17th October 2008

That’s right, the new version of XNA Game Studio that is used to created XNA games is due to go live on October 30th 2008.  With the New Xbox Experience due out in mid November to include the Xbox Live Community Games channel, this basically means we have all we need to start publishing our projects.

What this means for me, is that come October 30th, I’ll be going through all my code to convert it to the new XNA framework.  Yay for me.

Now a quick update on my current project.  I have given the game a codename “Pengu”, which may very well be the name of the game at completion.  Background scrolling, Sprite interaction, Text and Menu systems are now in place.  I now have the engine to a point where I’m starting to develop the Level Editor.  Basically this means I’ll be creating my very first Custom Content Processor which looks very interesting indeed. 

Anyway, time to get back to work.

23rd February 2008

Microsoft have just announced that coming soon, indie XNA developers and XNA enthusiasts will be able to host their games on XBox live for anyone who owns a Xbox 360 to download and play.

From XNA.Com

“Starting with the beta launch of the Xbox LIVE Community Games service later this spring, subscribers of the XNA Creators Club will be able to submit their own game creations for self-distribution through to Xbox LIVE Marketplace via the http://creators.xna.com website….the game will then be added to the global games catalog on Xbox LIVE Marketplace and available to gamers worldwide connected to Xbox LIVE.”

There are details currently being finalised regarding the revenue streams available to XNA developers for this new exciting service.

If you have an Xbox 360 there is a preview version of the service available right now, and you can currently download seven indie games for free (if you live in the USA or selected countries, apparently not Australia for the time being :(  Rollout timetables are different per country)

Also in the announcement are XNA Zune Games and updates to the XNA Creator’s club website.

Check it out.