Microsoft Gamefest happenings

(Wrote this earlier today and thought more was coming. Not so much.)

Microsoft's Gamefest is in full swing (I just realized I had an invitation; blast), and there's quite a bit happening of interest to gamers -- consumers and creators.

XNA Game Studio Express is becoming XNA Game Studio 2.0 -- This has some cool additions in the infrastructure (including Xbox Live network development) and Xbox 360 areas. My concern is I'm currently using the XNA Game Studio Express 1.0 Refresh, and while 2.0 is touted as working in "all versions of Visual Studio 2005. This includes Standard and Professional", I hope this still includes the Express versions. Also, I hope my projects survive the 1.0 to 2.0 upgrade. More info at the XNA development blog.

Third-party additions to XNA Studio -- It was cool enough that Torque X was available for Creators Club members. Now SOFTIMAGEXSI 6 Mod Tool (3-D modeling and animation software) will be free to use in XNA Game studio (for non-commercial projects).

Dream-Build-Play Challenge Contest Winners -- This is pretty cool. Microsoft has announced a bunch of winners for their indie dev contestm giving 10 grand and Xbox Live Arcade publishing contracts to John Flook (Blazing Birds) and James Silva (The Dishwasher: Dead Samurai). And Microsoft gave an unexpected $5K and extended contracts to two other, second-place winners, Steve Olofsson (Gravitron Ultra) and Daniel McGuire (Yo Ho Kablammo!). There were like 4,500 entries to the contest.

New ways to use Microsoft video and screenshots -- Microsoft has lifted the legal banhammer (mostly), allowing more use of screenshots and video from their games (for parody, machinima, etc.). It's for the stuff for which they own (or own trademarks), and it's for non-commercial use. The full rules are over at Xbox.com, and it's actually pretty generous (and a combination of retroactivity and proactivity on Microsoft's part). Good for them.

Schizoid debuts -- Schizoid is the first XBLA title built exclusively using XNA Game Studio Express (at least, first indie-built title). It showed up at Gamerfest, and there's video, too.

Xbox Live. Population: 7 million -- So, there are now more than 7 million Xbox Live subscribers, and combined they've downloaded 45 million ... things. I need more deets on the numbers before they mean anything (or before I snarkily dissect them).