XNA

I were in serious doubt as to what subject I should choose for the next session slot. I'm very much into webservices and SOA so "Patterns and Anti-Patterns for SOA" would be perfect. But at the same time Rob Miles held a session on XNA, the new game development framework for both PC and the XBOX. Game development really isn't my thing, but I knew Rob Miles is an excellent speaker, and at the same time I have done some 3D development earlier on and it could be quite interesting to see how the XNA is going to change ones perception of game development - so I chose the XNA session.

There shall be no doubt, XNA seems impressive, but I can't ignore my gut feeling that it's overly hyped. XNA is a framework that lies ontop of DX and GDI+, enabling one to more easily create sprite based systems, showing 3D objects and so forth. Also it has classes for using the XBOX 360 controllers directly through the USB port, very neat.

But how is this revolutionary? I mean, it really only seems like a framework on top of the framework on top of a list of other frameworks. I'm sure one could write his own XBOX 360 controller communication classes, aswell as a neat .NET layer on top of DX/OGL. The real coolness of XNA is the fact that games can be deployed directly onto the XBOX (to be released in december). XNA isn't supposed to be used for writing the a new Halo / WOW game as it really can't deliver that kind of performance due to the managed environment.

I'm sure there's going to be a whole load of hobby developed applications that one can download and run, or even buy directly through XBOX Live (though that costs the developer an annual fee). I do not however predict that we'll see a large scale game market through XNA development. The current top selling games will continue to be developed in native code for the foreseeable time, or at least until the performance of managed code is increased.

A great use for the XNA - as Rob Miles pointed out - is in education. XNA is great for encouraging students to learn programming and for teaching game development. It's easy to get it going and the managed code environment is lovely to work in. At least I'd like my university to offer an XNA development course, that's for sure!