NEW CONTENT FOR "XNA'ERS"

Ok, so you downloaded the refresh update for XNA GSE v1.0, read the readme page and updated the framework on your system, but have you happened to check the new content available at http://creators.xna.com?

I knew it! Don't be a lazybones, pay a visit to the XNA Creators Club Online site and:

• Download the new starter kit: finally! The long-awaited "Racing Game" (formerly called "XNA Racer"),
• Download the new samples: 3D audio, bloom, 2D particles, and many more.
• Read the new articles: data structure and the shader series,
• Watch the new video tutorials: advance audio series, and,
• Download the new utilities: the "Bitmap Font Maker" utility and controller graphics.

Wow!

[Are you an "XNA'ER"? Sounds cool, doesn't it?]

"PCGZINE 5" NOW AVAILABLE FOR DOWNLOAD

This month issue of PCGZine is now available for free download. As always, you have read it right, free download.

The issue includes an interview to the president of Massive Entertainment -the one behind "World in Conflict" game- plus a preview of "Enemy Territory: Quake Wars", a review of "The Lord of the Rings Online: Shadows of Angmar", and more, much more.

So, what are you waiting for?! Download it now!

"MONO.XNA": APRIL FOOLS?

Ok, at first that was what I thought: if you check the site, there's no many info available, nor downloads, well it's like a shell with no content and last submission of ??? was done on January, 2007.

However, after some search I happened to find a google group where you can actually check some XNA Framework's assemblies being ported to OpenGL.

As it's seems to be in the first stages of development, does anyone know whether it's a serious project?

"PROFESSIONAL XNA GAME PROGRAMMING" BOOK

Andy ("TheZMan") has written a good review of Benjamin Nitschke's book "Professional XNA Game Programming".

From Andy's post: "... The postman left a nice gift for me this morning, a copy of Ben's book. I've had a grand total of about 30 minutes to look at it so don't consider this a full review.... Firstly you can get the code for the book included versions of XNA Racer and XNA Shooter from the Wrox website. The XNA Racer and XNA Shooter sites are not up yet but Rocket Commander has been up for quite a while. I have no idea if the Racer game is identical to what was supposed to show up on the creators club site or a different version, but looks like the book version is available first ...".

Although, Benny didn't include in the book's readme file some of the XNA-news blogs that have been working hard to keep you up-to-date in the XNA world ... snif! snif! ... :( ... I still believe this is a great book, so go and buy it ... ;)

NEW VIDEO: "BULLET HELL TACTICS"

Kobingo has announced that the demo of the "Bullet Hell Tactics" game is almost complete, and along with the announcement comes a new video of its gameplay:

Enjoy!

NEW VIDEO: "TEH GAME"

Epsicode has posted a new video of his game: "Teh Game".

Enjoy!

WHAT'S NEW IN XNA GSE V1.0 "REFRESH"?

... if that's the question you've been asking your-self lately, then you need to pay a visit to at least the following three sites:

• XNA GSE 1.0 Refresh ReadMe: of course.
• Let's Kill Dave blog: list of "big" things pointed out by Dave.
• The ZBuffer site: Andy publishes a handy list of changes in the API.

Of course, you should also check XNA Creators Club Forums, since there have some questions on issues while installing, updating past code and so on.

Hope it helps.

SHARKY'S "AIR LEGENDS" AND XNA GSE "REFRESH"

Lawrence has announced that you'll do fine with the latest release of his game -"Sharky's Air Legends"- and the "refresh" update for XNA GSE v1.

From Lawrence's post: "... So I won’t be needing to rush out a new release to be compatible. You’ll be fine with the last one ...".

YAY!!!

A SIMPLE POST-PROCESSING BLOOM/BLUR EFFECT

Jamezila from skasoftware.com has submitted a handy tutorial on post processing bloom/blur effects to Ziggyware, which includes source code and a zip file to downlaod.

Read on!

ADDING "HYSTERESIS" TO YOUR DECISION MAKING CODE

Shawn has posted and interesting tutorial on how to handle discrete decision making from the changes in the values of continuos analog input: just by adding "hysteresis".

From Shawn's post: "... The problem is, game simulations tend to produce a lot of small and basically random fluctuations from one frame to the next. When these values are used to control a discrete decision, and when the input value is close to the decision threshold, the results can look pretty silly ...".

There's an interesting discussion going on there, so I suggest you read the post.

Bye!

XNA GSE 1.0 REFRESH RELEASED

Finally!!! The first update for XNA GSE v1 is now out ...

From the XNA Team Blog's post: "... We’ve gone over many of the features outlined in the announcement we made at GDC 2007. One thing we didn’t really cover previously is compatibility. The entire team made a conscious effort to maintain compatibility with this release.

Your game should just recompile in 1.0 Refresh with no changes required. Any game that is compiled should run fine if you have 1.0 Refresh installed.As mentioned, you can continue to use 1.0 on your Windows computer with 1.0 Refresh on the Xbox 360 console.

Games that are built on 1.0 Refresh may run on 1.0; however, if you are using new functions or features in the XNA Framework (such as font functionality), it will not work properly.You can download the XNA Framework 1.0 Refresh for including in your installer as you start to upgrade your games ...".

