Microsoft unviels XNA project

[KorJax]

Read the full story here: http://www.gamespot.com/news/6155590.html?tag=latestnews;title;1

Looming over the game industry are big problems, Microsoft warns.

Stressed game developers are burning out, universities are graduating fewer programmers and game designers, and small-game developers--forced to pay large licensing costs to make games--don't have the time or money to turn their innovative ideas into playable games, the company says. But a new piece of Microsoft's development technology is aiming to wipe those troubles out, all at once.

On the eve of Gamefest, the company's conference for developers in Seattle, Microsoft announced the XNA Game Studio development platform, "a far easier environment" that small developers, game enthusiasts, and students can use to make games. XNA Game Studio is an extension of Microsoft's cross-platform XNA technology, which offers game-makers a standardized set of tools for both PC and Xbox 360 development.

Anyone can freely download the toolset, available in beta form on August 30 and full form by the end of the year. The toolset comes in two flavors: the entry-level XNA Game Studio Express and the advanced XNA Game Studio Professional. Developing games using Express and releasing them on the PC will be free, but those who want their games available for download on the Xbox 360 must pay $99 a year as part of Microsoft's Creators Club.

In spring 2007, Microsoft will release the professional version, the only way to sell games created using the toolset. The pro version will feature "new capabilities more geared toward professional game developers" and a higher price, said Scott Henson, the director of platform strategy at the Microsoft Game Developer Group. Henson declined to reveal the amount. All the various methods of selling games--digital distribution, Xbox Live Marketplace, and boxed retail games--will probably be available to game makers, but the details haven't been decided, he said.

Launching alongside the August 30 beta toolset is a starter-kit, containing tutorials and basic but "fully realized games" that beginning developers can tinker with to learn the ins and outs of programming.

Ports of classics like Pac-Man and Galaga on Xbox Live Arcade are just the "low-end" of what the toolset can create, Henson told GameSpot during a phone conference prior to Gamefest.

"Our ambition is to get a game as fully realized as, maybe, Halo 2," he said. "We don't know if we'll get there ... but certainly we envision being able to do that with this technology."

As larger companies focus solely on making guaranteed hits, they often fail to imagine new ideas or genres, Henson said. Counter-Strike--the mod to Valve Software's original Half-Life that became one of the most popular games in history--is one "great example" of ambitious game hobbyists producing something fresh.

"Who's going to be the next Doom? Who's going to be the next Counter-Strike? ... All [their developers] were, quote, hobbyists at some point," Henson said. "And that's where the really inspired ideas that really bubble up and create the next phenomenon come from."

Ten universities, including the University of Southern California and Georgia Tech, have agreed to use XNA Game Studio Express in their curricula, said Dave Mitchell, the director of marketing at the Microsoft Game Developer Group. In an industry whose developers are only 1 percent female, university-sponsored "boot camps"--where kids, and especially girls, can get an early introduction to programming and game development--are crucial, he said.

Though some criticize best-sellers such as The Sims 2 and World of Warcraft for stalling innovation--the two regularly dominate sales charts, pilfering money away from new titles, critics bemoan--people forget that Blizzard's MMORPG and EA's virtual-life sim were landmark innovations upon release, Henson said. And it never hurts to usher in new blood.

"All of the dynamics that we've talked about--why we're so excited from an enabling perspective--is why [World of Warcraft] is so popular," he said. "We've got a growing industry in terms of overall dollars, but we don't have a growing audience. And if we're going to grow the audience, we're going to have to see more than the types of games topping the charts."

[rasz_pl]

yes, for FLASH like games ...

[KorJax]

I woudlnt exactly call somthing labled as "the next DOOM" as a flash-like game...

They are trying to get aspiring game devs that just dont have the money to spend thousands in a game console.  And the 360 IS capable of high-resolution 3D games, which means that 3D is definatly part of the catergories in games.

Im sure you can put in any kind of game you want if you wanted.

[next_ghost]

Yeah, you can do anything but it stays on M$ platforms.

[Caveman]

Sounds like a dev-environment on PC for the 360...

[Stannum]

Sounds interesting. I'll definately fiddle around with it when they release the beta.

[Issy Gee]

"yes, for FLASH like games ..."

