Archive for the 'Zune' Category
Zune / 360 Games
Thursday, February 21st, 2008
The XNA Community Games Platform team is delighted to offer you a sneak peek at our first major feature for XNA Game Studio 3.0: The ability to build games for the Zune platform! This will let you write one game and deploy it to all three platforms that XNA Game Studio 3.0 will support: the Xbox 360, Windows, and now the Zune. While the Zune lacks the 3D graphics horsepower to drive high-end games like you can on the Xbox 360, we’ve taken extreme steps in making sure that you will have the broadest access to the XNA Framework APIs possible, allowing you to create fun Zune games while still letting you integrate carefully with the overall Zune media experience. That means that XNA Game Studio 3.0 integration includes discoverability/access to the user’s music – allowing the user to customize background soundtracks or create real-time visualizations at their discretion. In addition, the XNA Community Games Platform team has announced the ability to have multiple Zunes wirelessly engage in an ad-hoc gaming experience (think of the possibilities!).
Our current planning is to offer a preview release of XNA Game Studio 3.0 in the Spring 2008 timeframe, with a final release scheduled for the holiday 2008 season. We look forward to your feedback and seeing what kind of amazing games you can create for the Zune!
One other choice tidbit - revenue sharing with developers or the option to give your game away for free. The details of this are not out yet.
I hadn’t looked at XNA much until this announcement - it’s pretty sweet. Development environment - Visual Studio, language - C#, runtime - optimized version of the CLR, framework - XNA gaming framwork plus the .NET compact framework for mobile devices. Wikipedia has a nice writeup.
Zune Gets Its Game On
Wednesday, February 20th, 2008
Little is out yet, but so far -
- it’ll be open to developers
- based on XNA, Yow!
- wireless multiplayer gaming supported
- full touchpad input
- Gen 3 Gen 2 will support it and Gen 1 may well too depending on the controls used in the games.
- SDK to be released this spring
Definitely one piece of Microsoft’s Unified Gaming Network (yes, my predictions do occasionally come true). Sweet. I love the fact that they went with a Galaga type game for their first release. Classic. I wanna write a game for my Zune!
Update - I meant Gen 2, sorry, no Gen 3 detail out yet but naturally it will support it too.
Zune 2.0
Wednesday, October 3rd, 2007
Not bad, they are playing this in a classic Microsoft way. The design brings them closer to Apple but they haven’t exceeded it (yet). New features that trump the competition – better sharing of tracks and wireless sync (very cool). They are leveraging their skills in backend software services through the new Zune Marketplace – something I think Apple is very weak on and can be exploited. The new interface looks fantastic. With video now supported, and whoa, DRM-free tracks which will be price competitive with iTunes tracks, there’s a real opening there. (This will get people like myself who abhor DRM music to actually purchase something through Marketplace, that’s a big win.) .. and probably the best news for media center geeks like myself – syncing of media center content directly to the Zune, which according the press release should include CableCARD content (no confirmation on this yet, but they don’t exclude it in the press release.) That’s a first and might help media center gain some street cred with average users.
I think if Microsoft really wants to cut the competition off at the knees, they need to leverage what they do better than anybody – social networking is one aspect of this, but the killer app in Zune we have yet to see – a handheld gaming device with a port of Halo or Halo 2 on it and access to casual gaming content as with Xbox Live Marketplace. They are working in that direction – Zune now supports DHCP for wireless network sync from anywhere in the house, which sets it up for multiplayer game play, handheld multiplayer gaming oriented patents, Marketplace support for video downloads now with wireless sync, ZuneCards al la GameCards added, bigger screen, touch sensitive input, a Halo 3 edition Zune… slowly but surely. Will we see a handheld gaming device in the next year or two that also plays music and video? I’d say with Allard behind the scenes the odds are a definitive - yes. The question is when. Something like that takes a while to ramp up, but once out there, could help Zune blow iPod sales numbers out of the water. I think the combined sales of the PSP and DS are somewhere around 40 million today. That’s a huge market. It’s also a space Microsoft is a clear winner in when it comes to ID and content. I imagine the idea of Microsoft getting into that ‘game’ has Sony, Nintendo, and Apple sweating.
Things that appear to be missing from the Zune 2.0 – a browser, that’s definitely needed. With DHCP why wouldn’t you build a browser for it? Built-in online store – I’m not sure how compelling of a feature this is, but with DHCP it’s a foregone conclusion they could easily do it. Full screen display – it’s not going to happen this year, if ever. I don’t think they see it as necessary yet. The Touch’s success or failure will most likely drive that decision. Classic Microsoft.
Update - Engadget has the specs smackdown. The flash based models have better specs than the Nano - bigger screen, wireless, wireless syncing, better interface. That’s huge.
