Is XNA Going Away?

The following consists of my opinion and does not constitute the passing on of an official statement from Microsoft. All thoughts and logic is purely my own and I do not have any more ‘insider’ information in this particular topic than anybody else

I’ve been hearing from the community a bit of noise about Microsoft’s XNA Framework- a Programming library and suite of applications designed to ease the creation of Games- being cut. A google reveals a lot of information, but a lot of it is just plain old rumours. The only one I could find that was based on actual information still makes a lot of assumptions. It is based on this E-mail:

Our goal is to provide you the best experience during your award year and when engaging with our product groups. The purpose of the communication is to share information regarding the retirement of XNA/DirectX as a Technical Expertise.

The XNA/DirectX expertise was created to recognize community leaders who focused on XNA Game Studio and/or DirectX development. Presently the XNA Game Studio is not in active development and DirectX is no longer evolving as a technology. Given the status within each technology, further value and engagement cannot be offered to the MVP community. As a result, effective April 1, 2014 XNA/DirectX will be fully retired from the MVP Award Program.

Because we continue to value the high level of technical contributions you continue to make to your technical community, we want to work with you to try to find a more alternate expertise area. You may remain in this award expertise until your award end date or request to change your expertise to the most appropriate alternative providing current contributions match to the desired expertise criteria. Please let me know what other products or technologies you feel your contributions align to and I will review those contributions for consideration in that new expertise area prior to the XNA/DirectX retirement date.

Please note: If an expertise change is made prior to your award end date, review for renewal of the MVP Award will be based on contributions in your new expertise.

Please contact me if you have any questions regarding this change.

This is an E-Mail that was sent out- presumably- to XNA/DirectX MVPs. I say presumably because for all we know it was made up to create a news story. If it was sent out, I never received it, so I assume it would have been sent to those that received an MVP Award with that expertise. It might have been posted to an XNA newsgroup as well. Anyway, the article that had this E-mail emblazoned as “proof” that MS was abandoning XNA seemed to miss the ever-important point that it actually says nothing about XNA itself, but actually refers to the dropping of XNA/DirectX as a technical Expertise. What this means is that there will no longer be Awards given for XNA/DirectX development. It says nothing beyond that. Now, it could mean they plan to phase it out entirely- but to come to that conclusion based on this is a bit premature, because most such expertise-drops actually involved a merge. For example, in many ways, an XNA/DirectX expertise is a bit redundant, since XNA/DirectX works using a .NET Language such as VB.NET and C# and very few XNA/DirectX MVPs truly can work with XNA in any language at all, it might make sense to just clump them with us lowly Visual C# and Visual Basic MVPs.

To make the assumption that XNA is being dropped based on this E-mail is a bit premature. In my opinion, I think the choice was made for several reasons. I guess some of the misconceptions might be the result of misconceptions about just what a Microsoft MVP is. First, as I mentioned before, a lot of the expertise of XNA/DirectX involves an understanding- and expertise- in some other area. Again, Visual C#, Visual Basic, Visual C++, etc. So in some ways they might have considered a separate XNA/DirectX expertise redundant. Another reason might have to do with the purpose of an MVP. MVP Awards are given to recognize those who make exceptional community contributions in the communities that form around their expertise. For example, my own blog typically centers around C#, solving problems with C# and Visual Studio, and presents those code solutions and analyses to the greater community by way of the internet, as well as sharing my knowledge of C# and .NET in those forums in which I participate. MVP awardees don’t generally receive much extra inside information- and that they do get is typically covered by a NDA agreement. The purpose of the award is to also establish good community members with which Microsoft can provide information to the community. MVPs are encouraged to attend numerous events where they can, quite literally, talk directly to the developers of the Products with which they acquainted. in some way you could consider MVPs “representatives” of the community, who are chosen because their contributions mean they likely have a good understanding of any prevalent problems with the technologies in question, and interacting with MVPs can give the product teams insight into the community for which their product is created. Back to the particulars here, however- as the E-mail states, XNA Game Studio is not under active development. Now, following that, it seems reasonable to work with the assumption that either that product has no Product Team, or those that are on that Product Team are currently occupied in other endeavours, or other products for which their specific talents are required.

It’s not so much that they are “pulling the plug in XNA”- the product is currently in stasis. As a direct result of this, it makes sense that without an active Product Team, having specific MVP Awardees for that expertise isn’t particularly useful for either side- MVPs gain from personal interactions with the appropriate Microsoft Product team as well as fellow MVPs, and Microsoft gains from the aggregate “pulse of the community” that those MVPs can provide. Without a Product Team for a expertise, that expertise is redundant, because there is nobody to get direct feedback. This doesn’t mean the XNA community is going away, just that, for the Moment, there is no reason for Microsoft to watch it’s pulse, because the product is “in stasis” as the OS and other concerns surrounding the technology metamorphize and stabilize (The Windows 8 UI style, Windows Store, and other concerns in particular). Once the details and current problems with those technologies are sussed out, I feel they will most certainly look back and see how they can bring the wealth of game software written in XNA to the new platform. Even if that doesn’t happen, XNA is still heavily used for XBox development- which is also it’s own expertise.

I hope this helps clear up some of the confusion that has been surrounding XNA. It doesn’t exactly eliminate uncertainty- this could, in fact, be a precursor to cutting the technology altogether. But there is nothing to point to that being the direction, either.