Ozymandias

Moving on from Microsoft

Ozymandias — Fri, 03 Sep 2010 21:07:11 +0000

Where to start?

Well, I guess I’ll just cut to the chase and say that I’m moving on from Microsoft to take a new role at Amazon. Can’t really talk about details at this point, but it’ll become pretty evident soon enough… and you all know where my passions lie.

I make this announcement with mixed emotions as I’m excited about where Microsoft is going in the next few years as they look to reinvent digital entertainment… but I’m also obviously very intrigued about what Amazon is looking to do. And add to that some of the smaller “intangible” benefits (such as a much shorter commute, dogs allowed at work, working in Seattle proper, etc.) it felt like the right time.

It’s been an amazing eight years here at Microsoft. I originally joined to help build and evangelize Xbox LIVE to a skeptical game industry. When I started, the team consisted of maybe 30 people in a hallway in the now-defunct Millennium campus. We’d work together to build the story of what we were trying to achieve, and then I’d hop on a plane and take some of the early slings and arrows. Not many people remember now, but there was a time when even the idea of Xbox LIVE was extremely controversial. We got… robust, shall we say, feedback on a variety of subjects. I remember folks insisting that voice would never be desired from the console audience, or that this whole crazy digital content download Marketplace thing would never take off. And of course, quite a few folks struggled to believe that Xbox LIVE would be a service that people would be willing to pay for. 25 million+ members later I think that debate has finally been put to rest.

I’ve always valued the passion Microsoft brings to identifying what the right thing is to do around a variety of topics for developers, publishers, consumers, and platforms… particularly the Xbox LIVE team. While I’ll never be able to recount them, I can say that there have been thousands of times when I’ve watched or engaged in a passionate debate in a conference room about some arcane subject where the platform teams (who are all also gamers) fought hard to do the right thing for the consumer – i.e., you. That continues today; those teams are all people who are also customers of the service, and I’m comfortable saying the future is very bright under their stewardship.

I know many of you have been watching this blog as of late for Windows Phone 7 news. For obvious reasons, I won’t be the right person to be writing about WP7 in the future, but did want to encourage you to keep an eye on the following blogs in the future:

Can’t share much more right now – I have a lot of learning to do, and need to learn where the lines lie. As I get up to speed I hope to be able to share information here and via my Twitter account, but I can’t make any commitments as to what or when at this point. Hopefully we’ll be able to have some interesting conversations in the not too distant future!

Thanks for reading, and thanks for all of your support over these last few years – it’s been greatly appreciated! Now onward!

New XNA Creators Club Educational Material Available!

Ozymandias — Mon, 23 Aug 2010 17:26:57 +0000

Just wanted to point folks over to the XNA Creators Club Online site today, as we’ve just released a set of samples, articles, and labs that are designed to help teach developers of all levels how to make games for Windows Phone 7 using XNA Game Studio. The first set of material is focused on introducing developers to the platform. Later phases will focus on optimization tips and tricks, as well as how to refine and polish a game and get it ready for launch.

We encourage you to download the Windows Phone Developer Tools Beta and start building your games! The launch of Windows Phone 7 is a great revenue opportunity for developers, whether you plan to launch a game in the Xbox LIVE portfolio or in the general Windows Phone Marketplace. That’s actually a point worth clarifying a bit more. We have two types of games (those that use Xbox LIVE services, and those that don’t.) Developers with game ideas that don’t need Xbox LIVE services are welcome and encouraged, and hence can choose the approach that works best for their business. Games and other apps that do not use Xbox LIVE features will be available in the Windows Phone Marketplace.

Games that do use Xbox LIVE features need to meet certain standards, especially when it comes to awarding Xbox LIVE Achievements and Gamerscore. That is why we decided to take an approach similar to Xbox LIVE Arcade, where only pre-selected developers can implement Xbox LIVE features in their games. That said, we’re open to partnering with all types of developers for the Xbox LIVE portfolio on Windows Phone 7; many games created by independent developers will be available in the Xbox LIVE portfolio at launch and we encourage other indie developers to submit ideas!

Short form, we welcome all applications and games, from big to small, and provide everyone with the same opportunity for great quality apps and games to be found and discovered. We’re looking forward to seeing what you come up with!

