ARTICLE: "GATES TAKES ON SONY AND NINTENDO"

GameIndustry.biz has published an article that summarizes Bill Gates' comments -interviewed by Dean Takahashi of the San Jose Mercury News, regarding how good the different strategies of the major console makers are doing so far, in his opinion of course.

As an indie, and from now on I will only refer to the 'game development' side of the story, I agree that the XBOX360 will do great since MS has decided to make the "development transition" easy for us: XNA.

I mean, the easier they make it for developers, the more developer's attention -and projects- they'll get, and ultimately, the more games will be created and released for their console.

If -in addition- "easy" includes "cheapper", the better.

Please do not misunderstand me, I'm not saying with this that console makers should make less restrictive the quality assurance policies and controls for commercial games. All I am saying is don't forget "indies", thus, help us produce for your consoles by providing better and affordable tools and frameworks, reducing the cost of game development (including time and effort as a "cost").

XNA GSE goes in that way, the right way imho ... ;)

ANIBOOM AWARDS 2006: FINALISTS HAVE BEEN ANNOUNCED!

At last! 25 animation pieces got into the finals -5 per category, and now they're facing the ultimate challenge: becoming the topmost ranked piece to get the biggest prize of all.

Remember! There's also a prize for each category's winner so you'd better start voting a.s.a.p.

Congrats to the ones who made it and good luck! ... yeah, right (my "crappy" entry didn't make it ... snif! ... snif!)

You all now my favorite: go Tadeo go! "Prime Time" is a very good one, too ... of course, mine was better than both ... or at least I wish ... :)

See ya ... ;)

FREE SOFTWARE GIVEAWAY TO UK DEVELOPERS?!!!

If you were amazed by my previous post, just read on ...

Ian Moulster has posted in his newest blog entry that they " ... are giving away 1000 free copies of Windows Vista and Office 2007 to UK developers ...".

In order to be elegible to recieve one and or the other product, you will need to register on Friday 19th for the software giveaway (details to be announce later on Ian's site, I guess), and then answer one question related to the selected product's track and then, if you are on the first 1000 people that answer it right you get your free copy.

If you live outside the UK, just hold your horses and continue reading Ian's entry since there's a catch: " ... you need to have a UK address ..." in order to receive the product.

Isn't Life fair sometimes? I don't know about you, but I'm moving to the UK just right now ...

Well, maybe next time ... but I'd really loved not to be excluded a priori from this kind of giveaways sometime ... ;)

WHERE'S MY FREE ACER FERRARI LAPTOP?!!!

According to this CRN's article (among other posts you may find in the WWW), Microsoft and AMD have been giving away "... top-of-the-line Acer Ferrari laptops to select tech bloggers ...".

Incredible, isn't it? Just wait a second ...

Then the article adds: "... raising questions in the blogosphere over whether the companies are trying to unduly influence the writers ...".

Following the wave of raising questions in the blogosphere I find my-self in the need to ask: where is my free laptop? ... Ok, or at least a T-shirt? A cup? A discount coupon to buy food at any local supermarket?

Just tell me who I must contact to inform my address and zip-code details in order to receive the laptop a.s.a.p. ... ;)

XNA: COUPLE OF NEW FRAMEWORKS

I was wondering lately what had happened with Visual3D.Net's CTP -due to be released this month, so I directed my browser ro V3D's forums so as to get some answers -which I did not, but for my surprise someone posted a couple of links to new XNA-targeted frameworks: "3D Evolution" and "XNA Magic".

To be honest, I didn't have time to browse 3D Evolution's site as much as I did for XNA Magic's one -I promise I will sometime soon, so I will talk about the latter in this post.

XNA Magic looks pretty cool. It reminds me of "Unity" (for MAC). The demo videos do a great job on showing off what this framework has to offer.

So, pay a visit to both frameworks' site and compare them while we still wait for V3D's CTP (c'mon guys, hurry up!).

More later.

JOSEPH BARBERA DIES AT 95

More sad news for the comics industry: "December 18, 2006 - The other shoe has fallen. Joseph Barbera, co-founder of Hanna-Barbera and co-creator of such favorite anmation characters as Huckleberry Hound, The Flintstones, Yogi Bear, Scooby-Doo and The Jetsons, died of natural causes at his home with his wife, Sheila, at his side, in Studio City, California, today, Dec. 18, 2006, according to Warner Bros. spokesman Gary Miereanu."

My most sincere condolence to Barbera's family and friends.

No more posts for today.

['Tom and Jerry' is one of my favorite cartoons of all times.]

DECEMBER 2006 DIRECTX SDK

Microsoft has released the latest SDK for DirectX.

Among what's new in the release you will find the official launch of DirectX 10.

I'm downloading it right now ...

GREEN LANTERN CREATOR DIES AT 91

Sad news for the comics industry: "MIAMI - Martin Nodell, the creator of Green Lantern, the comic book superhero who uses his magical ring to help him fight crime, has died. He was 91."