Oh no! Microsoft is actually coming out with something more friendly to aspiring developers than Mac products! What can I possibly do to gripe about it? I MUST blatantly criticize whatever that evil company does!

Come on. At least it's free. For Flash, you need to cough up dough or else get a bootleg. And think of it this way: The GNU project now has some more Microsoft products to create equivalents for (read: Free, better supported applications). Competition is good. Just look at the Yugo car. You want software like that?

Anyway, I like this. I hope it becomes the new 'chemistry set', so that we have more kids who are trying to learn how to program. It's sad when kids don't know what goes into those games they twiddle their thumbs over. Nowadays, I see kids who couldn't find their way through the command line (I blame Apple for creating such an efficient UI, which Microsoft copied ).

One of the problems with kid's entertainment is that it includes so much watching and so little thinking. If you can come up with an easy-to use interface for kids to think to create their own entertainment, then this situation might be cured to a degree. I know the SDK isn't targeted for kids, but nothing stopped my friends and I from learning about web development (Client-side stuff, though) before going into middle school.

I still like cross platform stuff. I just like it when some corporation throws their weight somewhat in the right direction. No Direct3D for me, thanks.

[Caveman]

"The GNU project now has some more Microsoft products to create equivalents for (read: Free, better supported applications).

ROFLMA
You just made my day. Just because M$ brings something out, which is either bought or stolen from somewhere, doesn't mean it needs a pendant free project.

[kevlarman]

I still like cross platform stuff

good for you, but this is far from cross platform. opengl is cross platform, you can find opengl implementations for windows, GNU/Linux, mac, and probably a good chunk of the unixes out there. this on the other hand, only works on microsoft products, it's about as cross platform as ActiveX.

[Lava Croft]

Actually, the news about XNA is pretty damn old.

[next_ghost]

All M$ marketing says is that XNA will be a development kit dombed down to a level where even a mildly retarded consultant can make a complete game. If we need something to bring some fresh ideas to games, then it's absolutely NOT thousands of kids writing write-only spaghetti code games. :roll: We need people who know that they should separate engine and gamecode and who know how to do it. For those, GCC, GIMP and Blender is enough to make a game.

[Teiman]

XNA seems to need a XBOX360, and the installation for users is very ugly, need to install the dev tools and more stuff.

Even If is from Microsoft is a good thing. But Is NOT the real thing. The real thing is something like the Quake3 engine that is used to make Tremulous. And compiled with GCC.

[Lava Croft]

XNA is just another step closer to MicroSoft's big dream. One box for all your media-needs. They tried it before, and they are trying again. One day, they will actually succeed

[Stannum]

All M$ marketing says is that XNA will be a development kit dombed down to a level where even a mildly retarded consultant can make a complete game. If we need something to bring some fresh ideas to games, then it's absolutely NOT thousands of kids writing write-only spaghetti code games. :roll: We need people who know that they should separate engine and gamecode and who know how to do it. For those, GCC, GIMP and Blender is enough to make a game.

I'm going to have to disagree with you. I think this will spawn a few good games. I know quite a lot of people who have good game ideas but. This will definately make it easier for them to make them a reality.

[Seafoideach]

**My concentration ran out part-way through that quote in the OP**

In the vein of one or two other people; this looks like it might be a sort of step, to make things easier for smaller developers who are more likely to come up with new things, instead of just churning out the same rubbish over and over agian, only ever improving the graphics (and maybe throwing in a gimmick or two).

However, the fact that it comes from Microsoft and is highly unlikely to support anything other than Microsoft products is a bit of a downside. I definately would prefer something that can easily create games for both windows and Unix like systems. Perhaps Blender/CrystalBlend will fill that role.


To those of you who are saying that all one needs to create a game is GCC, Blender, The Gimp, etc.; you can cut that down even further. A GNU/Linux distro which is stripped down almost to only the kernel plus GCC, maybe a text editor as well, is all you need. In fact, that's far more than one needs.

Why browse the web in firefox in Enlightenment when you could be doing it in Lynx from the CLI?

P.S. I'm typing this from a Firefox tab in gnome on Fedora 5. Though I probably could do it in Lynx. Maybe I'll do a edit in a little while.


EDIT: this is being done from lynx.

Linky to image. (I even uploaded that using lynx. A thought just popped into my head: why am I doing this? ).