Adobe AIR 3 Coming on October 4 with 3D Graphics and One-Click App Installs

Adobe has made the release date of the upcoming AIR 3 platform available. AIR 3 is coming, along with Flash Player 11, early next month, most likely October 4.

Since it's based on Flash Player 11, AIR 3 boasts all of the new features included in Flash, notably the Stage 3D APIs which bring true hardware accelerated graphics to AIR apps.

This makes AIR games with full 3D graphics and visuals to rival those running natively on any device a possibility.

The appeal of the platform for developers is that these games will run, with little or no adjustments, on desktops, tablets, smartphones even TVs, ensuring a potential market bigger than any one device.

Adobe is also touting AIR as a new way of distributing existing or upcoming Flash games. While Flash Player is installed on many of the world's computers and on many smartphones and tablets, those running Android, AIR ensures an even bigger audience.

"Game publishers can also package their Flash technology-based apps using AIR to deliver them across Android, iPhone, iPad, BlackBerry PlayBook, Windows, Mac, and connected TV devices," Adobe explained.

Even better, AIR 3 enables developers to bundle the runtime with their apps so users only need to install one application even if they don't already have AIR running on their computers or phones.

Runtime bundling is now supported on Android, Windows and Mac OS, along with iOS devices where it was already available.

But AIR 3 comes with a few advantages of its own on top of what Flash Player 11 brings. Adobe AIR 3 is now available as a release candidate.

"Native extensions in AIR 3 allow developers to take advantage of existing native code libraries and deep native hardware and OS capabilities, such as sensors (gyroscopes, magnetometers, light sensors, etc.), multiple screens, native in-app payments, haptic/vibration control, device status, and Near Field Communications (NFC)," Adobe listed.

Adobe AIR for Windows is available for download here.
Adobe AIR for Mac OS X is available for download here.

Adobe AIR SDK for Windows is available for download here.