Dream, Build, Play

AKA: Dream, dream, and dream some more.

Microsoft has set out to, as they say, "democratize" the game industry with XNA.

For those of you who have not heard of XNA (and are too lazy to look it up) here are some helpful links: Gamasutra feature and Official Page. You will also find many references to it in past blog posts, as Matt and I have used it extensively and have even made some video tutorials on it: Blog Post or Download Page.

The idea is to give the power to make games to mere mortals. No longer will games only be produced by huge teams and EA's sweatshops, but by anyone with the with determination and a little bit of know how. XNA (you don't want to know what the acronym stands for) allows you to write games in C# that can then be played on both windows machines and the XBOX360. And other than the account required to play the games on your XBOX, it's all free! And if you sign up for Dream Build Play, you can get a four month Creators Club account free too.

So instead of having to learn C++, one can start of with managed C#, which is much easier to learn. As far as the amateur programmer is concerned, there are no make files or pointers or any of that other confusing C++ stuff. I originally learned how to program in Java, and I must say, the transition was quite smooth.

But XNA is more than just a language choice: there are a multitude of included libraries designed to make writing a game easier, and a plethora of examples and tutorials. There are libraries for interacting with a gamepad, doing matrix operations, and collision detection. I really don't know how they could have made making games any simpler.

But... where are all the games? There are some notable examples, such as some of the previous Dream Build Play competition winners (XBOX.com news), but I haven't really seen a major explosion of indie games. Maybe I haven't given it enough time, and maybe my expectations are too high, but so far the most Dream Build Play has done for me is taught me that "democratize" is actually a real word (I though for sure they had made it up!). I was hoping for a resurgence of the maverick game makers, a new John Carmack or Richard Garriott to show those big game publishers that we don't need them! If a kid gets sick of WWII shooter 12 and thinks he can do better, than gosh darn it he can! All it takes is some dedication and a spot of help from XNA.

But the industry has changed to much, and the best we seem to be able to do with XNA is make some slick looking arcade-style or casual games. Even so, and please correct me if I'm misinformed, we haven't seen an explosion of these games either. XBOX Live has had some successful arcade games (such as geometry wars and Matt mentioned "Braid") but we have yet to see a gaming revolution. I don't see people buying XBOX 360s just so they can play these games, and I definitely don't see "democratized" game making. But what can I expect? After all, a democracy depends on the involvement of it's people, and I certainly haven't done my part.

Which brings me back to the start of this post: despite being interested in games and even making some with XNA (such as the demo one Matt and I made for the video tutorials), I have yet to make a concerted effort to enter in the Dream Build Play competition. I have plenty of ideas and was really excited about this iteration of the competition, but now the deadline is looming and I have nothing to submit. I've got the "dream" part down, but have yet to execute on the "build."

Well, I think it's time for that to change. Although it's a bit late for this competition...