Java is what the university has pushed on us from freshman undergrad all the way to the end of grad school. And, I have to admit, I really like the language an awful lot, and feel like it has some superb features for creating a roguelike.
That being said, the one thing that has kept me away is Java's big strength - because Java is the ultimate platform independent language (from a developers perspective) you have essentially zero control over anything to do with the hardware/display. I'm kind of pig-headed, and like to do everything myself, rather than use someone else's curses-type library for a hobby project (working on real software is obviously a different story), leaving me with little option for displaying the screen. (Don't get me started on what a pile of s**t swing is.)
Anyone actually had any luck with a ground-up Java roguelike (especially one that uses tiles) that doesn't rely on swing or someone's esoteric library that requires more time learning than it would to write it myself?
