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Adobe had called time on its Flash web player for Android and will cease to update it from August 15th, the company has announced.

The web player will now no longer be certified to run on mobiles operating on Android 4.1, and access through the Google Play Store will limit continued access to Flash player updates.

The company also said that devices that do not have Flash Player installed are increasingly likely to be imcompatible with the platform, and users will not be able to install if from Google Play Store after August 15th.

Adobe first shocked mobile developers in November last year by revealing that it would cease support for its Flash web player in the next major version of Android, 5.0, with its final Flash update occurring last December.

“For the foreseeable future, Flash offers advantages in delivering premium video with content protection, as well as providing a high performance, feature-rich and graphically advanced gaming platform,” the company stated.

“We are focusing our Flash Player efforts around these areas."

The discontinuation will likely result in the increased adoption of the controversial HTML5 platform, which has suffered criticism from developers for being tough to code and possessing a string of broken features.

Adobe’s Flash player has returned to the Google App Store despite having been pulled from Android devices just two weeks ago.

As reported by the BBC, the company said that a number of “strategic partners” in the UK had pressured the it into bringing its web browser plug-in back online.

Adobe had previously planned to end work on Flash for Android, and said it would no longer be certified to run on mobiles operating on Android 4.1, and that access through the Google Play Store would be limited.

However, partners such as media giant BBC have convinced the firm to bring it back, but only for the short-term. The UK broadcaster suggested that it needed time to shift to new technology as the plug-in was crucial to its iPlayer service.

"Flash Player continues to be available on Google Play for users in the UK for a short while due to requests from strategic partners," said an Adobe spokesperson.

Adobe still has no intentions to update the browser plug-in despite its return.

The discontinuation will likely result in the increased adoption of the controversial HTML5 platform, despite bearing the brunt of much criticism from developers claiming it carries a string of broken features.

A free course teaching HTML5 game development is now available at the web education portal Udacity.

Udacity is one of several new online learning programs designed to bring higher education to a wider audience.

HTML5 has become one of the most popular solutions for creating code ready for deployment across multiple platforms.

The course features instruction from Google developers Colt McAnlis and Peter Lubbers.

"This course will walk you through the major components of building GRITS, an HTML5 game," read the class description.

"We'll talk about how to take standard game development techniques, and use them to create high performance HTML5 applications."

Those interested in giving the class a go can register here. An e-mail notification will begin when the class goes live.

The hotly debated and controversial HTML5 platform for browser is the future of gaming, claims Gavin Shields.

Speaking at the Develop in Brighton conference, the Turbulenz COO said that creating games for console had become too risky for many developers, whilst discoverability was a huge problem for developers on the App Store.

He added that the HTML5 platform had overcome many of its previous issues, such as the size of its potential userbase, which he cited as 1.3 billion, whilst it was also cheaper for developers to create content for compared to large triple-A console titles.

"I know many of you will have an overriding issue with all I’ve just said," said Shields, in reference to his positivity surrounding web platform.

"I know the name HTML5 invokes much cynicism but I have no doubt that it is the future. Since Google enabled Webgl by default in its browser last year, approximately 1.3bn have access to browsers that can play modern games in Javascript HTML5.

"The argument that there isn’t a big enough user base for HTML5 is irrelevant. You’re no longer at the mercy of one business."

He added: "Day by day my colleagues and I become more convinced that it is the future."