XNA/DirectX being discontinued?

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    • XNA/DirectX being discontinued?

      I'm a bit confused about this news article regarding the end of XNA and DirectX?

      "The XNA/DirectX expertise was created to recognize community leaders who focused on XNA Game Studio and/or DirectX development. Presently the XNA Game Studio is not in active development and DirectX is no longer evolving as a technology. Given the status within each technology, further value and engagement cannot be offered to the MVP community. As a result, effective April 1, 2014 XNA/DirectX will be fully retired from the MVP Award Program."

      I don't fully understand what this means. It sounds like, "We're done spending resources to develop XNA and DirectX." I can't possibly imagine this means they're saying, "Hey, Windows game developers, get out." I would assume they're still going to continue developing certain parts of DirectX (e.g. Direct3D), but not all the APIs that fall under it? Maybe now would be a good time to really start learning OpenGL ...? (I'm sure MHolley would be thrilled if that were the case :-P)

      I feel like I'm missing some important detail(s) here. Anyone have some light they can shed on the subject?
    • RE: XNA/DirectX being discontinued?

      According to the comments on slashdot, so is the rest of the internet:
      games.slashdot.org/story/13/02…hases-out-xna-and-directx

      You are correct, you are definitely missing some important details. We all are. This was supposedly a leaked email Microsoft sent out, so all it's really doing is kick-starting the rumor mill. It's unclear what will actually happen. This could be anything from Microsoft phasing out PC gaming to them simply retiring the names and calling those technologies something else, or anything in between. There's no way to know. Based on the feedback I'm seeing, it's possible that they'll make an announcement. They might even do it at GDC, which would be fitting. I was in the audience at the GDC where they first announced their whole XNA architecture.

      When it comes to business, follow the money to find the truth. Is this the end of PC gaming? No. That wouldn't make any sense since they can essentially support PC and xbox gaming simultaneously. Is this the end of DirectX? Probably not, though it might go by a different name. Xbox uses DirectX so unless they want to get out of the video games market, they can't ditch DirectX without replacing it with something at least as good, which is possible, though not likely unless it's been in secret development for a while (which has happened in the past). Is this the end of XNA? Maybe. If Microsoft doesn't think they're making enough money to warrant the dev costs of supporting it, they will absolutely kill it.

      It'll be interesting to see what happens.

      -Rez
    • Would I be thrilled? I don't think so actually, Direct3D is great otherwise people wouldn't use it over OpenGL in the majority of cases, it offers an Object Oriented graphics API for those who feel more comfortable with that, I actually prefer OOP usually, but found OpenGL to my liking.

      I am in favor of OpenGL and highly recommend it but I began with Direct3D and know personally it is just as nice, however OpenGL feels easier to get started personally.
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    • Originally posted by mholley519
      Would I be thrilled? I don't think so actually, Direct3D is great otherwise people wouldn't use it over OpenGL in the majority of cases, it offers an Object Oriented graphics API for those who feel more comfortable with that, I actually prefer OOP usually, but found OpenGL to my liking.

      I am in favor of OpenGL and highly recommend it but I began with Direct3D and know personally it is just as nice, however OpenGL feels easier to get started personally.


      Ah. Well I am also under the impression you're really a Linux guy. Hypothetically if Direct3D disappeared, everyone would be using OpenGL and ports to Linux would probably be more readily available. Of course this is my own assumption in a world of "if this that and the other" which will probably never happen. That was really the underlying assumption in my original joke :P
    • I am a Linux user, however for the longest time I have worked under windows mainly because of Visual Studio, now that I have become comfortable with Eclipse I will be migrating all of my work over after my current project is finished.

      Really when it comes down to it, I would love if everyone made a linux port for there games, or even if Microsoft would somehow port Direct3D to more than just it's own OS's, which I imagine would be a colossal job. But as bigger game industries are driven by investors or capitalist owners, to pitch a massive game like Battlefield or COD to be ported over may not make financial sense. That is why I like the games on Linux, very few of them are games where the makers have said "This market will be extremely profitable", but instead likely said "I want as many people to play my game as possible". I'm not bashing EA or anything as we know first hand there are passionate people working at those companies at all levels (Rez), but I haven't seen any serious EA games on Linux, because it is likely not in there financial interest to do so.

      I really hope that Steam takes off with its Linux port, every week or so a new game go's on the Linux version and they have even ported there own Team Fortress 2, Counterstrike and Half-life, and I believe Left 4 Dead 2 is in the works. Linux is not an extremely small market, I mean looking at a pie chart it seems small, but in 2012 Ubuntu estimated 12 million users, for me as a new and hopeful indie developer 12 million users is a huge market, even being compatible for just Linux would be more than enough, let alone the fact that we are targeting Windows and Linux, when we finish our game, even if we only sell 100 copies world wide I would be happy and have enough to take the team out for dinner :D.
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    • Game development is all about compromise. If you don't compromise, you either end up with Duke Nukem Forever and your game never ships, or you end up with Spore and your game is only a pale shadow of your original vision. In the professional world, the compromise is money and time. We need to ship a game at a specific time to fill a hole in the publisher's release cycle. We also need to guarantee that it reaches a certain percentage of the audience, which is why professional games tend to prefer sequels, reboots, and other "branded" names because it guarantees a certain amount of sales. That's the compromise. On the plus side, it means building a game larger than what any single person could do alone. The scope of triple-A professional games is staggering. Star Wars: The Old Republic had hundreds of people. WoW has more. We have about 200 on my team right now.

      For indie games, the compromise is scope. You simply can't build a game as big as a professional game because you don't have the manpower. You have to really narrow your scope and hone in on the fun of your game. Some games can do this really well, like FTL or Super Meat Boy or Braid. They had their core mechanics and it worked really well for them, but they were very limited in what they could do. Furthermore, the games industry as a whole is very unstable. Companies rise & fall each year. Indie games make professional game companies look solid as a rock. For every successful indie game team, there are literally hundreds (or more) that fail. You're also stuck doing all the work, which can be good or bad, depending on what you enjoy.

      -Rez