Sean McHugh at myITforum.com

Earlier this week Microsoft released the XNA studio 3 to CTP, and it now includes support for Zune gaming.  I have been excited about the idea of gaming on the Zune since they announced the support, so I downloaded it and set it up on my Zune.  Here is what I found in my first day of messing with it:

Because the toolkit has only been out for a couple of days, there aren't too many games for the Zune yet, but they are coming out quickly.  Every day I find a couple of new ones.  Most of the games so far are simple, but as people have more time with the toolkit, I'm sure we'll see some cool stuff.  At this point, think Tetris, not Call Of Duty 4.  Most of the games are simple "dodge the falling object" type of games, and I have a Tetris port, a Bejeweled-like matching game, a clock application, a space invaders clone, that sort of thing.   A while back there were some XNA games showcased on the Xbox 360 Merketplace that were much more complex, and the Zune should be able to run most of those without too much modification to the code.

Installation and setup was pretty simple (see my previous post for some links to good walkthroughs and to game code http://myitforum.com/cs2/blogs/smchugh/archive/2008/05/08/xna-gaming-available-on-zune-now.aspx ) but I ran into a couple of minor issues.  Some are obvious, some not quite so much but maybe I can save someone a bit of time by not making the same mistakes I did.  I tried setting the whole thing up on a clean Windows XP VPC to start, and that caused me some minor bumps.  For starters you have to install the Zune software (and drivers) on the machine, as the XNA game studio uses them to communicate with the Zune (OK, duh...) and you will need to run the setup on a Vista machine or a machine with Office 2007 installed, because there is a truetype font used in the XNA games that comes with either Vista or Office 2007 that you need to have instaled to build the games.  You could also find the font (Segoe UI) and insttall just that, but I found it easier to just move my operation to a machine that already had it.  The install will also put .NET 3.5 and SQL Server Compact on your machine, so if that could cause conflict with anything else you already run be aware that it is part of the install.  You'll also need to shut down pretty much everything running on your system including the Vista sidebar to get through the install.

Once up and running I found getting the games built and deployed to the Zune to be simple.  Connect your Zune, shut down Zune software, Start VS C# Express, open the project file, build and deploy.  The Zune shows status of the XNA files being installed and indicates that it is connected to the XNA Game Studio.  The games were pretty easy to figure out how to play, and some even had support for the touchpad on my Zune 80.  I have installed games on a Zune 80 and 2 Zune 30's so far with no issues.  Some games are better on the 30 without touch, some are better on the 80 with the touch circle, but so far I haven't had problems running any of the games on either type of Zune.

Every time you exit a game, the Zune will completely reboot.  I assume that is to take a safe approach to completely clearing all of the game files out of memory, so the games do not step on each other or the Zune media player functions.  I'm sure they will have a more elegant solution on release, but I'm OK with the resets for now.  It's all part of the Beta experience ;-)

I haven't blown up any Zunes by doing this and so far the games are fun little diversions.  If you have some time to spend messing with this and understand what you are getting into, I would recommend it.

Following close on the heels of the Zune 2.5 software/firmware update, Microsoft has released the XNA 3.0 Game studio with Zune support support!

It is still a Community Technical Preview (read: beta) but if you're brave, you can get games on your Zune now!  If you program, you can also start creating Zune games.

Download here:

http://blogs.msdn.com/xna/archive/2008/05/07/announcing-xna-game-studio-3-0-community-technical-preview-ctp.aspx
 

There are already a couple of games out there (for orignal Zunes and V2 Zunes) and there are some excellent step by step guides to installing and compiling them for use at the following links:

http://www.zuneboards.com/forums/tutorials/23605-installing-game-xna-your-zune.html#post216424
 
http://www.zunescene.mobi/forums/index.php?topic=37524.0
 
http://www.zunescene.mobi/forums/index.php?topic=37503.0

I expect there will be a lot of games showing up pretty quickly and I am looking forward to getting mine set up for gaming tonight.

Disclaimer: I have not installed these games on my Zune yet, and there is a known issue where exiting out of a game can cause the Zune to reset, but that seems a small price to pay to me...  I'll update once I have games running on my Zune.

After 2 years of attending MMS in San Diego, my employer decided that they were not willing to pay for me to go to MMS 2008 in Las Vegas.  No matter how well I demonstrated the value of attending MMS in the past, the answer simply came down as no.  Fortunately, I was not easily deterred, and even more fortunately there is a great community in MyITForum.com and fantastic supporting vendors like Secure Vantage that came together to make it happen for me for this year.

For those that do not know, MMS sold out for the first time this year.  When I got the news that the conference was sold out and I still had not figured out a way to convince my company to pay, or even co-pay for me to attend, my hopes got pretty slim.  As I was trying to see if there was any way I could make it happen, I saw a post on the MyITForum blogs that they were given a sponsor pass from Secure Vantage and were going to raffle it off as the April prize for MyITForum donors.  I immediately broke out my PayPal account and made a donation (been meaning to do that for some time, guess this was a sign) crossing my fingers as I clicked "submit" that maybe there was still hope.  Days passed, and then I got the e-mail that I had been chosen as the lucky winner of the pass!  My MMS admission was paid for!  I immediately talked to my boss to see if they would pay for the airfare and a cheap room since the lions share of the cost was taken care of now.  He ran it up the chain and unfortunately the answer once again came back no.  There was no way was I going to be denied at this point so I hit the web and started checking airfare and hotels.  Wow, do they take you for a ride when you try to travel last minute.  The airfare that I had priced out at $130 a couple weeks ago had suddenly tripled, and "cheap room in Vegas" is something of an oxymoron as well.  I was talking about the situation with my good friend and former co-worker Brian Leary, when he said " Hey man, I have a suite at the conference, let me see if I can get it set up with 2 beds and you can room with me."   Amazing, the blessings just keep coming.  All that was left now was to get there, and after some quick calculations, the decision was made... ROAD TRIP!  I live in Denver, so Vegas is only 750 miles away and even with current gas prices being what they are, it was going to be much cheaper to drive than fly, in addition to the fact that after a year and a half of owning it, I hadn't broken my Pontiac Solstice in with a proper road trip yet.  So after checking the weather and loading up my things, I headed off to Beverly... uhhh, Las Vegas.

I ran into Rod from MyITForum almost immediately after registering on Monday and thanked him for helping to make it happen and I could tell that he was genuinely pleased that someone who really needed the pass had won it.  When I spoke to Jeremiah from Secure Vantage, he was happy to have been able to help and also that I was not only from Colorado where Secure Vantage is headquartered, but an active member of the local Microsoft Management User Group, which Secure Vantage also generously sponsors each month.  They also had a "VIP area" at the closing party which they welcomed me to join them at.  Thanks again for everything Secure Vantage!

At the MyITForum party they announced that they will be setting up a "scholorship fund" for future MMS sponsorship of a needy person much like myself this year.  They will be taking sponsor donations and have an account set up to take donations in an attempt to create a fund to pay for airfare, hotel, and admission to MMS 2009.  As soon as I heard that I talked to Rod, Megan, and Ron and told them that as soon as it is set up, I want to be the first person to donate to that cause and give a little something back.

Well, I certainly have rambled on enough for one post so I will wrap it by saying once again how thankful I am to Secure Vantage, MyITForum, and Brian Leary for helping me to get to MMS this year.  Without the assistance of this community, its sponsors and fellow members, I most certainly would only have been able to read about MMS this year.

I'll save the sesson recaps, Rock Band contest stories, SWAG inventory, photos, and the return trip with 20" of snow looming ahead of me for other posts to come soon...