New Scaleform GFx 4.0 Supports ActionScript 3, Flash 10

Scaleform said Friday that its new GFx 4.0 middleware will begin supporting Flash 10 and ActionScript 3.0, and offer a substantial performance boost over previous versions of the middleware. The company claimed a two- to five-fold performance boost over previous GFx iterations. Now that Scaleform GFx 4.0 supports both Adobe's ActionScript 2 and 3 scripting language, development studios using the middleware will have "access to a much larger talent pool," the firm added. Scaleform said the GFx 4.0 will let developers create improved menus and interfaces in games on various platforms, "while also opening up new doors for casual game developers to port their web games to native apps on mobiles and consoles." Brendan Iribe, CEO of Scaleform, said that support for Flash 10 and ActionScript 3 is "core to the company’s strategy going into 2011. The Flash 10 gaming market has seen incredible growth recently..." Scaleform 4.0 will be on display publicly for the first time at next week's GDC Online in Austin. Scaleform is taking steps to expand its business, including implementing support for 3D menus in games using GFx, integration with Epic Games' Unreal Engine 3 and a spike in growth in Asian territories, namely South Korea.