Entries tagged with kodu - Channel 10

Kodu Updated!

Sarah Perez — Fri, 12 Mar 2010 16:52:00 GMT

According to recent news posted on the Microsoft Research site, there’s a new build of the Kodu game creator now available and with the release there comes a lot of new features. Some of the more notable changes include improved mouse controls, a new hint system and an automatic update mechanism. There are also a number of bug fixes and minor improvements which will make the overall Kodu experience even better than before.

The full list of changes includes the following:

Automatic updates: When installing the new version you have the option to opt-in to have Kodu check for updates each time it starts up.
Usage information: When installing the new version you have the option to opt-in to having Kodu send anonymous usage information to help us make Kodu better.
New privacy statement.
Add support for Cyrillic characters.
Added mouse control buttons to help screens.
Allow the ‘Home’ key to take you directly from the MainMenu to the HomeMenu. Note that this only works if you already have a level loaded, ie you’ve either loaded a level or resumed since starting.
Allow going from paused mode straight to the HomeMenu. This is great for creating nice thumbnails since you can pause the game, move the camera to where it looks best and then go straight into the HomeMenu to save the game.
New Hint system. When toast pops up you can either press <Y> on the gamepad, or F1 on the keyboard or left click with the mouse to bring up the modal version of the dialog. Created a handful of hints that work with the new system.
Fixed bugs with ToolTips being rendered underneath AddItem menu and over text editor.
Fixed bug where dragging a character with the mouse across the bottom of the screen would drop the character and activate the ToolBar.
Added HelpOverlay information for tag editing on LoadLevel and SaveLevel menus.
Fixed help overlay information for paused mode. BTW To get into paused mode, on the keyboard just hit the ‘pause’ key. With the GamePad you have to press both triggers AND boh stick-buttons at the same time.
Fixed end of game display so you can just click on the buttons on the screen as well as pressing them on the keyboard.
Fixed bug caused by transitioning between gamepad and keyboard/mouse modes while the AddItem menu is active.
Fixed a bug in the radio button UI element which was causing its value to be ignored.
Fixed a bug in the text editor’s handling of key caps.
Tuned the physics behavior of the apple, rock and soccer ball to be less infinitely bouncy. This should not affect already created levels.
Fixed a bug with how the SaveLevelMenu handles mouse input.
Modified more built-in levels to be keyboard/mouse friendly.

You can grab the latest release of Kodu for PC here.

Kodu Tips Available

Larry Larsen — Thu, 04 Feb 2010 15:53:00 GMT

A couple weeks ago I wrote about Kodu being available on the PC. If you'd like to find out more about using Kodu, or you know a young potential dev who needs help getting ramped up, the Microsoft Research Blog has posted some tutorials on using Kodu. Tutorial #1 covers Basic Navigation, tutorial #2 covers the Edit Mode Tools, #3 goes over the features on the Load Level menu, and tutorial #4 goes over the Main Menu Options.

Kodu Now Available for PC

Larry Larsen — Wed, 13 Jan 2010 17:12:00 GMT

You may remember seeing the Microsoft Research project Kodu for Xbox last year. The game allows programming novices to develop robust games on the Xbox and control interactions between the characters. Now the PC version is available in beta form which is great news as most schools don't have Xbox 360's.

With Kodu, the idea is to give kids a way to accomplish something they didn't think they would be able to do while strengthening their design, math, and problem-solving skills. It was created as Matthew MacLaurin, director of Future Social Experiences Lab, watched his then three year old daughter interact with a computer. Realizing there was a disconnect between the passive experience she was having and the coding that went into applications, MacLaurin began the project. Kodu is now used in more than 60 educational institutions around the world including a pilot program across 26 schools in Victoria, Australia. You can download Kodu for PC and get started here.

Bye Bye Popfly

Lori Grosland — Fri, 07 Aug 2009 08:50:00 GMT

Falls ihr noch nicht gehört habt, wird Popfly am 24. August eingestellt und alle Sites, Referenzen und Ressourcen werden abgeschaltet. Das bedeutet, dass alle Spiele und Mashups, die ihr gemacht habt, wird gelöscht. Ich finde das sehr traurig und werde Popfly vermissen. :-(

Aber das Popfly-Team hat uns ein Abschiedsgeschenk gegeben: das Popfly Game Downloader. Es ist ein Tool, das erlaubt man Popfly Spiele herunterzuladen und offline zu spielen. Um das Game Downloader zu bekommen, müsst ihr nur ein .Zip-File herunterladen und das Tool installieren.

Das Game Downloader Tool findet ihr auf dieser MSDN-Seite: http://code.msdn.microsoft.com/PopflyGameDownloader

Mit dem Game Downloader Tool könnt ihr jede geteilte (shared) Spiele, die du selbst gebaut hast oder von dem Community herunterladen. Mashups und private Spiele sind nicht unterstützt.

Tipps und Tricks zum Dowloader Tool findet ihr auf der Coding4Fun Webseite: http://blogs.msdn.com/coding4fun/archive/2009/07/22/9845135.aspx

Obwohl Popfly bald weg ist, gibt es immer noch viele andere Möglichkeiten eure Programmierung-Fähigkeiten weiterzuentwickeln. Schau mal diese Ressourcen an, um mehr zu lernen:

Web Applikationen -Microsoft Web Plattform Installer: http://www.microsoft.com/web/

Xbox – Microsoft XNA: http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/xna/default.aspx

Xbox – Kodu: http://research.microsoft.com/en-us/projects/kodu/

Windows Programmierung – Microsoft Express: http://www.microsoft.com/express/

Und natürlich auch AntMe: http://antme.net/

Kodu Nears Xbox Launch

Sarah Perez — Tue, 30 Jun 2009 15:20:00 GMT

Kodu, the new game that teaches kids (or anyone) the basics of programming in a visual environment, is getting closer to its public launch. On Sunday June 28th, the game was released into “Peer Review,” which means that the independent developers over at the XNA Creator’s Club will now be evaluating the game for stability, appropriate content, and copyright issues - just as they do with any other community-created game.

Assuming all goes well, after a certain number of developer sign off of the game, it will be made available for sale in the Xbox’s Community Games Channel. The absolute soonest this could happen is Tuesday the 30th, since it takes 48 hours after approval for a game to go live on the service.

If, on the other hand, the game has any problems or bugs that need to be corrected, it will obviously take longer to arrive. We hope that’s not the case! Fingers crossed! In any event, someone will update the Microsoft Research blog if any issues arise, so stay tuned.

Otherwise, log on to your Xbox later this week to (hopefully) try Kodu for yourself.

CES 2009: Watch Kodu in Action

Larry Larsen — Thu, 08 Jan 2009 02:43:00 GMT

Matthew MacLaurin, Principal Program Manager for Kodu (the game formerly known as Boku), sits down to show us a preview of playing the game. And what better way to show off a programming tool for kids than to have a kid in the driver's seat. Sparrow is one of the young testers who helped with Kodu and she shows us some of her favorite characters and playgrounds.

CES 2009 Matthew MacLaurin on Kodu

Larry Larsen — Thu, 08 Jan 2009 00:06:00 GMT

Matthew MacLaurin is the man behind Kodu (formerly Boku), a Xbox game designed to help children learn the basics of programming launching on Xbox Live this spring. Kodu is both surprisingly simple and incredibly complex, allowing a child to make a simple game, or an adult to rapidly prototype a far more complex game.

Matthew sat down with me to talk about Kodu, where it started, and how to create a programming language that can easily be coded using an Xbox controller.