Skeckulous

And there's integration with Torque, expecially T2D, which of course is relevant because we use it in CTIN 483 and 484.
http://www.garagegames.com/products/torque/x/

Of course this is exciting on one level, but I do get suspicious when Microsoft enters the room...sorry folks. (I'll use it if it is as good a learning environment as pure T2D).
Also, don't think this will make porting to Xbox 360 easy. It'll be less painful.

And a final note- Torque presently works with Mac and Linux as well. So this would kiss that goodbye.

USC's Chris Swain comments about the xbox development on today's Marketplace

the xbox 360 announcement regarding xna studio express seems like a bigger deal than it really is at the moment. after looking at the faq, the current requirements for sharing a game you made for the xbox360 with another friend is that they are also a subscriber to this $99 a year service (XNA creator's club), and that they have the development environment installed so they can actually build your software themselves (ie you cannot distribute binaries). That's just too many roadblocks for an indie developer to get their stuff out there for this to be the revolutionary step that some people are hyping it as.

i imagine they'll have a less limiting system for distribution way further down the line. however, what really is interesting (to me at least) is the XNA framework itself and how it might empower people to more easily create 3D PC games. C# is a great language and if Microsoft is making it a more powerful choice for those wanting to develop real-time 3D applications, that is great.

Nintendo already commented at the beginning of the summer that they were going to make Wii available in the same exact manner. The SDK would be made available for a nominal fee and the games that are created by fans and indy developers would be downloadable via Virtual Console (the Wii online service). The fact that MS announced this on the same day that they announced that their camera was going to have depth perception software (to partially mimic the Wiimote's functionality) pretty much indicates that they're trying to draw attention away from the Wii's previously announced plans/features.

the same exact manner? i didn't hear the part about how Nintendo was making a cross-platform (console AND PC) framework. xna framework is free until you want to put it on an xbox 360: you can start out learning how to use it and making stuff with it for PC without paying anything.

we haven't even heard if the Nintendo SDK is gonna be less than $1000. we haven't really heard anything at all about Nintendo's dealie. Maybe its not coming for another year or so! its vaporware right now and xna, which has been under development for more than two years, comes out in beta form in 10 days. oh snap.