Microsoft’s software development kit allows designers to build games for the Wii Remote.
Hot on the heels of Microsoft’s announcement that their first party IP Viva Pinata would be making an appearance on DS, the Redmond-based software behemoth demoed an extension for it’s proprietary software development kit, XNA, that adds support for Nintendo’s Wii Remote as an input device. The extension, which was released in March, is known as Managed Library for Nintendo's Wiimote and was coded by Brian Peek.
Speaking for Microsoft at a seminar hosted by Assembly, an organization that sponsors seasonal festivals to promote education and networking events for game designers, Chad Z. Hower presented a demo of how to build a game on XNA, which used the Wii Remote as the controller. Hower’s demo was relatively basic, featuring only a simple stick figure to demonstrate the ease of the interface. While XNA can be used to develop software on the Xbox 360 platform, the console's lack of Bluetooth support, which the Wii Remote uses for communication, means that XNA programmers wanting to incorporate Wii Remote support into their games are limited to PC development.
The veracity of Nintendo’s claim to create a home console where the big idea can win out over the big budget is still up for debate, but few can now argue that the tools are out of reach for someone who wants to give it a try. Which leaves us with one question: anyone have any big ideas?