My most sincere condolence to Nodell's family and friends.

"In brightest day, in blackest night, no evil shall escape my sight! Let those who worship evil's might, beware my power... Green Lantern's light!"

No more posts for today.

TORQUE X OPEN BETA AVAILABLE

Well, yes. It's true. I have received an email message from GarageGame notifying the availability of an open beta of TorqueX.

You can download and test the demo of it as well as pay a visit to the new forums areas related to this product.

Now, it's time for Visual3D.Net to come out, don't you think? Let's hope so ...

Later.

XNA GSE V1.0 RELEASED!!!

As you may already known -given the large amount of blogs' news pointing out the same- XNA GSE v1.0 is out. Check the official words from the XNA Team itself.

One question though, any news regarding the release of TorqueX? We are still on December 11th ...

ANIBOOM AWARDS 2006

I have received an email from the creative director of "Aniboom", a new website dedicated to host and share animations, inviting me to pay a visit and check the site out.

Although the site is currently in a beta phase -it works better with IE than Firefox, let me tell you that I have really found some high-quality videos, cut-scenes, 2d/3d animations and demo reels.

But the interesting thing is that these guys are carrying out a competition for a total of $50k in prizes: five categories, $5k for the winner of each category, and $25k for the "grand prize" winner.

Check the rules, choose a category and upload your creation. There's still time for new entries, so hurry up!!!

Who knows? Maybe I decide to submit a 5-minute sci-fi animation I created back in my old days as a student of 3D animation by using 3DS Max 2.5 ... and yeah, you've just read it right, I said v2.5, so imagine how astonishing it could be ... you have no opportunity against my demo reel ... whooooooahahahahaha ... ;)

I'll leave you with this very funny entry:

[BTW, thanks Einat for your kind words about my blog!]

VISUAL3D.NET CLOSED BETA

According to xeonx the close beta program for Visual3d.NET has started.

Check the forum's thread for more information.

TORQUE X NEWS

The guys from 360 Homebrew have posted some interesting information regarding the versions, price and release date for TorqueX.

• TorqueX Engine Binary: free (for direct coding through .NET).
• TorqueX Pro: USD 150,oo (will include source code).

Ok. That is cool for developers -like me- that love coding with C#. Now, what if you desperately need a level editor right now? Well, fear not. You will be able to use Torque Game Builder tool with TorqueX upon release of the latter.

When it is going to be released? Good you asked. According to what has been posted TorqueX will be released the same day XNA GSE is officially released.

So go ahead and check the demo of TGB.

Ahh! And don't forget the "XNA Homebrew Development Contest", where you may win some prizes from GarageGames, like TorqueX Pro and TGB -if you win the compo.

Hurry up!

BRING IT ON!!!

As announced, beta 2 version of XNA is out so for those of us who want to use C# to program videogames these will be interesting times.

Also, I have received an email message by GarageGame's postmaster announcing the closed beta program for TorqueX and at almost the same time RightRiot has confirmed that Visual3D.Net is coming towards the public beta release this month.

On the console fields, I have read an article published by Gamasutra where it is commented that Sony will be take more into account "indies" for game development for PS3 since, among other reasons, they deem XBox360 as its main direct competitor, mostly in the US market.

Thus, as said, everything is set for interesting times which will likely mean "opportunity".

The fun is about to start: many tests, assessment and decisions shall be done to choose the right framework but in the end, I guess we -"indie" developers- will be the winners.

RUMOR: BETA 2 TO BE RELEASED TODAY?!

So far it's no more than a rumor, but it has been said -don't ask where just do a Google search- that beta 2 version of XNA GSE would be released later today.

In the meantime, you can read David Weller's "How To" comments regarding migration to beta 2.

'till next time.

SPREAD THE WORD: XNA GSE BETA 2

Wow! Great news guys! Microsoft has announced the release of a second beta of XNA Game Studio Express.

No details have been provided yet regarding the new features and fixes it will contain but it has been commented that this version would possibly be deem as a final release candidate.

You can read the full story here.

Let's hope this one include the content pipeline, so keep fingers crossed!

MANAGED DIRECTX 2.0 NO MORE

Some of you may know that Microsoft had announced that the beta version of MDX 2.0 would expired on the first days of October 2006. As promised, it did. What is more, the beta has been removed from the latest SDK release.

Consequences? Either you go back to MDX 1.1 or move forward to XNA-supportive implementation.

Even though it has been clarified that XNA is not officially supported in the above-mentioned SDK, if you use and or ever used MDX 2.0, I believe that moving your programs to XNA is the right path to go -unless of course you cannot wait for its final release, given the features XNA currently offers as well as the upcoming ones.

So go ahead! Support XNA and please avoid the temptation of modifying the date in your system's clock to September 2006 ... ;)