kodu

Awesome!  Thanks for the updates.  I know that you guys are really busy!

Those characters rock! Ha.

I can't tell you how excited I am to get my hands on this! So close now! And I have to say, you guys have really created a fantastic overall look and feel. Bravo!

Nice! The fish are definitely very aesthetic.

My new desktop wallpaper.

What a nice surprise after a long wait--two updates on the same day!  Even seeing screenshots helps ease the wait a little bit.

Thanks for answering all of our questions on the other blog post.

I definitely can understand wanting to avoid linking worlds together since this is meant for beginners.  Maybe we can look forward to 'Kodu Advanced' in the future for fans who are ready to take the next step.

Is there functionality to copy a coded object from one world to another?  I suppose you must be able to duplicate worlds, so this would be another method to obtain the same result.

Hey, this stuff looks AMAZING. Thanks for all your hard work. Do you guys have a set release date yet? Or is that still in progress. I'm so anxious, and I just want to know when the wait is over.

Thanks

LETTERS ON THE GROUND!!!!!!

This is an awesome update.

Can't wait. I agree about the wallpaper. Changed it just now to the fishes.

yeah the letters are awesome, I hope we can access each letter as a char!!

Haha I too have joined in on the background phase.

Everybody's doing it! :o

Almost 100 FPS. Are you aiming for 90 FPS?

Hey I was just thinking. Maybe you could possibly do like kodu contests based on specific genres, or like best mock up of a retail game and the winner gets ms points or something. That would be awesome! Good work btw.

Hi, I was just wondering whether it was possible to impliment doors in the gameworld, not necessarily actual doors but a method of only allowing your charactor into a selected area or over a threshold if a certain condition is met, ie the kind of logic that would be needed in a 'find the key' element of a game?

I cant wait to try out some of my mini-game ideas, and I must say that from what I have seen, KODU is looking like an awsome tool. Great work!!

Hello,hmm I still dont quite understand.Will this be released to the public on the 360 first?Will the PC version be sold to the public or only to schools and such?

accel99: As my understanding goes... Kodu will be released to the public via the Xbox Live Marketplace Community Games Channel, possibly even this month.

A PC release is planned, but not for some time. The current PC versions I know of are in at least one elementary school in Michigan, and the one used to generate the screenshots we all see here from time to time. The school version seems to be something you (as a school administrator or principal) work out with sources for funding and Microsoft Research. Keep in mind my answer is unofficial and not Microsoft Policy. :)

I have a question of my own.

I know the meter filling up on the side refers to the number of objects added to a level. Is there a limit to how deeply we can code and define the objects in our games? And if so, is there a meter to display that?

Thanks again.

KODU is better than I even imagined lol.

Wait do you have it? Is it out??

KODU is in playtest right now in the XNA creators club, (crashed it twice) I'd tell you more but I'm not sure if I can. I asked if i could on the forums, but I'll send an email to mattmac too.

I was expecting he'd post a blog when it went to playtesting, but it's good to hear nonetheless.

It's unfortunate that you've crashed it, though.  I hope it doesn't get delayed.

That means it's close right?

Hi everyone, Matt said I could post whatever I wanted to about Kodu so I will.

giveusthisdayourdailygame.blogspot.com

Cool- darthuvius said in his blog linked above that  Kodu is now in the Creator's Club playtesting forum!

And, duh, I missed that announcement above.

I guess that since it is still crashable, we may have some time to wait before general release, though.

Well, according to his Blog there was already one patch since playtesting started... So it might be OK yet.

I crashed the new build too, Kodu is a very complex game, I'm going to spend all my free time testing it out, but I think it would take an army of testers to find all of the bugs. There is a way to do this though, I've asked Matt about releasing the beta of Kodu to trial members of the creators club.

YES YES YES YES YES MATT THAT IS AN AMAZING IDEA I WILL TEST THIS GAME DAY AND NIGHT.

Excellent,

It is reported below that Kodu is to be released on the 30th for 400 MS points.  The team must be working major overtime to make that happen.  That would explain the lack of updates here...

seattletimes.nwsource.com/.../2009373985_confirmed_microsoft_kodu_for_x.html

www.geek.com/.../microsoft-kodu-starts-game-design-careers-next-week-for-5-20090625

Regarding bugs, patches can be released for community channel content, right?

Lots of retail games release with numerous bugs and it wouldn't be possible to clear them all up even in a program of this magnitude.  Since this game is so complex, I disagree that it would get held back unless there's an absolute show-stopper of a bug somewhere that was easily reproduceable and occurred every time.

Also, depending on what you're doing exactly to crash it, the crashing might not really be an issue.  If you're creating an infinite loop with the intent to crash the program, well, of course it's going to lock up, but I don't think something like that should be considered an issue.  This is supposed to be a programming language of sorts after all, and programmers know it's pretty easy to freeze the system by doing certain things.

I hope you are right Spuz, I'll go crazy if I have to wait much longer for this, however I wouldn't be surprised if it was delayed by a week or two. While you, I and many others would happily put up with a few bugs I'm not sure they would give the green light if the younger budding programmers are going to make it crash easily. I do hope it gets released on the 30'th though, even if it's only a trial beta with saving/sharing disabled. I'd be happy to play around with it and report back on any bugs encountered, seriously I would!. For now let's just sit tight & hope!

NICE JOB on the research there GantryG.

And yes, they can do patches. I am a big fan of the community game Biology Battle. And their developer Novaleaf has been VERY good about interacting on the forums with gamers, listening to what they say, considering their likes and dislikes. And instead of changing everything, mostly major problems and bugs were fixed, while Novaleaf did their best to preserve the challenge of the game. :) They even made a statement about how Marketplace limits update/patches to once every two weeks. To date, Biology Battle is currently the only game I've purchased from the Indie Channel.

And regarding any negative buzz online...!

Koducious say:

He who is mentally challenged will always diss the rubix cube.

Peace and happy gaming!

Can you make a multiplayer game can it be splitscreen???

I have never seen anyone show or mention a splitscreen mode, so I would guess not on this release (anyone know otherwise?)  I have seen that you can make multiplayer games, up to four players on one screen at once...