re: Microsoft games?

I feel that Microsoft has really dropped the ball with Zune Games. The concept of having the comunity create its own games is great, but it is very disapointing that there has been no further effort from Microsoft. They made 2 crap games and left us to come up with everything else. Im not saying there aren't capable programmers out there because lord knows there are, but they are very uncommon and anything they make they are doing on their own time with no compensation other than the thanks of the users. How hard would it be to have a Zune Games team release a good game every once in a while? If there were people who could dedicate their time to zune games they could acomplish things A LOT faster than it takes for some programmer who codes a game for the zune in his spare time. The other major disapointment I feel is that there is no officiality to the games, no central place to find them. You can say that there is this thread on the forum but that's a joke. Don't get me wrong, I love the Zune, I love games on the Zune, but I waited and begged and pleaded as many of of did for games and just because you gave us 2 crap games and a programming software doesn't put you in the clear. Come back; show that you care about the Zune and us zuners.

The whole point of XNA GS was to enable programmers to make their own games. It was never the goal that Microsoft would start churning out games. Not to say they definitely won't at some point in the future, but that is not what this is all about. Also keep in mind that XNA GS 3.0 is still in CTP (community technical preview) state meaning it isn't even a release (it's still pre-beta). A full release won't happen until the end of the year.

Again, Microsoft isn't actually catering to the gamers with XNA GS right now; they are catering to the developers. In the future I'm sure things will shift, but for now remember that you have been given the privilege of playing with technology only intended for developers (again, at this point).

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Nick Gravelyn -- Microsoft XNA MVP -- http://nick.gravelyn.com/zune-games/

I disagree.  I'd have to side with Saab on this one- I've been a hardcore Zune fan for quite some time now, and for all that while Microsoft has been beating their chests about getting games on the zune, and how the Zune platform is not an "mp3 player" it is a "multimedia platform" which is why people should expect these sorts of great things from their gadgets- Videos, Radio, Music, Pictures, Games, I Don't Know Why I'm Capitalizing Everything... you get the picture.  They've been promising it by June of this year, which was a clear let down for a lot of people.  When a company promises something in their device that encourages people to buy it, that's not a privilage, that's an expectation.  Microsoft is known for these kinds of slipups, and I don't know how much longer we'll actually have to wait for an official version of that update (XNA, clock, so forth so on) because no date they give is is really reliable.

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I give wings to those who would be wingless.

I hope every one here knows that you can download free games for your zune at zuneboards.com. For you begginers the tutorial page is (copy and paste into your address bar) http://www.zuneboards.com/forums/tutorials/23605-installing-games-xna-your-zune-how-install-zune-games.html or just go to the site and search "games tutorial". click on the first article and select the tutorial link. you can load up within an hour if you follow the directions properly. the only bad part about it is that you have to restart your zune after every game, even though its only a few seconds. Try it out!

Well I think what most of us are saying is that Microsoft dropped the ball on that they promised us real, official, backed, out-of-alpha/beta/gamma/testing games by June 2008 and it never happened.  They're promising the same by the end of the year, but who knows.  And even so, they're saying it's still geared towards developers, Microsoft has kind of forgotten about us, and has left the community to do Microsoft's job.

Which is a little lame, even though some of the games our community has been churning out has been hands down amazing.  I guess what I'm saying is that even though they should have the option to create them,  they shouldn't be forced to create them or have nothing at all.

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I give wings to those who would be wingless.

 IamMav wrote:

Well I think what most of us are saying is that Microsoft dropped the ball on that they promised us real, official, backed, out-of-alpha/beta/gamma/testing games by June 2008 and it never happened.

Microsoft never made that promise. The release date for XNA GS 3.0 was, and always has been, "Holiday 2008".

And even so, they're saying it's still geared towards developers, Microsoft has kind of forgotten about us, and has left the community to do Microsoft's job.

It's not Microsoft's job to make games for you. They are developing a platform upon which others will make games. Again, this has always been their intention with XNA Game Studio. Is it possible they eventually release "official" games for sale on the Zune? Sure. But that is not, and never has been, the point of having XNA Game Studio on the Zune.

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Nick Gravelyn -- Microsoft XNA MVP -- http://nick.gravelyn.com/zune-games/

I think they will have at official by the end of the year though.  microsoft seems to take big steps for zune around that time of the year. 

 

hey, at least one good thing is we don't have to pay for them yet..... 

Thank you Zune team, looking forward to the 16th.

Wow, great job! So far my only complaint is the frone menu letters are a little small, but I guess alot of people wanted those smaller.
Texas Holdem is amazing! and Hexic is pretty slick, hopefully we will be able to save all the games that came from 3.0 CTP. I dont know you guys were planing on doing what I asked anyway but thank you, it seems like you guyas really are listening to us.