August 2007 - Posts

• A great example of how to include WPF in student dissertation or projects

  Matt Duffin, who was the last years Academic Evangelist Intern  is now entering his last year at Reading University.  As part of his BSc  Computer Science degree, he's started to write a dissertation on computerized board games and has just started to create a basic version of 'WPFopoly' – no prizes for guessing where he took his inspiration! Take a look at Matt's blog to discover his journey as he gets to grip with this great technology.  Who knows, you may learn a thing or two or perhaps inspire some of your student to include WPF in their projects or course work.    Kate Posted Wednesday, August 22, 2007 7:42 AM from UK Academic Team Blog | 0 Comments

• Inspiration Tour

  We’re very excited in the Academic team, we’re just about to launch the “Inspiration Tour” and we can’t wait to go out and meet you all. Ed Dunhill           Ed and Ben will be out on the road during the next six months, so why not take a look at our Inspiration Tour web page to find out more and beat the rush to reserve your tour date now! Ben Coley                                               The aim of the inspiration tour is to bring technology to you and your students, everything from the . NET platform to some of the really cool stuff that’s around at the moment like Silverlight, XNA and Microsoft Embedded technologies. Spaces will fill up fast so please email us if you are interested in securing a date. Posted Tuesday, August 21, 2007 9:28 AM from UK Academic Team Blog | 0 Comments Filed under: .NET, Academics, Careers, Events, Imagine Cup, Students, Technology, Training, Web, XNA

• Microsoft announces Dream-Build-Play contest winners, demonstrates XNA Game Studio-developed “Schizoid,” and shares details of new game content usage rules

  Microsoft Makes Game Development Dreams a Reality       SEATTLE — Aug. 13, 2007 — At Gamefest 2007, the annual Microsoft® Game Technology Conference, Microsoft Corp. today announced the highly anticipated winners of its Dream-Build-Play game development contest, which encouraged experienced game developers and enthusiasts to create innovative and fun-to-play video games for Windows® or Xbox 360™ platforms using XNA® Game Studio. In a surprise announcement during the keynote address, an astounding four winners were invited to publish their games on Xbox LIVE® Arcade. Tied for first place were David Flook of Ontario, Canada, and James Silva of New York with their respective games: “Blazing Birds,” an action-packed, robotic sports game modeled after the game of badminton, and “The Dishwasher: Dead Samurai,” a highly stylized game of mayhem and revenge. For their accomplishments, Flook and Silva were offered publishing contracts with Xbox LIVE Arcade, $10,000 (U.S.) each and several other prizes. Steve Olofsson of Sweden and Daniel McGuire of the United Kingdom received honors as runners-up for their games: “Gravitron Ultra” and “Yo Ho Kablammo!” respectively. Because of the amazing creativity demonstrated by these top four winners, the Xbox LIVE Arcade team also extended invitations to publish on Xbox LIVE Arcade to Olofsson and McGuire, along with $5,000 (U.S.) and other prizes.   A total of 16 others were recognized with third-place honors. More than 4,500 members of the gaming community from more than 100 countries enrolled in the Dream-Build-Play challenge. Final results have been posted on the Dream-Build-Play Web site at http://dreambuildplay.com. “The games we received in the Dream-Build-Play competition are truly inspiring,” said Chris Satchell, general manager of the XNA organization at Microsoft. “Created in just four short months using XNA Game Studio, these games demonstrate an incredible range of innovation, fun gameplay and technical achievement.” “We uncovered some remarkable talent with this contest and are pleased to include these original creations in our diverse library of games on Xbox LIVE Arcade,” said Bryan Trussel, director of content and portals for Microsoft Casual Games. “It’s aspiring, independent developers like these who are really driving our industry.”   XNA Game Studio has seen a surge of momentum this past year, with more than 400,000 downloads of the tool and adoption by nearly 200 academic institutions globally since its release last December. In addition to the XNA Creators Club Online community at http://creators.xna.com, more than 50 new community sites in numerous languages have emerged around the world in support of XNA Game Studio, pushing the boundaries of game development further toward Microsoft’s vision of true collaboration and democratization.   “Schizoid” by Torpex Games Showcased for the First Time In his Gamefest keynote address, Satchell welcomed Bill Dugan, president of Torpex Games, to share a live demonstration of the highly anticipated action title “Schizoid,” the first Xbox LIVE Arcade game to be created with XNA Game Studio. The game, which will be released later this year, establishes XNA Game Studio as a premier development platform for hobbyists, independent developers and professionals alike.   Microsoft Announces Game Content Usage Rules Satchell announced that effectively immediately, some game content published by Microsoft Game Studios and owned by Microsoft is now available for noncommercial use by consumers. Under a license similar to the Creative Commons license, consumers may now use gameplay footage, screen shots and other gameplay elements from popular Microsoft Game Studios titles such as the “Halo®” franchise, “Forza Motorsport®” and “Age of Empires®” to express their own imagination and creativity. Details on the game content usage rules have been posted at http://www.xbox.com/en-US/community/developer/rules.htm along with samples of permissible and nonpermissible use.     New SOFTIMAGE|XSI 6 Mod Tool for XNA Game Studio SOFTIMAGE|XSI 6 Mod Tool is new, free 3-D modeling and animation software for the creation of noncommercial game content. Based on the same toolset as the professional XSI 3D software, XSI 6 Mod Tool enables aspiring game developers to create compelling 3-D characters, levels and content designed for use with XNA Game Studio. Integrating natively with the XNA Framework Content Pipeline, XSI 6 Mod Tool comes with an enhanced user interface and training videos from Noesis Interactive, making it a perfect learning environment for newcomers to 3-D game content creation. “Softimage and Microsoft are committed to nurturing the next generation of game creators,” said Leonard Teo, product marketing manager at Softimage Co. “With the free XSI 6 Mod Tool and XNA Game Studio, anyone can download these tools and learn how to make great games now. Students, enthusiasts and aspiring game creators now have a toolset similar to those used by professional game companies.” Posted Friday, August 17, 2007 11:06 AM from UK Academic Team Blog | 0 Comments Filed under: Events, Technology, XNA

