Galaxy Bunnies for Windows Phone 7 (WP7) V1.2 Published on Windows Phone Marketplace!

Familia Games' first Windows Phone 7 Game (or toy) has been published to the Windows Phone Marketplace! This has been updated to V1.2 recently with the following updates:

1. Respects the user's Windows Media Player status. If user was listening / watching Media, it'd stop the media on starting the app, and resume the media on exit.

2. Updated credits with Easter Eggs. (Poke around the page to find out!)

If you have a Zune account use this link.

Tobe's Vertical Adventure Released

Just wanted to share the following game release that 3 of our DIT GD alumni worked on.

http://tobesadventure.squarespace.com/

Credits : http://tobesadventure.squarespace.com/credits/

Soh Yiheng, Ikhwan and Nicholas Sim worked on the title after their graduation while waiting for NSF enlistment.

The company, Rayteoactive, was so impressed by their contribution that Raymond (founder) asked for internship and FYP collaborations.

The game is available on Xbox LIVE Indie games channel - go get a trial and buy it!

Achievements Unlocked!

Just yesterday during my XNA Game Studio class, a student asked me if we could include achievements in his Xbox 360 XNA game... yes, you know what he was thinking... 2 million gazillion gamer points!

Unfortunately, no. That's not possible with community games... yet. :)

That brought back fond memories of a spoof of metagaming late 2008.

Article: Making a Better Community Game

Xbox LIVE Community Games are a great place for budding game developers to show their talents, but very often, their games fall short in sales.

Ryan Langley's article on how to make our games better is a must read for XNA developers.

How to draw Transparent Objects?

Someone asked me recently how to draw transparent 3D Objects in XNA.

Shawn Hargreaves has a good blog entry that describes the different approaches you can take, and the steps to do so in XNA.

Force Feedback Class

XNA gives a good raw functionality for vibration on the controller, but here's a cool class for simulating force feedback.

XNA Xbox LIVE Community Game Sales Numbers

During the last GDC, some numbers from sales of Xbox LIVE Community Games were released.

Check out the articles on GamerBytes and Gamasutra. There's also a deeper analysis on Gamasutra as well on how and why some games sell.

DreamBuildPlay 2009

It's coming again in April 2009! Get your coding gear on and get a Creator's Club License as well.

DreamBuildPlay is the one coding competition for XNA you must not miss!

XNA Game Studio 3.1 + Avatars!

XNA Game Studio 3.1 is coming later this year. Along with it, cool features such as:

Avatars - you'll be able to use player's avatars in the games you make; that's right, no more fumbling with FBX models.

Video Playback - do I hear a YES out there?

News released from GDC 2009.

Xbox LIVE Community Games comes to Singapore

Yes! Singaporean game developers can now make games and release them on the Xbox LIVE Community Games Channel.

A group of year 3 students and myself were invited to attend the press release this morning.

There's a S$50,000 grant up for grabs for each successful application to MDA under the MDA-Microsoft XNA Development Initiative.

Check out the official release at MDA's site.

DreamBuildPlay Game Video

Our team of 5 GD students submitted their game recently for Microsoft's DreamBuildPlay 2008 challenge.

Here's the video trailer of the game.

Reminder: DreamBuildPlay 2008

Here's a reminder to sign up for the DreamBuildPlay Challenge 2008. Entries close 23 September 2008, but you may want to submit as early as 1 September!

There's prizes galore, plus a free 12 month Creator's Club Subscription once you sign up. What are you waiting for?

Code-a-thon 2008

The annual Code-a-thon is here again. This year's event will be held Mon-Tue, 15-16 September. Here's the email invite:

"Code-a-thon 2008 is open for registration!

Code-a-thon is the games festival for games developers worldwide. Talented student game programmers and artists will be challenged to code a game for 30-hours.

Code-a-thon 2008 will be held in Singapore on the 15th - 16th September 2008 and the results will be announced during Games Convention Asia 2008. Nanyang Polytechnic would like to invite your insitution to form and send student teams to participate.

For more information, please refer to the official competition website below: http://www.nyp.edu.sg/sgcc/codeathon/ "

Let me know if you'd like to sign up as a team - support can be given in the form of notebooks and other development equipment if needed.

NOTE: Closing date is 31 August - you'll need a letter from us to confirm you're enrolled in SP as a full-time student, so please let me know by today if you want to enter!

XNA Robot Game

Now this is too cool to let by. The folks at Creator's Club have released a new mini-game for Premium members.


Robot Game is created by a South Korean game company, Zapetto. Download and try it out. Besides the fun factor, it boasts several cool technical examples you may want to check out. It also features a nice split-screen co-play mode. (Hint hint nudge nudge - cough, Assignment 2, cough).

Fancy the next mini-game coming from a team here in SP... now just imagine that... :)

Dream Build Play 2008

Can't get enough of XNA Game Studio 2.0 in class? ;)

Microsoft's Dream Build Play challenge is on again. The emphasis for the competition is as usual, fun games.

Register to get a year's subscription for the XNA Creator's Club (worth US$99 or S$179).

If you're doing the Console Game Development module in DMIT, you might want to think about putting in the polish for those assignments and submitting them as an entry in the challenge.

Due date is in September 2008. Submissions may be made from 1 - 23 September.

Microsoft Game Developer's Day 2008

The Microsoft Game Developer's Day is here again. Looking at the schedule, it looks to include what's new in XNA 3.0 and a peek at the XNA Community Games.

Registration is only $30. Learn more here.

XNA Role-Playing Game Starter Kit

Final Fantasy fans rejoice! Those interested in creating RPGs can reference the XNA Role-Playing Starter Kit released recently on Creator's Club.



This is a 2D RPG with a tile engine, developed by India based Dhruva Interactive.

To begin, try out the tutorial in adding your own quest to the game.

XNA Radio Broadcasts

Scott Lim and I got interviewed by Michael Tan from Mediacorp regarding the Console Game Dev module and GD in general in Singapore.

Here are the links for the podcasts:

XNA Part 1

XNA Part 2

We're on the news!

The local press had a field day yesterday at our GDC (Game Development Centre), T2021A.

Here're some reports that's appeared so far...


The event yesterday was also covered by GameAxis.
http://www.gameaxis.com/home/?blog=2175

Straits Times.com
http://www.straitstimes.com/Video+News/Singapore/STIVodcast_4077.html?

ChannelNewsAsia
http://www.channelnewsasia.com/stories/singaporelocalnews/view/343475/1/.html

You may like to click away after the first minute or so into the st.com video. :)

2007 SGCC 30-hour Code-a-thon

Looks like Darren got to posting this in the comments before I did, but here's the news anyway.

The Code-a-thon is coming again and it's MUCH bigger this year, with the chance of winning up to S$6,000 in cash prizes!

For Code-a-thon 2007 You are to programme a game tech demo (and bring your artist friends along) in XNA, over 30-hours. If you choose to do the code-a-thon at Suntec City (this year's venue), you are allowed to bring only your notebooks. If not, you can come to Suntec on the 4th Sep to register in the morning and proceed to code at your own venue (i.e. home) and then return on the 5th Sep for the competition submission (after taking your shower).

Go ahead and register online NOW http://www.nyp.edu.sg/sgcc/open.html

You'll need to form a group of 5 programmers/artists, so if you're interested, please let me know! Send me an email at alvintang@sp.edu.sg with your member's details.