I would like to write an educational game for primary school students (age 7-9 yrs) with learning difficulties. This game would involve matching words to images, some basic math and some phonics. I would need to have audio as part of the game e.g. an online tutor vocalising instructions, explanations etc. I am knowledgeable using Java and would like to develop this as an online game that can be played within a browser.
My question is this; is using a Java applet the only route I can take or could this be achieved using JSP/Servlets? I am thinking Applets as I would like to use SWING to develop the interface in order to give it a desktop look and feel.
GF
Yes, you can use swing or jsp / servlets + GWT or another JavaScript tool to make the application interactive.
Your most obvious options are
Unless there is a lot if animation, I would say gwt is a very rapid tool for creating tablet/iPhone/PC accessible, rich web apps in a short period of time, especially given the google app engine, which hosts such apps for free.
Swing in the browser works, but Java requirements might hamstring some of your users. Nevertheless, if you need to animate things and want a standard Java solution without external APIs, swing is a pretty simple option .