Donwloading it right now!

XNA GSE UPDATE IS AROUND THE CORNER

There's a new post on the XNA Team Blog: Dave Mitchell comments on the following:

• XNA Creators Club membership extension (4 months "on the house"),
• Community resources, assets, premium content, etc.,
• The update to XNA Game Studio Express 1.0,
• The brand new "Club Packaging" format, and
• Dream-Build-Play compo.

From Dave's post: "... As a gesture of thanks to our incredible community and especially those who have jumped on board the XNA Creators Club train earlier than others, we’ve extended each and every active XNA Creators Club membership that was active on March 5th by an additional 4 months ...".

Read on!

"WHICH VISUAL STUDIO VERSION WILL YOU USE?"

JoeN's asking "Which Visual Studio version will you use?".

From Joe's post: "... As we finish up the refresh release to XNA Game Studio Express, we are looking at the next major version and some decisions that need to be made. I wanted to get some impressions from people around a particular topic that I am currently looking at.

As many of you know, Visual Studio is releasing a new version at the end of this year (codenamed Orcas). One of the major features we are planning to add in the next major version of XNA Game Studio Express is the ability to create games in all SKUs of Visual Studio (Express, Standard, Pro, etc). With Orcas coming, the next obvious question is which release of Visual Studio should/can we support ...".

Also, there's a thread on the Creator's site on this regard.

This is an important step in the future of XNA GSE, so c'mon and share your thoughts!

NEED SOME IMAGES OF 360 CONTROLLER BUTTONS?

If so, then just visit Mykres Space site and download the files with these images:

Quite useful!

QUO VADIS CONFERENCE 2007

Head onto Benjamin Nitschke's blog to see some photos from this year's "Quo Vadis" Conference in Berlin, where Benny's showed off some of the XNA-based games he made (like the formerly called "XNA Racer" and GDC's "Dungeon Quest").

From Benny's post: "... There was not much interaction with the audience because most people had no questions, but I talked my way through it and I heard some positive feedback about XNA later ...".

Shy audience, ugh?

FROM ZYGOTE'S SITE: WANT TO WIN 100 BUCKS?

Ziggyware is hosting a contest: write an XNA article/tutorial, submit it to Ziggyware, and you will have the chance to get USD 100 if you're picked as the winner.

From Zygote's post: "... Ziggyware is hosting an XNA tutorial/article contest. Simply submit a quality article covering any range of XNA related content.

Top prize is currently One Hundred Dollars USD. Contest deadline is May 30th 2007 ...".

So, do you want to win 100 bucks?

VISUAL STUDIO CODENAME "ORCAS" BETA 1 NOW AVAILABLE

Microsoft has released the first beta build of the next version of Visual Studio product family (known as "Orcas").

The first great thing is that you can donload and betatest a fully functional version of the Team Suite, either by downloading ISO images -not available yet- or the VPC images (for the latter, you will need to download Virtual PC 2007). I had previously downloaded March CTP's VPC images and everything worked ok.

But this time, there's something more, with this release comes the beta builds for the VS Express editions. Although I have not installed VC# Express "Orcas" yet -I'm downloading the installation files as I write this post- it seems we'll be getting an object-relational UML designer tool (probably a lite version of it).

Great news!

[BTW, does anybody know whether the upcoming release of XNA GSE will support "Orcas" VC# express edition?]

TUTORIAL: INTRODUCTION TO XNA

There's a new tutorial available on c-sharpcorner.com site entitled: "Introduction to XNA: The Microsoft 2D and 3D Game Development Platform" -by Mike Gold.

From Mike's post: "... Although I couldn't name all the episodes, I think I watched every original Star Trek episode that was produced. My fascination with Star Trek didn't end with the original, but continued into the Next Generation. After that, I kinda lost track...Anyway, this month, Microsoft came out with an article in MSDN on the XNA framework, written by Charles Cox and Michael Klucher. I became intrigued and decided to pursue exploring the XNA Framework. In doing so, I created this simple example. Most of the inspiration for this article didn't come from the MSDN article, but from a game called elves revenge on a website called Errolian. By examining this code, I was able to piece together this demonstration of XNA ...".

Read on.

A GLIMPSE ON XNA'S PER PIXEL LIGHTING

Yes, you've read it right: on the upcoming release, the XNA Framework will add a "built-in" per pixel lighting -through the "BasicEffect" class, and Shawn's explains how to deal with it.

From Shawn's post: "... Per-vertex lighting is efficient, and it looks good on models that contain lots of highly tessellated triangles or which don't use too much specular. It can look pretty bad on lower resolution meshes, though, ..."`.

Read on ...

UPDATE: "BULLET HELL TACTICS"

Bullet Hell Tactics' getting a graphics update as you can tell from this catchy titlescreen.

From the post: "... Tonight I worked with some new graphics for player shield and the "energypacks" the enemies drop. Sometimes it's fun to just sit and play around with colors and some filters in photoshop, what a difference - so much better! ...".

Nice!