The third release of the Android Native Development Kit (NDK) is now available for download from the official Android developer site. According to a blog post by Android developer David Turner, applications focused on Android 2.0 or higher now gain the ability to directly access OpenGL ES 2.0 features, which brings the capability to “control graphics rendering through vertex and fragment shader programs, using the GLSL shading language”.
The current iPhone platform already supports OpenGL ES, which brings a new level of visual realism to 3D gaming on mobile devices. Supporting OpenGL could facilitate for programmers who’ve already created games using the technology move more effortlessly to Android while maintaining high graphics performance.
We’d love to see some visually fantastic 3D games debut on the Android platform; this particular decision will greatly aid developers in that particular quest.
