Interview - Last week, Microsoft held its annual XNA Gamefest developers conference.  During the conference, Microsoft announced major changes for its Games for Windows Live service. Also, the company announced DirectX 11, which is considered to be key API for next generation of PC and console games. We got the opportunity to chat with Microsoft’s Windows gaming guy about these changes and how they will affect the platform and gamers. And we learned that DX11 is perhaps the DX that should have been released with Windows Vista.

Microsoft had a big week and if you followed the announcements and are interested in how your PC will evolve as a gaming platform, there was big news. To get the details, we decided it was time to talk to Kevin Unangst, senior global director of Windows Gaming at Microsoft, which makes him the Windows gaming guy.

Here is what he had to say about Games for Windows Live, Marketplace and how DX11 will take advantage of your multi-core CPU and tap into the power of your graphics chip.


TG Daily: Just as a brief recap, what were the key Microsoft announcements at Gamefest from your point of view?

Unangst: During first day of XNA Gamefest, we have made several large announcements. These announcements touch both our Games for Windows Live service and updates to our DirectX graphics technology.

I'll start with Games for Windows Live, as I spend most of my time there. First of all, as of XNA Gamefest we made Games for Windows Live completely free. This includes the multiplayer, TruSkill matchmaking, cross-platform play and others. For Windows users, there is no charge now for either developers or the consumers. This will affect not only new titles, but rather all of the titles that exist in the Games for Windows Live catalog. At E3, you may have seen Dawn of War II, Fallout 3 and Battlestation: Pacific. All of these titles will support the new Games for Windows Live service. They will offer a free multiplayer feature and other very important online functionality.

The other piece of big news for the Games for Windows Live program is the fact that we are introducing Marketplace. During Gamefest, we have introduced this feature to the developers for the very first time. Marketplace is scheduled to arrive with our fall update for Games for Windows Live. The service will be available on the web, through a stand-alone client and it is really focused on delivering additional game content to enhance the gaming experience.  This could range from levels and maps to demos and game trailers. Those kinds of things will all be available through the Games for Windows Live service.


TG Daily: Why are you introducing these features now? What was the motivation, the movement inside Microsoft to bring all of these changes now - one year and several small changes after Games for Windows Live service was actually introduced?

Unangst: When we introduced Games for Windows Live about a year ago, we introduced the service with Vista, followed by the version for Windows XP. It was a cross-platform service. After that, we spent time listening to developers, PC gamers and reviewers. We evaluated what that service needs to offer in order to be successful. So, we went down the list.

Even though we had free PC-to-PC multiplayer, [developers] said: "look, if you're going to have another service on the PC platform, we want to have full matchmaking capabilities. We know that gamers love [our game] on Xbox 360, they love it on the PC. We want to have that and we don't want to have to pay $50 a year for that. We want to make sure it is easy to integrate and we want it to be as simple as possible."

Developers wanted an interface that was more designed for the PC, not something that had the look and feel of a console. All of those things tied together, we took their feedback and made certain changes. Gamefest just made a lot of sense for us to announce them. We wanted to tell people what they can expect to come next year, so that the developers can work on our platform and make it better.


TG Daily: How many people work inside the Games for Windows Live team?

Unangst: We don't break out our headcount of our resources based on a project that people are working on inside Microsoft. But I can tell you that since Microsoft announced [the Games for Windows Live service] two years ago, we went through a significant investment in Windows as a gaming platform. We have also exponentially increased the number of people that are dedicated to our Windows gaming effort. I can't give out specific numbers, but I can say that there is exponential growth in the number of people that wake up and go to sleep every night thinking about nothing else but how to make Windows gaming better. That includes our investment in our Live service and I think that you can see the way how we are shaping the future of Windows gaming.


TG Daily: To clear the confusion about the announcement: As far as we know, Xbox Live! Will remain unchanged with Silver and Gold subscription levels?

Unangst: Yes, there is no change on the Xbox side and I think if you saw the E3 announcements, there is obviously great value that we're going to continue deliver the Xbox Live service to customers through new features that are coming with the benefit of the [fee-based] Gold subscription. But, I think what this [announcement] illustrates is that our focus now is to bring connected gaming services. You still have the same friends list and the same gamer tag. There is just a different value proposition. You'll see exclusive things that come on the Windows side that may not come to the console side and vice versa, because they have different customers.

Read on the next page: DX11 will be fully backwards compatible