M$ isn't an accepted abbreviation. MS is.

Nothing more to say about this except: get the fuck back to the topic guys.

P.S. If you google MS you'll find microsoft.com as the 4th result. Google M$...you won't find what you're looking for. So, again, no. Just no.

I feel like I'm stuck in some sort of reading comprehension black hole where people think I'm arguing for M$ being fine...

XNA is, at heart, fundimentally a DX9 focused API and DX9 is on it's last legs; it was going to die at some point and be replaced, when better than to drop it out when a new OS/hardware/console cycle is kicking off? Now, however you've got a year to consider detangling your 'game play' and 'backend' logic so that if you want to get in on the Metro stuff you can be nice and prepared for it.

Welcome to technology; Things change. Learn to adapt.

Now correct me if I'm wrong, but couldn't XNA be rewritten for DX 11/12? Why drop it completely because of a new API? I mean Microsoft is not going to rewrite the whole .NET platform for WinRT are they? I would assume that XNA would evolve but the backend stuff would just call WInRT methods or still call .NET methods which wrap DX calls.

But if we all have to use DX now, does that mean that Promit & Co. are going to have a busy 12 months, seeing SlimDX is also C# methods that wrap around DX calls?

Now correct me if I'm wrong, but couldn't XNA be rewritten for DX 11/12?

Sure.. they could rewrite the entire Windows to use Haskell if they wanted to.. the point is: why would they?

Let's face it, XNA is great but the quality of the work created with it is pretty low, the whole indie channel on xbox went pretty bad, save some rare exceptions all you have is awful games or awful games with avatars.
Also add the great work people are doing with SlimDX and SharpDX and ask yourself if really there is the need for MS to commit to an upgrade of XNA?
I think they are just being consistent with the direction of the gaming" API they provide.. look how slim DX11 is compared to DX9. The general idea seems to be that, if you are serious about producing a game, you will do things your own way.

I don't see the advantage of XNA beside being based on C#.. and C# isn't going away any time soon. If there is a target audience, projects like SharpDX/SlimDX will take care of it and, surely, higher level libraries a-la sunburn will pop out. But, we are talking about 2+ years (maybe more) down the line before Win8 Metro apps will be "the only way" to do games, so people developing with XNA still have lot of time to profit from their investments without getting hysterical... and, if their codebase is a good one, all you'll have to do is to rework the rendering side of it.. just as a C++ shop that needs to move from DX9 to DX11.

Let's face it, XNA is great but the quality of the work created with it is pretty low, the whole indie channel on xbox went pretty bad, save some rare exceptions all you have is awful games or awful games with avatars.
Also add the great work people are doing with SlimDX and SharpDX and ask yourself if really there is the need for MS to commit to an upgrade of XNA?
I think they are just being consistent with the direction of the gaming" API they provide.. look how slim DX11 is compared to DX9. The general idea seems to be that, if you are serious about producing a game, you will do things your own way.

a big part of XNA is to be used as a learning tool, and it is amazing for that. It has a very complete and well written/presented set of tutorials and sample projects that are fairly easy to throw things together with. Also to be noted is that it's a great prototyping tool. While it might not be the finished platform of a lot of great games, there are a lot of amazing indie games that start as XNA games before being ported to C++ for extra performance.

Now correct me if I'm wrong, but couldn't XNA be rewritten for DX 11/12? Why drop it completely because of a new API? I mean Microsoft is not going to rewrite the whole .NET platform for WinRT are they? I would assume that XNA would evolve but the backend stuff would just call WInRT methods or still call .NET methods which wrap DX calls.[/quote]
I think the problem is that the only things we've heard about xna recently have come from teams that are not the XNA team. It makes me think that most of the quotes are more along the lines of, "I have no idea what's happening with XNA. I don't work in that department. I just make DX," rather than, "XNA IS FINISHED."

I do think an update on where xna is going would be nice though. Would be a huge shame to not promote metro apps with the library.

[quote name='Alpha_ProgDes' timestamp='1317608556' post='4868466']
Now correct me if I'm wrong, but couldn't XNA be rewritten for DX 11/12?

