Joystiq live from the Microsoft GDC keynote

Really cool news out of the Game Developer's Conference:

10:56 am PT -- It's changing today. For the first time, community games will be distributed through Xbox Live. (emphasis mine)

10:57 am PT -- "'Xbox Live Community Games' will give creators a huge audience to share their creativity with. Game distribution will be democritized, allowing the community to control the content. Create, Submit, Peer Review, Play are the four key steps." "We want creativity to flow through this pipeline," says Satchell. Oh, we get it.

Very cool...publish your own games, created in XNA Game Studio, on XBOX Live. And then there's this:

11:05 am PT -- Satchell whips out a Zune (he actually has one) and selects "Zauri", a topdown shooter. It supports custom soundtracks too (what with it being an MP3 player and all). You can take a game from Windows, to Xbox, to Zune, explains Satchell. "We've more than delivered," says Satchell of Microsoft's original XNA vision.

I'll be very interested to hear more about this. Major Nelson has blogged the announcement, so that seems like a good sign. More info when I hear more.

UPDATE: According to this, support for Zune games is coming in the next release of XNA Game Studio (3.0), a preview release of which should be available this Spring.

Combine this with the announcment of DreamSpark, providing free software to students, including an XNA Creators Club membership, and clear that it's a great time to be a gamer.

Here are the official announcments:

Xbox LIVE community games

XNA Game Studio 3.0 and Zune

Joystiq live from the Microsoft GDC keynote - Joystiq