Essentially, this is a WebKit module for NodeJS.

BabylonJS is a JavaScript framework for building 3D games in HTML5, with WebGL.

Below is a set of steps to follow to write your first cross-platform Desktop 3D Application using Electron, NodeJS and BabylonJS – running on Linux, MacOS and Windows:

Install NodeJS:
https://nodejs.org/en/download/

Install Electron:
npm install -g electron

Clone or download the quick-start Electron application:
https://github.com/electron/electron-quick-start

Create your first 3D world (add the following code to your quick-start application, index.html):
(Based on http://www.babylonjs-playground.com/)
var canvas = document.getElementById("renderCanvas");

var engine = new BABYLON.Engine(canvas, true);

var createScene = function () {

// This creates a basic Babylon Scene object (non-mesh)
var scene = new BABYLON.Scene(engine);

// This creates and positions a free camera (non-mesh)
var camera = new BABYLON.FreeCamera(“camera1”, new BABYLON.Vector3(0, 5, -10), scene);

// This targets the camera to scene origin
camera.setTarget(BABYLON.Vector3.Zero());

// This attaches the camera to the canvas
camera.attachControl(canvas, true);

// This creates a light, aiming 0,1,0 – to the sky (non-mesh)
var light = new BABYLON.HemisphericLight(“light1”, new BABYLON.Vector3(0, 1, 0), scene);

// Default intensity is 1. Let’s dim the light a small amount
light.intensity = 0.7;

// Our built-in ‘sphere’ shape. Params: name, subdivs, size, scene
var sphere = BABYLON.Mesh.CreateSphere(“sphere1”, 16, 2, scene);

// Move the sphere upward 1/2 its height
sphere.position.y = 1;

// Our built-in ‘ground’ shape. Params: name, width, depth, subdivs, scene
var ground = BABYLON.Mesh.CreateGround(“ground1”, 6, 6, 2, scene);

return scene;

};

var scene = createScene();

engine.runRenderLoop(function () { scene.render();

});