Quite a few people recently have been blaming Java for part of the downfall in current computer science (CS) graduates. While I don’t particularly like java, I’d like to go to its defence to say that teaching Java is not the real reason that a lot of CS graduates are no good these days. I know this is a touchy subject for some people so I apologise in advance if I’ve offended anyone.
For some time now I’ve been asked by a few people to write up my thoughts on a coding standard. To me, coding standards are like source control, until you use them you don’t realise just how awesome they are. Coding standards are a requirement for large software teams, however even if you are working alone I’d recommend adopting at least a simple coding standard.Keeping code consistent and readable is helpful when reading other people’s code as well as when reading your own code weeks or months are it was written. In effect a coding standard is trading development time for maintainability time. I’ve found that the ratio of dev time to maintenance time grows from 1:1 on a small project to something approaching 1:∞ on larger projects.
Now that I’ve discussed why you should be using XNA, I’d like to look from the other side and talk about what Microsoft should do with XNA to benefit both developers and gamers. XNA is a great opportunity for Microsoft to get even further ahead of Sony in the current generation of consoles; they just need to make the right decisions to get there.
A good friend of mine Damian Trebilco has just made public his new rendering technique. It takes the best parts of forward and deferred rendering. A paper on the technique as well as a demo showing it off are available at his Google Code page.
I thought I’d give a little insight into the things I learned about making a game for the Xbox 360 controller. I’m a big fan of the controller’s feel and ease in developing for it. The added bonus is that the wired controller can plug straight into the PC meaning there’s even more coverage for it. I won’t go into details of Xinput but instead give more general advice. I’ll also share a little knowledge that an ex-Microsoft colleague taught me about its use.
I have a lot of dreams about what I’d like to see in the future. One of the strongest dreams involves game development education. To put it bluntly, I’ve been unimpressed by what I’ve seen so far. There are a number of courses around but none of them have stood out as being amazingly good. Quite a few are too young to determine how good they are, but suffice to say, looking through resume’s of people, there’s no golden bullet of educational institute that guarantee’s a certain quality of programmer. So what does my dream involve, and how is it going to change the way games are made?
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