Rom's Rants

Wednesday, November 22, 2006

Runner-Up

I just got an E-mail from CMP, the people who run the Game Developers Conference. Turns out I was first runner-up in their haiku competition. No prize for being a runner-up, but given that I wrote my 8-haiku entry in under 20 minutes, being first runner-up isn't bad.

They'll post the haiku on the GDC website shortly.

Update, 2:16p: Looks like the one haiku of mine they didn't post was the one that cost me first place. My original entries, with the omitted one bolded:

Annual absense
Has caused career turmoil
So I must attend

The keynote speeches
Lead to a renewed sense of
Purpose for our games

The featured classes
#define our purpose: Coding
Experiences

The panels bring out
The curmudgeon and the sheep
To battle it out

Casual Games Summit
Connects the hardcore with mom
To bring fun to all

IGF: Where next
Year's ripped-off gameplay is seen
Today in the flesh

GDC Awards:
We celebrate each other
But only one wins

So many classes...
So much information, but
Why ignore testing?

Labels: Contest, Personal

posted by Michael Russell at 11/22/2006 01:34:00 PM | 0 Comments Links to this post | View blog reactions

Thursday, November 09, 2006

[Contest] Win Free MSDN/VSTS While I Rant

Cory over at AddressOf is offering an opportunity to win a free subscription to a single-developer seat of Visual Studio 2005 Team System and (possibly) a subscription to MSDN Enterprise.

The catch is that you have to say what you would do to get it.

As for me, I'm not sure what I'd do for it. I certainly wouldn't pay the overinflated single-seat license cost of $10,939 for it, which is as much as you would pay for premium dorm space at Stanford for one year. Hell, I'm lucky to have Visual Studio 2005 Standard.

I guess if I had one thing to get it, it would be to hack together the bastard child of SharpDevelop and XNA Game Studio Express Edition to bring together the promise of .NET (language independent development, platform neutral coding) and XNA (game development for the masses) to bring the true meaning of .NET development to light. Just as all gamers don't speak English, not all game coders speak curly braces!

Gamedevs, cast off your unnecessary typecasts! Walk with me towards a bold future, where the language we code in is rendered irrelevant by the end result: interactive entertainment that can be created by anyone and enjoyed by anyone on the platform of their choice, be it Windows, Xbox 360, Zune, PocketPC or smartphones. Let your games live anywhere, whether or not they use Live Anywhere. Send these unnecessary restrictions into the void.

The tools are there. Microsoft documented the interfaces for us to call. (Poorly, but the documentation and interfaces are there.) You can try to take away our language independence, but you'll never take away our freedom!

Labels: Contest