XNA concepts already being tested on Zune
by Dustin Burg 
{ Apr 14th 2008 at 11:00AM }
Talking with Eurogamer, XNA main man Chris Satchell informed them that XNA development on the Zune is moving along rather nicely and that they have concept games up and working.Satchell confirmed word that, internally, Microsoft has already created a few concept XNA games for the Zune, including a Wolfenstein software rendered that outputs at a solid 30 frames per second. Worried about the Zune as a controller? According to Satchell, the Zune's squircle "touchpad is great". And what about those who want Zune to Zune multiplayer gaming? You're covered as well, with Satchell's confirmation that "one of the things we talked about was the network play, and we've had people doing prototypes internally of multiplayer shoot-'em-ups both in versus and co-op". Delicious!
So, now that they've dangled this XNA / Zune integration carrot in front of our faces for an eternity, when can we get a confirmed launch? Hmm?
Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)
itsburnsie @ Apr 14th 2008 11:17AM
My brain tried three times to read the word "squircle", but just couldn't do it...
Deck @ Apr 14th 2008 11:19AM
"Squircle!" Haha.
I love my Zune, its how I get my podcast fix. But playing games on it seems...really rather different...
LesbianHam @ Apr 14th 2008 11:41AM
It's a real word, believe it or not. It's the shape in between a square and a circle (which I'm sure you've already figured out).
IIRC there's like a formula for this or something, I dunno, I don't listen to my maths teacher's ramblings :)
Tony @ Apr 14th 2008 11:36AM
I hope the games are either entirely different or could be brought between XBLA and the Zune in some way or another. It would suck if, for example, the Zune got Pac-Man and they'd expect me to pay for it yet again.
Boff @ Apr 15th 2008 5:20AM
You obviously haven't been a Microsoft customer for very long then!!
Raoulle @ Apr 14th 2008 11:53AM
Yes! Achievements on the GO!!! Hopefully they'll get is so you can link your Gamertag to it also..
AxFactor @ Apr 14th 2008 9:39PM
I'm all about the games, but 1 thing I would want most out of my Zune game wise would be the music trivia game that iPods have. It plays a 5 second clip of songs from your library and you guess the album,artist or song and it's just a fun and simple game.
mat parker @ Apr 14th 2008 11:56AM
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1ZdT34upCKE&feature=related
ZEBRA NINER @ Apr 14th 2008 2:06PM
Oh yes... This will push me over the edge on a Zune. If it has sweet cheevos it's a done deal.
Anthony33 @ Apr 14th 2008 4:13PM
What about trying to play on a Zune 30. Much more difficult I'm assuming?
Kevin @ Apr 14th 2008 3:40PM
Yesterday we had a contest at our college where a member from Microsoft XNA came out and had an "AI programming challenge" where we had 1 hour to program an AI in XNA and they competed against eachother. Incredibly fun. It's a contest that they held at GDC and Joystiq did an article on it
Anyways, one of the prices he gave out was XNA creator club membership, including a beta for XNA 3.0 that would start next month. I asked him about what that meant for my Zune, and he said that meant next month I could start beta testing (and creating) games for my Zune. He said it sounded like it would go public this winter (6-7 months)
Pretty exciting!
-Kevin
Kevin @ Apr 14th 2008 3:43PM
Sigh, sorry, I meant prizes, not prices. It was a prize because it had no price. My bad
-Kevin
baby sea tuna @ Apr 15th 2008 8:56AM
They'd better get this, better content integration with XBLM, and Live Anywhere up and running on this sucker or the Zune is going to die a slow painful death.