Tech troubles spur dev to debut browser-based RTS as a PC game

- Artillery CTO and co-founder Ian Langworth on why, after 3 years of work, Artillery is abandoning browsers as the primary platform for its game.

Palo Alto-based startup Artillery is switching gears and developing its debut project, codenamed Project Atlas, as a native PC application instead of a browser-based game.

It's a significant about-face for the company, which made headlines a few years ago for trying to build an HTML5 game with eSports ambition in concert with noted eSports commentator Sean "Day[9]" Plott.

At the time Plott stated that Artillery was "the only company who can deliver graphically intensive, rich gameplay in the browser," but in a post on the company blog last month Artillery co-founder Ian Langworth noted that "browsers still fall short in delivering an optimal player experience" and thus Atlas will debut as a "browser-like" application for PC and Mac.

"Chrome and Firefox feature aggressive release schedules, which is great for consumers but problematic for the development of large, intensive web applications," admitted Langworth. "Frequent new features and security updates result in a great browsing experience, but we found it impossible to deliver consistent stability and performance as our application platform shifted beneath us."

The browser-based version of Project Atlas does work and Artillery still seems intent on developing it alongside the native application version of the game, which was effectively built based on an optimized version of the browser client. You can read more details on the ups and downs of that process over on the Artillery blog.