XNA Creators Club
 

I'm considering joining and attempting to make a game that I could sell on XBLA. I figure that if the people behind Swords And Monsters can do it, so can I. I've looked at some books that I could learn C# through and am strongly considering going through with it. Anyone else thought about this?

Sounds interesting, C# is the more java like one yeah?

I say go for it OANST.

I know someone who'll do the music for it.

Me?

Do it. Even if you don't end up releasing the game, learning C is always something useful

Nah, though you'd probably be a lot better for the job.

This guy is a fuckin' weirdo.

pick me and I can churn out all the Neverhood jew folk you could ever want.

Holy shit I loved the Neverhood.

Anyway, if you want some halp I sure I could be bothered to learn some rudimentary C. It could be fun. Making up some random story or plot could be something I could do, too, depending on what you want it based on.

I probably don't have the time to help significantly but I'm more than prepared to offer moral support or code debugging where needed. I've lots of experience with C++ and some with C#.

I have to much dignity to learn C (Or any programing language for that matter).

What's dignity got to do with programming?

I can write the dialogue!


I hunger
I hunger
run coward
I hunger

are you sure dignity is the right word?

Clearly Moxco thinks that he's too cool to learn something as geeky as a programming language. His loss, especially when he's minimum wagin' and we're off on the gravy train to Usefulville.

Not when the Zombies come, Nate.

That's when we'll need Bike Repairmen and Neverhood Jew-tunes.

I'd buy it. ;)

I'm shit at computers but I could do art (providing I can hand draw it) and diogue/ script/ writing, etc. if you want.

Or literary language, for that matter.

Don't tell MoxCo I know basic HTML. He'll think I'm a loser, and God knows his opinion of me is too precious to my heart to have it be smashed in only two sentences.

I'm not sure if you guys are flaming me or anti-flaming me.

PROTIP:

They're making fun of you.

I have no idea what he'll think of the large proportion of Forum leaders who are experienced in Computer Science.

Probably much the same as what he already thinks of us. Now, if he finds out that for my job-that-I'm-hoping-to-get that I will have to learn Delphi... then he can safely lose respect in me.

On the plus side, I did just start learning Perl.

tl;dr version: Download Microsoft XNA Game Studio 3.0 first. Pay for membership later.

Good thing Non-Oddworld Gaming is part of 'Off Topic' Discussion. Anyways falling back to the OP's question:
It's my dream to one day become a Video Game Designer and having something like a download-able/purchasable game would be a great way to start. I was beginning to learn how to program with Flash, after unfortunately losing all my work with Game Maker. I decided to switch to Flash for the simple fact that it would be much easier to advertise my game and find a larger audience with it. Upon finding this thread I've spent a couple days trying to find everything I could learn about the subject. The opportunity provided by XNA is definitely something I would like to pursue, but in order to submit a game that would require me to become a 'Premium Member' aka pay $99.
This seems great, but unless your game makes at least the minimum payout you won't find a single penny for your work and just be down 99 bucks. This all just depends on how well you advertise your game and how well it is accepted by consumers.

Siding with caution I figure I'll take advantage of the free download of Microsoft XNA Game Studio 3.0. Only after working with those tools, if I feel I've made a game that could possibly make money will I pay for the membership.

Sup twelve-year-old myself.

So what has changed since then?

Sup ten-year-old myself.

Why did ya'll guys give up? I can't imagine spending the rest of my life having to go to a job that I hate.

Video games designing is like being a cake tester.

You ever get sick of cake?

Maybe it's because my dad worked at Sidhe Interactive (one of the very few commercial New Zealand gaming companies), but I guess you just realise how much work has to be put into it (it cannot be a solo effort, you need a whole team; Concept artists, modelers, coders, PA department, fucking everything).

It's become much like the film industry in that you need lots of money, which can be extremely detrimental to the integrity of your ideas vs the funders.

I dunno, just got turned off the concept. If it were the 90s, it'd be a fun thing to do. Give out shareware floppies and shit. The future of indie gaming is really just XBL arcade games and small innovative downloadable games where payment is optional (though that's not going to help the creators at all).

Well I guess it just isn't for everyone. I don't tire of things easily. Perhaps I just have a stronger passion for this then other people. Always wanted to be a video game designer since I was 3. 16 years later and I still have the same passion.
I've found programming extremely frustrating, but when I finally figure out that one thing that's making my program not behave correctly I'm completely over joyed. I'm the kind of person who when confronted with a problem no matter how long it takes to solve it I spend hours or days on it till I figure it out.

I think it really all depends on what you want going in. I want to be able to create something that other people enjoy and possibly learn something from. I don't really care if my game becomes a big seller or not, but the more people who get to enjoy it the better. Does it really matter if a indie game is downloadable or not? I think that just makes access to it easier. I don't see why the game has to be some disk you can purchase at a store to make it worth while.

If you find programming frustrating I can't see why you'd still follow that dream.

I LOVE programming.

Yeah, if programming is any kind of hurdle for you, you're pretty much fucked.

For the amount of time put into creating games, making them just for people to enjoy and/or learn from isn't enough. This is a fulltime, 9-6 job with lots of overtime. You could make mini applets as a hobby, but full games... nah.

Well if my goals never come to fruition what ever, at least I would have learned how to program in Flash and C#.
I actually find programming very interesting as I do math. Because of the simple fact that it feels like a concrete thing to me. I hate english with a passion because of how many things are situational. But in math 2+2 is always 4. Some how that brings me comfort. It's not that I dislike programming cus I don't. I just get frustrated when I can't figure out what's wrong when everything looks correct.
Like just a few hours ago I couldn't understand why my program refused to show me errors or output. To form a comparison I would create another program and just try to make it display an error which it did. Despite recreating the same situation in my project program it refused to show me the error. Then I noticed when I run a test on my project it makes the saves in my flash drive, while the made up new program saves on my hard drive. By simply changing where my project saved I could then see my errors and outputs.
From my previous experience in programming I just assumed everything worked off of the initial file, but apparently Flash is to cool for that. Once I figured that out I was happily able to go back to programming.