iPhone developer ports game to Zune HD in a mere 12 hours

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A few days ago, Novell unveiled its new 'MonoTouch' SDK to be used for developing iPhone applications in .NET, much to the happiness of some and, unfortunately, the opposite for others. It seems that developers are already taking advantage of this, according to Ars Technica, with a developer porting its popular game to the Zune HD in just 12 hours.

The developer, Foundation42, posted their milestone via Twitter, showing the power of Novell's new SDK and what can be achieved with it. The game that was ported is called WordMonger, and was displayed on a YouTube video which we have included below. Many have questioned Microsoft's games which were included with the Zune HD, as (although they're free) they display a short ad each time they are launched. To add to this, Microsoft doesn't have an official way of distributing apps as Apple does with its App Store, though that will perhaps come in the near future. The only way to install third party apps properly on the Zune HD so far, according to Ars Technica, is to, "[have the user] download and install Visual C#, .Net 3.5, and the XNA Game Studio 3.1. Then, the developer must give the source code of their game to the user, and make them build and deploy it manually."

This is a great step forward for iPhone developers, .NET developers, and even Novell, as their SDK will begin to show off its capabilities as more companies pull this off.

(4 replies) #1 zagor on 22 Sep 2009 - 04:02

The question is: will Microsoft take advantage of this? They have a huge developer base in general. All they need to do is develop a business model where developers can make some money.

But, I guess they are holding off for something else for the moment.

#1.1 M_Lyons10 on 22 Sep 2009 - 04:14

zagor said,

Perhaps it will launch with the Windows Mobile 6.5 App Store? It would make sense for the Windows Mobile App Store and the Zune App Store to at least use the same groundwork...

#1.2 cakesy on 22 Sep 2009 - 04:25

i think they will bring this out as soon as they can, they are just spending time on the backend. Microsoft, you need to get rid of those ad sponsored games as well, or at least have the ability to pay for them. I am sure google will let you use google checkout if you need a payment system.

#1.3 Trong on 22 Sep 2009 - 04:52

cakesy said,

If anything, Microsoft is probably going to want to use their 'Microsoft Points' system to be a bit more consistent.

#1.4 acnpt on 22 Sep 2009 - 07:09

Nah, keep the ad-supported apps(I'm not going to pay for a game, if i'm only going to play it for 30mins) and paid apps, just keep them in different sections, eg Paid and Free.

It was the free apps which made the app store so popular.

(2 replies) #2 M_Lyons10 on 22 Sep 2009 - 04:13

Wow. That's impressive. A shame the MonoTouch SDK is so costly...

#2.1 zagor on 22 Sep 2009 - 04:15

M_Lyons10 said,

You don't even need the monotouch sdk.
XNA zune hd extensions are out and developers are already digging it.

#2.2 GP007 on 22 Sep 2009 - 11:53

It's good news all around though, XNA was the first thing that popped into my head when I read the specs for the ZuneHD and how it would have Xbox360 tie-ins.

I really hope devs jump on it, and MS gets the app store ready (which should be the same one they have coming for WinMo 6.5 probably.)

(2 replies) #3 Rudy on 22 Sep 2009 - 04:31

The games hasn't been completely ported yet.... After 12 hours he has the main engine going but it doesn't look as smooth (might just be the video) and there's no sound, and no menus etc etc

A full 100% port will take him some more time (I'm guessing easily another 12 hours to polish everything). While this is impressive, it's nothing special. Porting is rather quick (especially from something like Objective-C to C#, if your code was well written then everything will translate fairly easily)

#3.1 cakesy on 22 Sep 2009 - 04:34

He may have used c as a base, you can do that with Objective-C. If you can do the same with C#, which you probably can't, then it would be not hard. Still, a great example of the developer tools that Microsoft offers (not that they are much better than Xcode on Mac OS X). Having used both, I still prefer the Apple way.

#3.2 wookietv on 22 Sep 2009 - 14:11

deleted comment, nevermind

#4 +Berserk87 on 22 Sep 2009 - 07:32

the camera hes using is terrible.

look at his hand moving in the video and its obvious that its the camera not the game.

#5 Pupik on 22 Sep 2009 - 10:01

I like that you can actually see the letters on the Zune version, even with the crappy webcam.

(1 reply) #6 neufuse on 22 Sep 2009 - 16:29

You know the Zune HD screen being OLED looks SO much better then the iPod touch's screen..... OLED is definatly the future in portable devices at least

#6.1 Ambroos on 22 Sep 2009 - 16:44

neufuse said,

Big +1, also noticed colors are a lot better on the Zune HD!!

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