This post is a collection of my thoughts on scripting in a Java-based engine.
In researching ways and means of extending an application, as mentioned in my premiere post in this blog, I've mentioned that both editor and engine should be extensible. To wit, this includes creating a Service-Provider Interface of sorts, that can be used by other programmers. But, the opposite side of the coin is in scripting of several aspects of game logic.
I admit first that I'm no expert in any of this; and where I could in any way speak with authority in this regard, is where I've done a little research of what's possible. Thus far, I believe there are different aspects of scripting solutions: one is in using something built-into the JDK (like Rhino or Nashorn extensibility), or by third-party scripting solutions.
Another "complication", if you will, of scripting is in the scripting structure, and in variable and method access between application and script, and even if scripts can access other scripts. Now, I know that Lua scripts can require (depend upon) other scripts; but I don't know if that goes the other way as well, if scripts can require any specific API from the application....
Do any object-oriented scripting languages exist, which have class-based structures and which are not Ruby? Enterbrain has already used Ruby for their previous RPG Maker titles, which I'm a little leery of using, in fear of being called merely another RM-imitation, instead of something unique. (Though the recent RPG Maker MV is going the way of Javascript to allow web-games and cross-platform compatibility.)
Types of scripting solutions to check later: Javascript, Lua, Python, Ruby, maybe a few others. Of those, I'm most familiar with both Javascript and Lua; the luaj project appears to be a decent runtime library, although I'm not sure of how per-game-tick time costs can be evaluated in either case.
