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The final release of XNA Game Studio 4.0 is coming soon

  • Artigo

Many folks noticed the recent post on the Windows Phone Developer Blog that announced a September 16, 2010 release date for the Windows Phone Developer Tools.  XNA Game Studio users have noted that CTP and beta versions of WPDT have included pre-release builds of XNA Game Studio 4.0, and they have asked whether that implies that XNA Game Studio 4.0 is shipping then as well.  Today, Kathleen posted more details about the answer to this question on the XNA team blog, and I wanted to summarize it here as well and provide a bit more detail about the scenarios that will be supported when XNA Game Studio 4.0 is released.

When will XNA Game Studio 4.0 be available, and what will it include?

The Windows Phone Developer Tools will ship on September 16, and XNA Game Studio 4.0 will also ship on September 16.  The final release of XNA Game Studio 4.0 will include the following:

  • Support for developing Windows and Xbox 360 games (tools, XNA Framework assemblies, Visual Studio 2010 integration, documentation, etc)
  • Support for developing Windows Phone games, but only if installed with the Windows Phone Developer Tools
  • Standalone XNA Framework Redistributable 4.0 for creating installers for Windows games

Along with XNA Game Studio 4.0, we will be shipping a beta version of a version of XNA Game Studio Connect that will allow you to deploy, run and debug XNA Framework 4.0 Xbox 360 games if you have an XNA Creators Club premium membership.  We will release the final version of XNA Game Studio Connect in the future, but the API surface area will be the same because that is defined by the XNA Framework reference assemblies that ship with XNA Game Studio 4.0.  That means that once the final version of XNA Game Studio Connect is released, you should not have to make any code changes to your game in order to get it to run correctly.

Where will I be able to get XNA Game Studio 4.0?

XNA Game Studio 4.0 will be available to install as a part of the Windows Phone Developer Tools installer or via a standalone package.  Windows Phone Developer Tools setup will install the same XNA Game Studio 4.0 package that will be available as a standalone download, and it will install some additional components to enable Windows Phone development.  The supported scenarios differ somewhat based on how you choose to install XNA Game Studio 4.0.

Windows Phone Developer Tools supports the following:

  • Windows Vista and Windows 7
  • Windows Phone game development in Visual Studio 2010 Professional or better and Visual Studio 2010 Express for Windows Phone
  • Xbox 360 and Windows game development in Visual Studio 2010 Professional or better, Visual C# 2010 Express and Visual Studio 2010 Express for Windows Phone
  • You do not need to install an edition of Visual Studio 2010 before installing Windows Phone Developer Tools

The standalone XNA Game Studio 4.0 package supports the following:

  • Windows XP, Windows Vista and Windows 7
  • Xbox 360 and Windows game development in Visual Studio 2010 Professional or better and Visual C# 2010 Express
  • No Windows Phone game development – you must install Windows Phone Developer Tools to do this
  • You must install an edition of Visual Studio 2010 on your own before installing the standalone XNA Game Studio 4.0 package

Comments

  • Anonymous
    September 09, 2010
    So, if we upgrade our projects to XNA 4 we cannot deploy to the xbox until you release the new connect tool? I assume if this is the case then you wont be forcing games to move to XNA 4 until after you release this tool?

  • Anonymous
    September 10, 2010
    Hi Trent - Yes, that is correct, but we are releasing a beta version of XNA Game Studio Connect at the same time as XNA Game Studio 4.0 so you will be able to deploy, run and debug your Xbox projects. We haven't yet announced timeframes for when the XBLIG submission pipeline will start accepting 4.0 games or when consumers will be able to buy and play 4.0 games.  Those timeframes will be announced in the future, so please keep an eye on the XNA team blog (http://blogs.msdn.com/xna) and the Creators Club site (http://creators.xna.com) for further announcements regarding XBLIG support for 4.0 games.

  • Anonymous
    September 13, 2010
    Any timeline on ZUNE or ZUNE HD Support?

  • Anonymous
    September 14, 2010
    Hi DaveP - XNA Game Studio 4.0 support developing games for Windows, Windows Phone and Xbox 360.  You will need to continue using XNA Game Studio 3.1 for Zune and Zune HD games.  You can install XNA Game Studio 3.1 and 4.0 side-by-side on the same computer.