Interesantes detalles de la interfaz

At the Game Developers Conference Europe 2005, Microsoft delivered an interesting lecture on Xbox 360 development, revealing some new info on the The Guide, Xbox Live, and other features that debut with the Xbox 360. Andre Vrignaud, Director of Technical Strategy for Xbox Live, explained attendants many new features that Microsoft has developed to make things easier for game developers. Here is a rundown:

The Guide

Vrignaud explained how the new Xbox 360 Guide liberates game developers from writing a lot of code since it is an always-running application that handles configuration and device management and common system tasks such as Xbox Live log-in, log-out, alerts, Friend’s List, game invitations, plus game saves, controller disconnection, music playback, and error messages.

In addition to that, the Guide also handles all the new features, such as gamer profiles, game achievements, and the Xbox Live marketplace among others.

By having this application running in top of games, developers have reduced considerably the code they have to write for anything that is not related to their games.

Microsoft has also given developer lot of options, including the ability to temporarily delay system messages during gameplay (you don't want to receive a pop-up just when you are arming a bomb in a Halo 2 match!) and even decide which part of the screen they want the alert to appear.

Vrignaud also revealed that developers have the option to skin the Xbox 360 Guide when their game is loaded with any theme and they can also display their own banners; similar to those ads you see on web sites which link to downloadable content for the title available on the Xbox Live Marketplace.


Gamer Profiles

Another area that Vrignaud touched on his speech was the Gamer Profile features, revealing some interesting tidbits.
One of the things that the Gamer Profile will include is your common game settings for different types of games. So for example, you always use automatic gear in racing games and inverted Y-axis controls in first-person shooters, once you load any racing game or FPS, the game will automatically load your Gamer Profile settings, saving you to set up any of these in the game configuration screen.

Developers are required to write the necessary code so their games always check your gamer profile before running the game, so they load the common preferences associated to the Gamer Profile that is playing the game.

Of course, you can take your Gamer Profile with you using the Xbox 360 Memory Unit and automatically load your profile in another Xbox 360 and continue earning achievements in other console.


Achievements

Speaking of achievement, Vrignaud revealed new info regarding this feature. As you may know, all Xbox 360 games, even if they don’t have an online mode, can feature achievements and accolades to indicate progress, skill, and accomplishment. Through Xbox Live and your Gamer Card, you can share your achievements online and compare what you've accomplished with your friends, or use them as indicators of skill to Xbox Live subscribers.
Andre explained that there will be a minimum of five achievements per title and developers can create up to a maximum of fifty achievements. Each game can have up to 1,000 points and developers are therefore free to set any amount of achievements for their games and give any amount of points per achievement as long as they don’t surpass the 1,000 points per game limit.


Making New Friends

In his speech, Vrignaud explained the importance of the new Reputation and Gamerzone features when it comes to find new gamers to play with and eventually add to your Friend’s List.

After every game, gamers will be able to provide feedback on other players which will set up for every gamer a sort of reliability rating. This together with the Gamerzone will improve the matchmaking capabilities of the next-generation Xbox Live.

Gamerzone is the equivalent of Reputation but this time is about rating yourself as a gamer. Every gamer will have four choices: R&R, for those who just want to hang out and play without undue competitive stress; Pro, for those who are fiercely competitive and must win at all costs; Underground, for those who take an alternative approach to gaming; and Family, for those who want to make sure the environment they play in is kid-friendly.


Technical Details

In his speech, Vrignaud also revealed some new technical details. Microsoft confirmed that the storage medium is completely abstracted, meaning that the game will choose from a variety of storage resources but does not assume which type of storage device it is. As long as the free space on the storage medium allows the game to save its data, developers should not worry about if it is an Xbox 360 hard drive, a memory unit or eventually, a remote storage space on Xbox Live. This is a clever way to guarantee backward compatibility with future generations as far as what storage respects.

Another interesting new feature is the fact that the new Xbox Live allows statistics to be displayed on the Internet, so those features that Bungie developed for Halo 2 will be a common features for Xbox 360 games.

Finally, it was also revealed that through The Guide, you’ll be able to launch “Quick Chat” sessions that also sit on top of any in-game voice. Developers need to a reserve an 8 kbps bandwidth stream for these quick chat conversations that run separately of in-game voice.

Keeping consistent with the Gamer Profile, games will also check if you have muted players so when you launch a multiplayer game, those gamers will remain mute in the Xbox Live sessions you play with a new title.

We’d like to thank Gamasutra for providing the Game Developers Conference Europe 2005 info. To read a complete report of what Andre Vrignaud said in his speech, click http://www.gamasutra.com/features/20050831/carless_01.shtml.

http://news.teamxbox.com/xbox/9133/Xbox-360-New-Details-from-GDC-Europe/

Si luego tengo tiempo lo resumo un poco.