• XNA Game Studio 2.0 just released

  Many of you have come to know and love XNA, the programming language for the Xbox and the PC. Since the global launch at Warwich University in December there has been considerable interest in UK Universities and students and academics alike have used XNA and have joined the Creator's Club community. We are currently planning ways to show off all of the great work that has already happened at GameCity October 24-28 and will be in touch soon with the details. In the meantime we are excited to announce the release of XNA Game Studio 2.0 As always, if you have any questions about XNA, teaching resources or our pilot programme then please get in touch Claire Posted Tuesday, August 14, 2007 8:12 AM from UK Academic Team Blog | 0 Comments Filed under: Academics, Teaching Resources, Technology, XNA

• And the winners of the Imagine Cup 2007 are...

  Software Design ·         First place: Thailand — Team 3KC Returns/Project LiveBook! Prachaya Phaisanwiphatpong, Vasan Chienmaneetaweesin, Jatupon Sukkasem, Pathompol Saeng-Uraiporn ·         Second place: Korea — Team En#605/Project Finger Code Lim Chan-kyu, Min Kyoung-hoon, Lim Byoung-su, Jeong Ji-hyeon ·         Third place: Jamaica — Team ICAD/Project CADI Imran Allie, Conroy Smith, Ayson Baxter, Damion Mitchell Embedded Development ·         First place: Brazil — Team TriventDreams ED Carlos Eduardo Rodriques, Andrew Wilson Furtado, Ivan Cordeiro Cardim ·         Second place: Romania — Team Aether Alexandru Vranescu, Bogdan Tanasa, Ionel Vuza, Bogdan Holmanu ·         Third place: China — Team SEED Huning Dai, Zhou Xue, Ziqing Ye, Dai Tang Web Development ·         First place: France — Team APB Benjamin Talmard, Thomas Albisser, Pierrick Blons, Sebastien Lam ·         Second place: Ireland — Team Red Dawn Mohammed Al-Tahs, Marouf Azad ·         Third place: China — Team Frontfree Studio-Web Jiasheng Guo, Weining Sha, Xia Xiao, Zhenda Zhao Project Hoshimi (Programming Battle) ·         First place: Argentina — Team OIA Pablo Gauna, Nicolás Rodríguez Vilela ·         Second place: France — Team Arenium Laure Portet, Régis Hanol ·         Third place: Serbia — Team vladan.simov Vladan Simov IT Challenge ·         First place: China — Zhifeng Chen ·         Second place: France — Romain Larmet Third place: Romania — Ilie Cosmin Viorel Algorithm ·         First place: Poland — Przemyslaw Debiak ·         Second place: Ukraine — Roman Koshlyak ·         Third place: Hungary — Szilveszter Szebeni Photography ·         First place: Poland — Team Maraqja Iwona Bielecka, Malgorzata Lopaciuk ·         Second place: Croatia — Team Black and White Aleksandar Kordić, Igor Matoša ·         Third place: Canada — Team Awesome Patrick Struys, Ryan Marr Short Film ·         First place: Poland — Team Skylined Julia Górniewicz, Jacek Barcikowski ·         Second place: Taiwan — Team Circle Chang Hao-Jan, Chang Shu-Wei, Tseng Yen-Chi, Lin Di-Er ·         Third place: Brazil — Team Papa Paçoca Alexandre Nacari, Arthur de Pádua, Felipe Pellisser, Wendel Yokoyama Interface Design ·         First place: Austria — Team OOT Graphics Verena Lugmayr, Claudia Oster ·         Second place: China — Team Frontfree Studio UI Dongjing Yao, Yushi Ma ·         Third place: France — Team Atomnium Manon Gaucher, Flavien Charlon   CONGRATULATIONS to all of the above! Their achievement is incredible and will change their lives, their submissions were inspiring! Read a retrospective about the finals, watch the video blog and watch this space for more news on the competitors and their entries.   Claire Posted Friday, August 10, 2007 9:01 AM from UK Academic Team Blog | 0 Comments Filed under: Academics, Events, Imagine Cup, Students