Time to Return your Rented Cable Modem?

Ozymandias — Wed, 11 Aug 2010 17:47:08 +0000

Just a quick note to suggest folks who rent their cable modem (usually for $4-5 dollars a month) think about buying your own and returning the old one. Here in Seattle Comcast tends to be the most common broadband provider. I’ve been renting an old Motorola Surfboard from them for years – first for $4, then $5, then just last week I noticed the price had increased to $7 a month. Some folks at work pointed out that for $85 you could buy a new Motorola SurfBoard 6120 DOCSIS 3.0 capable modem from either Newegg or Best Buy… and as a bonus, thanks to DOCSIS 3.0, you effectively get a free speed boost. (My connection speed leapt up by around 30-40% downstream and doubled upstream on several tests.)

The speed boost may not stick around (at least without paying for higher tier of service), but at $85 you can quickly recoup your rental costs and cut your cable bill. Apparently lots of folks are doing this – the folks at the Comcast office were very familiar with my request, and I saw two other people doing the same thing. Something to think about!

Stream your Personal Music Library over the Web

One Year of Gaming Tweets

Ozymandias — Wed, 28 Jul 2010 18:37:20 +0000

With thanks to Joystiq for the pointer, wanted to share an infographic created by Aggregame that visually shows one year of Twitter videogame-related chatter. Aggregame filtered over 28 million gamer tweets to find the top 150 commonly used words… found a few things interesting:

Xbox, PS3, and Wii rule the gaming platform roost – PC is much smaller
Modern Warfare, MW2, and Halo are all roughly the same
Kinect significantly larger than Move
Amazon pops up as being “game-relevant” – and not Gamestop

Anyway, take a look and enjoy!

Windows Phone 7 UI Design and Interaction Guide Updated

Ozymandias — Thu, 22 Jul 2010 17:43:23 +0000

Just wanted to point folks to the newly updated Windows Phone 7 UI Design and Interaction Guide (PDF). To quote a summary mail:

The UI Design and Interaction Guide for Windows Phone 7 v2.0 has been updated for beta. With additional information and a new layout we hope you will find more readable, this guide provides detailed information about UI elements and controls, UI system behaviors, and the interaction model for the touch interface based on the design system codenamed “Metro”. Designers and developers should read this guide to learn about the dos and don’ts of UI implementations for their Windows Phone applications.

The Design Templates for Windows Phone 7 are a collection of 28 layered Photoshop template files and system fonts that can be used to create pixel-perfect application layouts, to help guide UI development, or to pitch an idea. These design templates showcase many controls that are a part of the Windows Phone Developer Tools Beta. They also include examples of controls that are a part of Windows Phone, but are not available as a part of the Windows Phone Developer Tools.

In addition, I’m pleased to say that some of the work I’ve been doing around game developer guidance made it in on pages 18-19 – woot! As always, let us know if you have any questions!

XKCD: War

Ozymandias — Thu, 22 Jul 2010 16:13:48 +0000

I don’t know why this new XKCD strip cracks me up so much… but I love it! Fair warning if you haven’t come across XKCD before: you’ll probably spend a lot of time browsing through their strip archives.

Oh, bonus hint: always check out the hover text on the strips…

Kinect, Molyneux, and “Milo and Kate”

Ozymandias — Tue, 13 Jul 2010 19:55:17 +0000

Just wanted to point folks to a Wired UK write-up of Peter Molyneux’s TED talk today… it’s a great read! In general, I think folks are going to be really impressed by some of the Kinect titles that’ll be available this year (and no, that is not a hint about Milo and Kate’s release date!) My favorite quote in this article?

Lastly, Molyneux departed with one intriguing nugget of information about the title. He wouldn’t say when it was going to be released (I’d put money on Christmas 2011 — Microsoft isn’t going to want this one hanging behind Kinect’s release too much), but he did disclose that Milo’s mind won’t be on the disc — it’s in the cloud, and gets much smarter the more people use it.

We’re at the very beginning of a huge shift in how applications of all sorts (including games) are built. As more and more logic is shifted to the cloud, we’re going to see really interesting scenarios that just couldn’t have been enabled before. This “hive-mind” is just a small example – and if you branch-predict ahead a little, you really start seeing huge shifts in what the word “platform” means, and how people (and developers/publishers) interact with it.

