Well I had some time yesterday to take a break from all the work I have been doing lately to stop thinking about making video games and actually play one... At first I was a little skeptical about all the hype surrounding this game... sure Epic has always made quality first person shooters but this game was supposed to change the way we think about FPS's... right? Well we all heard that story before... remember when Quake 3 came out for the PC? There was a ton of hype surrounding that release and it was supposed to change the way we thought about FPS's... while Quake 3 did bring some exciting new elements to online/multiplayer FPS's it wasn't so ground breaking and different from Quake 2... I still know people who are playing Quake 2 multiplayer over there lunch break at the office... but anyway... back to Gears... I started a new single player campaign last night and of course set it to "Casual" so I wouldn't get frustrated right away with the level of difficulty... well right from the start Gears of War was totally captivating! The last FPS shooter I played through was Halo 2... I have been playing Prey lately but there is something about that game that just doesn't yell for you to come back and keep playing... that IS NOT the feeling you get with Gears... right away you fell immersed into the storyline... the camera angles really have a dramatic effect on the experience... I haven't really loved the "sneak around" games like Splinter Cell so I wasn't so sure I would take to the whole "look for cover constantly" idea in Gears... but let me tell you... IT IS A FANTASTIC STEP FORWARD for FPS's!!!! You really do feel like you are part of the action in this game... and there is something about the squad based combat too... maybe it's just hearing Dom yell out "Marcus... Flank 'em..." but there is a great sense of meaningfulness to the part you play in the game... the in-game cinematic breaks don't really take away from the game play... they are short and sweet and always seem to do a great job of showing off some of the graphical goodness in the game! I only took the time to play through Act 1 last night but I am hooked!
Has anyone else pickup up Gears yet? If so what did you think? Is anyone else as stoked about this game as I am?
Bill Reiss has made available a new game called Dr. Popper. It is a puzzle game similar to Bubblet or Jawbreaker. There are four gameplay modes, and the full source is available.
It's here! Our first tutorial focusing on Beta 2. In this tutorial, we will put together what we learned in all of the previous Tile Engine tutorials (which I'm going to be updating to Beta 2 over the next day or so) and we build a complete Tile Engine Component. The component can be used in any game that requires tile-based graphics, including some things you might not think of as tile based at first (See the multi-leveled background scroller sample at the bottom of the tutorial).
Also included is a Tile Studio export script to allow tile studio maps to be exported into the format we have been using for our tile maps.
David Weller has posted a new entry to his Lets Kill Dave blog with some insights on the changes that will be necessary for XNA Game Studio Express Beta 2 due out "very, very soon".
In his article, David runs through our Tile Engine Tutorial Part 1 and shows us what has changed in Beta 2, including:
New Methods for your main Game class
Using the Content Pipeline to house our sprite images and load them into our resource objects
P.S. -- If you've read this far, you're probably thinking, "So when will beta 2 be available?" The answer is...look for my next post that will come within the next 24 or so hours
It looks like the XBOX 360 Fall Dashboard Update is scheduled to hit tomorrow! Included in the list of features is support for XNA Game Studio Express! Hopefully BETA 2 will follow or possibly even be released tomorrow along with the dash update!
Head on over the thezbuffer.com and checkout this article about BETA 2 of XNA/GSE! There are some great details listed here about what we should expect from BETA 2!
The Tile Engine Tutorial series will be shifting gears in an upcoming installment to focus on building a GameComponent to do tile mapping. One of the most reqested features for the existing tutorial series, however, is how to let the Avatar leave the center of the screen when the map is scrolled to the edge.
Tutorial 4b covers how to do this in a quick, easy manner. The Tile Engine Component that is the subject of Part 5 is awaiting the release of Beta 2 of XNA/GSE, which has some major changes to the way components are built, but it should be posted and available shortly after we all get our hands on Beta 2.
Andy Fraser has posted on the XNA GSE Forums about a component he has released called XGameLineInput. It allows the player to enter a text string without using the keyboard by scrolling through a characterset with their controller. Instructions and source are available at XGameLibrary.com.
Well I had some time yesterday to take a break from all the work I have been doing lately to stop thinking about making video games and actually play one... At first I was a little skeptical about all the hype surrounding this game... sure Epic has always made quality first person shooters but this game was supposed to change the way we think about FPS's... right? Well we all heard that story before... remember when Quake 3 came out for the PC? There was a ton of hype surrounding that release and it was supposed to change the way we thought about FPS's... while Quake 3 did bring some exciting new elements to online/multiplayer FPS's it wasn't so ground breaking and different from Quake 2... I still know people who are playing Quake 2 multiplayer over there lunch break at the office... but anyway... back to Gears... I started a new single player campaign last night and of course set it to "Casual" so I wouldn't get frustrated right away with the level of difficulty... well right from the start Gears of War was totally captivating! The last FPS shooter I played through was Halo 2... I have been playing Prey lately but there is something about that game that just doesn't yell for you to come back and keep playing... that IS NOT the feeling you get with Gears... right away you fell immersed into the storyline... the camera angles really have a dramatic effect on the experience... I haven't really loved the "sneak around" games like Splinter Cell so I wasn't so sure I would take to the whole "look for cover constantly" idea in Gears... but let me tell you... IT IS A FANTASTIC STEP FORWARD for FPS's!!!! You really do feel like you are part of the action in this game... and there is something about the squad based combat too... maybe it's just hearing Dom yell out "Marcus... Flank 'em..." but there is a great sense of meaningfulness to the part you play in the game... the in-game cinematic breaks don't really take away from the game play... they are short and sweet and always seem to do a great job of showing off some of the graphical goodness in the game! I only took the time to play through Act 1 last night but I am hooked!
I have just completed converting our existing Tile Engine Tutorials over to Beta 2. Give them a look on our 
Bill Reiss has made available a new game called Dr. Popper. It is a puzzle game similar to Bubblet or Jawbreaker. There are four gameplay modes, and the full source is available. 
It's here! Our first tutorial focusing on Beta 2. In this tutorial, we will put together what we learned in all of the previous Tile Engine tutorials (which I'm going to be updating to Beta 2 over the next day or so) and we build a complete Tile Engine Component. The component can be used in any game that requires tile-based graphics, including some things you might not think of as tile based at first (See the multi-leveled background scroller sample at the bottom of the tutorial).
Beta 2 is NOW AVAILABLE!!! Stop reading and go 
David Weller has posted a new entry to his 
It looks like the XBOX 360 Fall Dashboard Update is scheduled to hit tomorrow! Included in the list of features is support for XNA Game Studio Express! Hopefully BETA 2 will follow or possibly even be released tomorrow along with the dash update!
Head on over the thezbuffer.com and checkout this article about BETA 2 of XNA/GSE! There are some great details listed here about what we should expect from BETA 2!
The Tile Engine Tutorial series will be shifting gears in an upcoming installment to focus on building a GameComponent to do tile mapping. One of the most reqested features for the existing tutorial series, however, is how to let the Avatar leave the center of the screen when the map is scrolled to the edge.
Andy Fraser has 