Sure.. they could rewrite the entire Windows to use Haskell if they wanted to.. the point is: why would they?[/quote]
You realize that analogy was very inappropriate. The two aren't even in the same realm. I really hate when people go to the extreme like you did.

Let's face it, XNA is great but the quality of the work created with it is pretty low, the whole indie channel on xbox went pretty bad, save some rare exceptions all you have is awful games or awful games with avatars. [/quote]
It's an indie channel with beginning developers. What would anyone else be expecting?

Also add the great work people are doing with SlimDX and SharpDX and ask yourself if really there is the need for MS to commit to an upgrade of XNA?
I think they are just being consistent with the direction of the gaming" API they provide.. look how slim DX11 is compared to DX9. The general idea seems to be that, if you are serious about producing a game, you will do things your own way.[/quote]
SlimDX and SharpDX are wonderful libraries, but how do/should those libraries preclude the existence of or need for XNA? The leap to this conclusion really doesn't follow.

I don't see the advantage of XNA beside being based on C#.. and C# isn't going away any time soon. If there is a target audience, projects like SharpDX/SlimDX will take care of it and, surely, higher level libraries a-la sunburn will pop out. But, we are talking about 2+ years (maybe more) down the line before Win8 Metro apps will be "the only way" to do games, so people developing with XNA still have lot of time to profit from their investments without getting hysterical... and, if their codebase is a good one, all you'll have to do is to rework the rendering side of it.. just as a C++ shop that needs to move from DX9 to DX11.[/quote]
Aside from this hysterical business, that seems to be in every other post, the fact is that XNA is a great tool that can produce great games. Even pro dev shops have made games with it with great success. The library provides easy access, great setup. Like other game dev libraries, it can produce great games or terrible games. If XNA is not for you, that's understandable. But don't think that's a reason to condemn everyone else.

SlimDX and SharpDX are wonderful libraries, but how do/should those libraries preclude the existence of or need for XNA? The leap to this conclusion really doesn't follow.

They don't preclude anything... they open doors instead. What I was trying to say is.. if ever XNA goes out of the window, just look around, there are new and (possibly) better ways to do games in .NET .

I understand that XNA brought a lot of new young game developers in the business of making games, and that is a good thing, and that will continue to exist because, just as any other .NET library, XNA will still work on Windows 8.

What I don't understand is the hysterical (again) response to the idea that MS won't update XNA. So what? Was DX9 "updated"? Actually no.. they redesigned the entire DX api for the 10/11 .. you don't see native DX developers crying around don't u? It should be the same with XNA or whatever will come after XNA.

New OS, new technology, new APIs.. get ready to learn and evolve.. it has been like this for the last 50 years of computing, it's going to be like this for the next 50.

SlimDX doesn't solve the problem of getting your game deployed and sold on a console; XNA does. Until that is remedied there can never be equivalence between the two. Also, do realize that as long as Microsoft intends to support XBLIG there will be a need for something like XNA - unless someone here believes that XBOX3 (or whatever they end up calling it) will give out their entire devkit right of the bat. I, for one, find it... unlikely.

SlimDX doesn't solve the problem of getting your game deployed and sold on a console; XNA does. Until that is remedied there can never be equivalence between the two. Also, do realize that as long as Microsoft intends to support XBLIG there will be a need for something like XNA - unless someone here believes that XBOX3 (or whatever they end up calling it) will give out their entire devkit right of the bat. I, for one, find it... unlikely.

sorry but.. where is the problem? XNA deploys to XBOX and will keep doing so with or without Windows 8.

What I don't understand is the hysterical (again) response to the idea that MS won't update XNA. So what? Was DX9 "updated"? Actually no.. they redesigned the entire DX api for the 10/11 .. you don't see native DX developers crying around don't u? It should be the same with XNA or whatever will come after XNA.

I think the point being made from the OP is that nobody is sure if anything will come after this version of XNA or if Microsoft will drop it completely. Even with your DX9 example, there was still DX10/11. They were different, but there was still a next version of DX.

I'm sure XNA developers would welcome a complete overhaul to the XNA library to fit into metro applications even if it involved having to make changes on existing games as long as xna were still there.