Lect 2 - XNA, Silverlight, Imagine Cup, (090119)

Rant first - Obama is President!

Obama has been officially inaugurated as America's President today! His speech was as usual, inspiring, though less rousing than I would've expected. It felt good to have the opportunity to watch a historic event in my lifetime, an event that is inspirational and gives the world hope for a better future, after the slew of tragic historic events that has struck the globe so far. 9/11, tsunamis, SARS, the melamine scare, Lehman brothers collapse, the disastrous Bush administration...all historic, but all horrendous.

Change, is in the air.

It is unthinkable that someone who has a drug history in college, born of a teen mother and from a broken family, made to relocate in different countries during his childhood, not to mention African American(!), can ever become the President of the United States. But Obama has proven that sucess is only a matter of hard work and being prepared for it when the opportunity arises.

I just feel that the inauguration of Obama is a defining sign that the world has changed in fundamental ways. Only a world (and an America) that has changed can ever concieve of trusting and voting for a black president. Somehow, boundaries have been re-drawn, in racial politics, in communication media, and in global awareness. And these are a positive changes, changes that I believe everyone has to embrace in order to survive in this new world.

Perhaps we are one step closer to utopia, where people are judged by their abilities and not the color of their skin, or their accent, where one person can reach and convince many with the touch of a mouse, and where diversity is tolerated and inter-cultural exchanges encouraged and celebrated.

Forgive me, I am emotional about his inaugration, it is a defining moment in world history. This is the moment where the world changes. The hinge on which we turn towards a new era. This is the moment, like Neil Armstrong's walk on the moon, that proves to the world that anything is possible.

Yes We Can.

______________________________________________________________

CS3216 - XNA

Yeah, I realized I inverted the order of things on this post, but I had to - it was fantastically exciting and inspiring to watch the whole thing live on CNA and AP online, while exchanging comments with a friend on MSN.

CS3216 lecture, however, was rather interesting. I'd known of XNA and Xbox live prior to the presentation, because I know the team that worked on Carneyvale Showtime, and everytime they achieve something great I feel really happy for them, because I really like the game and the art. Its a beautiful game, and its fun. I hope they win something in IGF 09! Oh, and if anyone out there has a Xbox 360, pls try Braid! My friend demo-ed the ending for me to see, and its a fantastic game, trust me. After seeing Zero Punctuation's review of Psychonauts , I damn gian to play tt too.. Too bad I don't have an Xbox.. ^_^ Oh, and try Portal!!!!

Well, there's one question I wanted to ask Yan about Xbox live arcade, but I couldn't think of how to express my question before he left:

As developers, we have an interest in getting people to play our game, if we put it up on Xbox live. Players must be able to find our game if they are looking for it, or chance upon it. So I wanted to ask how games are rated and categorized in xbox live arcade, and how Xbox live presents new games to players who are surfing the arcade.

This is important. Because if you are a developer and your game's good but isn't presented as the first few games avaliable, it might get passed over and not played just because it is not given equal "shelf space" as other games. Is there a way that xbox live is preventing that from happening? Like providing the 10 best in each category (puzzle, dating sims, etc), for example. Do they even have categories?

As the presentation showed, bad games can be displayed prominently as they are new arrivals. (uh, I thought the dating sim looked like a pretty bad game..i.e. a game I wldn't touch) So...is there a failsafe? Is there a reviews website? A search function?

I like the way deviantart.com manages user generated content. All new art is displayed on the homepage, and it is being constantly refreshed, like the xbox live "new arrivals" page. ( As an artist with a profile on deviantart, I'm sure I got some comments and favorites from my 2 seconds of worldwide fame on the "new arrivals" page.)

However, artists are also allowed to tag their artwork with names, e.g. red riding hood, and so on, so that users can search either the most popular art with that tag or the new arrivals for that tag. All art is also categorized, so users who are looking for anthro digital comics can go straight to their queries.

Anyways, I'm working on designing a 3d game w XNA in another module NM/CS4343, so I hope that works out well and we can post it up on XNA live arcade.. ^_^

______________________________________________________________

CS3216 - Silverlight

Ah...silverlight. After all that talk, I'm still not too sure about what its all about. All I remember is the deep zoom thingy that sounds dubious and that Yuhan mentioned is pretty much crapping on their part. I still really have no idea what WPF is all about.

And of course the Microsoft Surface - who can forget that! That's exciting. I'd seen similar demostrations during the Design and Technology exhibit at the Science Centre about half a year ago, and at ISEA 2008, and got the chance to play with them. Very exciting, and very fun! At the DAT exhibit I played with manipulation of images projected on the table surface (by a projecter on the ceiling) by manipulating physical objects such as cups and strings on the table. At ISEA I think I tried the ripples thing that MS surface showed. The ripples really wasn't fun tho. It got boring pretty fast. And what's the sense of the keyboard app? Two finger piano just isn't fun... >_<

I remember seeing a news clip on TV mobile on a shop in Taiwan..Hong Kong? which is already using the technology I saw in DAT to attract customers though. That was a few months back. I guess Microsoft surface is just upping the ante with the whole transferring files and pictures thing. That is pretty dangerous though, isn't it...allowing your pictures to spill all over the table.. very interactive though, and so much easier to transfer files.

Have I mentioned I hate handphones because I hate pressing those buttons? At least I'll have some easier interface to look forward too in the future. ^_^

______________________________________________________________

CS3216 - Imagine Cup

Ah.. possibilities. I really like the speaker for this one, I just wish she had more time to give her speech and to mingle around. She's such a proactive and positive person. The Imagine Cup looked amazing... Justin was like - aiyah, don't study liao la, let's just go for it.. ^_^

Hmm.. given the pace of the module, however, it seems like we can't really "enjoy" our speakers. After each lecture there's the rush to meet up for project meetings, and we can't really spend time with the speakers. Perhaps schedule it such that speakers end 15 mins early and we can all go out and mingle? The lecture room is so not conducive for mingling. ^_^

______________________________________________________________

CS3216 - Project 1

AAAAAAGGGGGHHHHHH....Our whole group spent Monday night after lect all the way till Tuesday morning 8am rushing out content for the facebook project.. Tired pictures on Facebook. It was impromptu.