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GDC Impressions: Gaming on Windows Phone 7
We already broke out the news you're looking for: Each of the Windows Phone 7 Xbox Live-infused games will offer its players 200 Gamerscore points. You'll be able to boost your Xbox rep in significant chunks without having to hunker down in front of a big screen for long stretches. You'll never again have to go so long without hearing that satisfying "Achievement unlocked" sound. The world, as you know it, has changed. Fortunately, the channel through which you'll access these on-the-go 'cheevos looks like it has loads of promise. The handful of work-in-progress Windows Phone 7 games we were shown today at GDC didn't leave much of an impression -- however, the effortless portability of games between the platforms supported by the recently announced XNA Game Studio 4.0 opens up a lot of possibilities for development on Microsoft's new mobile device.
Microsoft shows off XNA games running on Windows Phone, full 3D is a go
Alright, we're going to be straight with you: you're not going to like this. See, Microsoft just showed us a pair of 3D games running on its ASUS Windows Phone prototype and built with its brand new XNA Game Studio 4.0, but wouldn't let us nab a single photo or video of the process. What we can tell you is that they exist, they work, and at least Microsoft tossed us some screenshots to wave in your face. The two titles are The Harvest (pictured), a good looking touch-controlled dungeon crawler with destructible environments, being developed by Luma Arcade; and Battle Punks, a less impressive one-on-one sword fighting Facebook game by Gravity Bear that's being ported over. We didn't get to see any full motion 3D camera moves, since Battle Punks is just composed of two characters duking it out, and The Harvest has a fixed camera and some pre-rendered elements, but there were indeed some real polygons being crunched before our eyes at a full resolution (no upscaling), alpha-rev, choppy framerate, and we were assured that full screen 3D was possible. We also got to see one of our first glimpses of universal notifications on Windows Phone: Achievement unlock notices (also pictured above) that slide down from the top of the screen in a black bar and then slide back, and can't be interacted with. Follow after the break for some more nerdy details, along with a video of VisualStudio in action, and screenshots of the two games are in the gallery below. %Gallery-87820%
