Creators Club Communiqué 28

Last week we had a minor malfunction in a lesser part of the server quadrant that is housed in the Omega Satari nebula on the edge of the Blogipeligo. We on Team XNA apologize for this unexpected outage, but assure you that we have resolved the issue and have returned to full functionality!

Now on to learnings!

One of the things I love most about being the XNA Community Manager, even more than  banning jerks and spammers, is that the vast majority of our community are mature, amazing space geniuses. This week there were a few forum posts from our incredible Creators that really impressed the team!

After downloading our 3D Particle Sample mtnPhil went ahead and improved on it by adding support for soft particles that work on the Xbox 360. This could help improve the look of a particle engine by smoothing the hard edges where particles intersect solid geometry in the scene.

While working on his own title creasso figured out how to attach a weapon to a skinned character hand. He lists some things you’ll need to have accomplished before his pro-tips will help, but if you’re working on a gunslinger or swordfighter (or other assorted hand and weapon combos) he might be able to save you some time!

Finally, THE LEXX combined our own Chase Camera Tutorial and a bit of code from a Riemer’s XNA tutorial on Quarternions with his own ideas to upgrade the chase camera with rotation!

As always many thanks to all the incredible Creators and MVPs that contribute to our ever growing community. You’re what we’re here for and why we’re doing it!

xxoo

~kathleen sanders

XNA Community Manager