Seattle: So That’s Where Everyone Went!

Ozymandias — Thu, 24 Jun 2010 16:58:45 +0000

A friend sent along a very interesting link with infographics showing where people have been moving within the US. Living in Seattle, I found the image below particularly fascinating; maybe we’ll find a use for all those new condos after all!

Be sure to go and check out the original source Forbes article, as you can make your own interactive maps by selecting different counties across the country.

How do You Sign In with Xbox LIVE on Windows Phone 7?

Ozymandias — Tue, 22 Jun 2010 21:56:55 +0000

As promised a few weeks ago, I wanted to come back and walk you through the experience of using Xbox LIVE on Windows Phone. Today we’ll focus on how you log in, and how Windows LIVE ID is integrated into the system. Next time we’ll walk through how the gameplay experience works. Lots to talk about here, so I’ll just dive right in!

One of the most important things to understand about Windows Phone 7 is that access to all of your information centers around a Windows LIVE ID (WLID for short, also once known as a Passport or Hotmail ID). When you use Windows Phone, you log in once with your WLID. That, in turn, gives you access to a variety of linked data services including Hotmail, Windows Live Photos, Find My Phone, and yes, your Xbox LIVE account. Many people have a Windows LIVE ID (WLID for short) associated with their own personal email address, and if you have a Hotmail account you also already have a WLID.

The first time you power on a Windows Phone you’ll be asked if you have a Windows LIVE ID. To show your Xbox LIVE account on the phone you need to enter the WLID associated to your gamertag. If you don’t remember the WLID username and password you can tap the information link “I have an Xbox LIVE account.” for instructions to find your WLID on your console.

Once you’ve completed that setup, when you enter the Games hub it will retrieve your Xbox LIVE account, and you’ll see your Gamertag and other Xbox LIVE profile information as you continue to use the phone. If you want to use a different WLID on your phone (e.g. you want to use your Messenger ID instead), you will need to use your console to repoint your Xbox LIVE account to the phone WLID before you make purchases in the Marketplace or use Xbox LIVE in the Game hub. You can find information on how to associate your Xbox LIVE account with a different WLID here.

After signing in with your Windows LIVE ID, you’ll land on the start screen which has a Games Hub icon. Selecting the Games Hub icon brings you to the Games Hub itself. Note that at this point the avatar shown is either your real one (if you’ve associated your Xbox LIVE account with your WLID), or a generic one (because you aren’t currently an Xbox LIVE member).

If this is your first time with Xbox LIVE, you can select the “Play games with friends. Join free!” option. You’ll then go through a simplified Xbox LIVE account sign up process where you enter your Country and Date of Birth. Hit Accept, and you’re now the proud owner of a free Xbox LIVE account… with a couple of minor things left to tweak.

Since this is a new Xbox LIVE account, we don’t have a Gamertag for you, nor an avatar. To speed your signup we automatically create a Gamertag and show a blank avatar silhouette. You’ll be able to change them later, so select “done” and we move to the Games Hub.

You’ll notice your automatically generated Gamertag here, as well as a rather drab avatar silhouette. Tap on the avatar silhouette and you’ll be taken to an avatar editor, or tap the Gamertag to edit your profile details and change your Gamertag.

Once done, you’ll be back at the Games Hub and ready to explore all that Xbox LIVE has to offer on Windows Phone 7. You might choose to check out some of the suggestions in the Spotlight, or edit your avatar. You can view your achievements, and browse game invites and requests. Or take a look at the game Marketplace and see what tickles your fancy!

We’ll talk more next time about how you can purchase games and how the game play experience works. In the meanwhile, let us know if you have any questions!

Tourists versus Locals Photo Heatmaps

Ozymandias — Wed, 09 Jun 2010 17:07:31 +0000

Thanks to Gizmodo for a cool link to some photosets mapping photo hotspots in different cities. You can check out the work Eric Fischer did here on Flickr, and below is a small thumbnail of the Seattle heatmap. I can say from experience that the local vs. tourist trends indicated below ring true – pretty cool stuff!