Comments on: Piecing together Microsoft’s XNA gaming platform http://damieng.com/blog/2006/05/17/piecingtogethermicrosoftsxnagamingplatform A .NET developer in Redmond Tue, 06 Jan 2009 04:52:54 +0000 http://wordpress.org/?v=2.7 hourly 1 By: William http://damieng.com/blog/2006/05/17/piecingtogethermicrosoftsxnagamingplatform/comment-page-1#comment-6082 William Sun, 03 Feb 2008 15:37:39 +0000 http://damieng.com/blog/archive/2006/05/17/piecingtogethermicrosoftsxnagamingplatform.aspx#comment-6082 I agree with Rim here and am totally against everything Steve had said here! Steve, to me it sounds like you are extremely _biased_ and are unaware of quite a few things in the real world friend. It's mainly geared for C# VB has little to do with it my friend. With that said XNA is an excellent framework as was pure DirectX for it's time and I have fallen for XNA big time here and totally love it. I use to use C for so many years in the past and it was nothing more than a headache. I am proud of MS for not listening to these guys that are so for this C stuff! I also find it extremely easy, beneficial, and efficient to write using the .Net Framework and C# all together. This is excellent. I love the blog Damien, it's very informative mate; keep up the great work! --- William. I agree with Rim here and am totally against everything Steve had said here! Steve, to me it sounds like you are extremely _biased_ and are unaware of quite a few things in the real world friend. It's mainly geared for C# VB has little to do with it my friend. With that said XNA is an excellent framework as was pure DirectX for it's time and I have fallen for XNA big time here and totally love it. I use to use C for so many years in the past and it was nothing more than a headache. I am proud of MS for not listening to these guys that are so for this C stuff! I also find it extremely easy, beneficial, and efficient to write using the .Net Framework and C# all together. This is excellent.

I love the blog Damien, it's very informative mate; keep up the great work!
---
William.

]]> By: Rim http://damieng.com/blog/2006/05/17/piecingtogethermicrosoftsxnagamingplatform/comment-page-1#comment-1490 Rim Sat, 08 Jul 2006 04:04:59 +0000 http://damieng.com/blog/archive/2006/05/17/piecingtogethermicrosoftsxnagamingplatform.aspx#comment-1490 (Just came across this blog, dropping a belated comment to speak my mind)<br /><br />Obviously I'm biased (MDXInfo staff), but I don't agree to Steve's assessment that using .NET will distract people from the skills they need to get into the real game industry. <br /><br />A programming language is just a platform, a means to an end if you will. The true skills people need to be succesful in game development (or any software development sector) are not tied to a specific language. The ability to transform ideas into code and problems into solutions is the schoolbook example, but also game specific elements, like working with shaders, scene management, resource management and all fancy visual techniques are possible in Managed DirectX. <br /><br />A thorough understanding of these concepts is going to get you much further than knowing C++. Yes, I find it easier to code in C# than in C++, but what's wrong with that? With all due respect, writing off people that rather use .NET than C++ is a bit shortsighted. Granted, the porting issue may hold, but I'll settle for being able to publish for the Windows and XBox360 gamer crowds, that constitute a more than interesting part of the market. (Just came across this blog, dropping a belated comment to speak my mind)

Obviously I'm biased (MDXInfo staff), but I don't agree to Steve's assessment that using .NET will distract people from the skills they need to get into the real game industry.

A programming language is just a platform, a means to an end if you will. The true skills people need to be succesful in game development (or any software development sector) are not tied to a specific language. The ability to transform ideas into code and problems into solutions is the schoolbook example, but also game specific elements, like working with shaders, scene management, resource management and all fancy visual techniques are possible in Managed DirectX.

A thorough understanding of these concepts is going to get you much further than knowing C++. Yes, I find it easier to code in C# than in C++, but what's wrong with that? With all due respect, writing off people that rather use .NET than C++ is a bit shortsighted. Granted, the porting issue may hold, but I'll settle for being able to publish for the Windows and XBox360 gamer crowds, that constitute a more than interesting part of the market.

]]> By: Steve http://damieng.com/blog/2006/05/17/piecingtogethermicrosoftsxnagamingplatform/comment-page-1#comment-1489 Steve Thu, 18 May 2006 08:44:00 +0000 http://damieng.com/blog/archive/2006/05/17/piecingtogethermicrosoftsxnagamingplatform.aspx#comment-1489 There are some nice tools here, but roping it all into .Net is a mistake. MS may like to sell this to indies but given the limited portability options it just looks like as much of a dead end as the old managed DirectX before it - used for a few niches and amateurs (especially VB coders) but not much more. <br /><br />ANSI C++ is portable, full stop, no 'ifs' or 'buts'. No arsing around with partially implemented, permanently out of date versions of closed source frameworks like Mono. Libraries that you need to speed development are already there, proven, stable and fast, on all the platforms you need. <br /><br />Mostly this looks like a pitch at the amateur game development scene for people who haven't got to grips with C++ development - laudable but I wonder whether it just distracts these people away from the skills they will _really_ need to get into the game industry. There are some nice tools here, but roping it all into .Net is a mistake. MS may like to sell this to indies but given the limited portability options it just looks like as much of a dead end as the old managed DirectX before it - used for a few niches and amateurs (especially VB coders) but not much more.

ANSI C++ is portable, full stop, no 'ifs' or 'buts'. No arsing around with partially implemented, permanently out of date versions of closed source frameworks like Mono. Libraries that you need to speed development are already there, proven, stable and fast, on all the platforms you need.

Mostly this looks like a pitch at the amateur game development scene for people who haven't got to grips with C++ development - laudable but I wonder whether it just distracts these people away from the skills they will _really_ need to get into the game industry.

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