I'm not sure Javascript will ever take over as a preferred technology for browser-based games. I have always seen Javascript games and advanced effects as more novelties than anything else. It is a great language for enhancing user experience for web pages but I can't think of a reason to use Javascript instead of Flash for an identical task given the current support for HTML5 and the performance of js right now.

The HTML5 specification brings a lot of cool new features that may have me eating my words if it's ever fully supported by all major browsers, however, right now advanced js creations are better suited for the demoscene than the mainstream.

Browsers are nowadays pretty much regarded more as application platforms than as web page viewers (see any social networking site and its "apps" section). Still, those are mostly server-side applications; cross-browser compatibility alone makes game programming in JavaScript nightmarish.

I have to agree, though it hurts me to say that because I make JavaScript games (http://scriptnode.com/lab/spacius/).

Maybe there could be a Chrome plug-in to complete with Flash.

Playing WAV files out of data: URIs does't rely on Quicktime, does it? JS909 was pure JS, although it was more of a clever hack than a programming feat.

There is currently no "A-grade" way of providing audio using only JavaScript. The best fallback is flash, unfortunately.

And probably the best flash->JS library: http://www.schillmania.com/projects/soundmanager2/

IIRC, Netscape introduced some JavaScript functions for playing audio, but those rely on the browser having a plug-in to play it.