I’m not sure if I’ll pick up the 80GB model, since my Zune 1.0 will get the interface / feature refresh when these come out, but a flash based model is definitely in my future.
Zune 2.0
Thursday, September 13th, 2007
From 11 Months ago when people started talking about 2.0. What’s it going to be guys? Some lame player or something that can compete? Are you going to release something killer, or are you going to take another major hit and let the Engadget/Gizmodo/TechCrunch/iFan crowd drag you through the mud for another year, or worse, two. I’m not holding my breath on this one.
Zoon
Wednesday, September 12th, 2007
(from Jamie on C9)
I get pretty fired up about Apple, but I have to admit, it’s pretty fun being the underdog. I mean when you own 99% of every market, it gets kinda boring. As far as Zune goes, Microsoft has been quitely touring the country with various tours, drumming up grass roots support for the Zune as an alternative to the “main stream”. They have the marketing down too (Fulltank blew me away the first time I picked it up on Adult Swim - I remember thinking “I wish Microsoft could advertise like that.” Low and behold, they can.) Now they just need to nail the ID and improve on sharing and wireless features. Time will tell.
Microsoft’s Response To The iPod
Thursday, September 6th, 2007
Microsoft offered no new details Wednesday, with Menendez saying simply, “No announcements to make other than the fact that the Zune team remains committed to building a solid experience for users.”
This is the problem with Microsoft. “committed to building a solid experience for users”? What the hell does that mean? How about “committed to building the most killer player you’ve ever seen.” I’m already starting to second guess Zune 2.0.
Microsoft Unified Game Network Patent
Friday, July 27th, 2007
Multi-component gaming system Abstract
A gaming system including handheld devices and console devices has variable functionality and processing performance as determined by the number of components in the system. Gaming components can be combined wirelessly, by wired connections (e.g., via a docking station), or a combination thereof. The processing capabilities and functionality of each gaming component in a combination are augmented by the processing capabilities and functionality of other gaming components in the combination. To take advantage of another gaming components processing capabilities and memory capacity, each gaming component is capable of utilizing another gaming component to process gaming applications. Further, each gaming component is capable of rendering audio and/or video information provided by another gaming component. Also, a gaming component is capable of utilizing another gaming component as an adjunct processor.
Basically, it sounds like a multiplayer network which brings together consoles and handhelds that share processing of the game being played. The console can also act as a wireless access point for multiple handhelds. Depending on the processing power of devices connected to the network, devices will be able to hand off processing tasks to other, more powerful devices on the same network. In looking at the image, I immediately thought about kids living in a dorm, all playing against each other using a single 360 as the access point and game server. Or, possibly playing online through a handheld device, with your 360 acting as the network access point.
I’d say a Zune gaming handheld is pretty much “in the works” from looking at this. I doubt it’ll be out this year though, although you never know for sure. Pretty much every rumor I’ve read mentions two devices this Christmas - a small, fullscreen RAM based player that supports video and wireless, and a new hard drive based Zune 2, supposedly with either 80GB or 120GB of drive space.
iWars
Friday, July 27th, 2007
What really blows me away is that Lucas spent months in 76 hand painting effects like this directly onto film, while today two kids can whip something similar up in a matter of hours and post it online. Really cool. I especially like the ending too. 
Milan Media Player
Wednesday, June 13th, 2007
But the most interesting are the sample “press releases”. November 14 seems to be a date of significance, but if you read the third release, “Microsoft’s New Milan Media Player on Store Shelves on Nov 14″, it becomes fascinating. Milan being the codename for “Surface”, it would be not far-fetched to assume a “Milan Media Player” is a portable media device which has multi-touch capabilities, which brings me to the Zune. The Zune, which is now due for a second revision pops to my mind. And out of pure coincidence, November 14 is also the date of the Zune launch in 2006. Announcing a multi-touch 2nd generation Zune on the first anniversary sounds like a good pretty good plan to me.
Probably just a joke by the design team, but man would that be cool if it wasn’t.
Pimp Your Zune
Thursday, May 31st, 2007
Yeah I know, Zune. A complete flop. Well, unless of course you consider 10% of a market in 6 months a flop. (We knew this was going to happen.) If you’re interested in making your Zune stand out amongst the other million or so out there here in the states, Colorware will sell you a new one in any of 26 customized color schemes, or you can ship your existing Zune back to them to have it pimped for about $75.00. Since I’m pretty confident I’ll be picking up a rev 2 Zune in the fall (or two), I’m going to send my rev 1 in for a make-over. I’m thinking of going with a John Deere theme. Call me crazy, but I think it’s going to look pretty sweet. I should also point out that iPod lovers out there can do the same with their hardware, except of course you won’t be standing out much since, well, everybody including your grandmother has an iPod.
Update - .. and yes, I’m fully aware of the irony in that last statement.
