PAXNAUG - Portland Area XNA User Group

The third meeting of PAXNAUG will be held on Wednesday, May 28th at 6:30 PM at the River East Center location. We hope to see you there!

Rick Mogstad will be speaking on sprite movement. He’ll cover some concepts of sprite movement hitting on things like velocity, acceleration and deceleration. If you’re making a game, you’re going to want to move your sprite around and this will cover some  of the options available to you.

As always,  we’ll make sure to post cell phone numbers on the door so you can call us if the doors are locked. Refreshments will be available (we’re working on pizza again, but no promises if funding falls through, keep your fingers crossed!) and we still have several books to give away.

Mark your calendars and plan to come on down for some great networking and fun conversations on the XNA framework and game development in general. Whether you’re a hobbyist, an artist, a musician or someone thinking about working in the industry, think about stopping by and seeing what PAXNAUG is about.

Hope to see you there!

The second meeting of PAXNAUG is upon us. Well, tomorrow evening to be exact. Hopefully you didn’t forget and can still attend. Plan to be at the River East Center location on Wednesday, April 23rd at 6:30 PM.

We will again post cell phone numbers on the door because they still haven’t managed to adjust the lock times for the time adjustment (we’re hopeful they will eventually get that resolved). So if you come and the doors are locked, just call and we’ll come let you in.

Along with the pizza and the general social time, I’m going to walk through creating a simple 2D game using XNA Game Studio. We’ll see how far we can get in making a “complete” game.

Hope to see you there!

* the definition of “complete” may vary….

The first ever meeting of PAXNAUG has come and gone. Things went remarkably well and the turnout was great for our first meeting. Thanks to everyone who participated! It was great meeting all of you and hope to see you at future gatherings.

We are currently in the process of looking for a speaker for the next get together. If you or someone you know would like to give an XNA related presentation, please contact us so we can get things arranged.

Speaking of the next meeting, PAXNAUG will be meeting next on April 23rd at 6:30. The location will remain the same. We had a little issue with the doors to the building locking a bit early, but we managed to overcome that slight obstacle (for a bit more about how the meeting went you can read my blog post) Also, we’re always looking for advice and feedback so feel free to either contact us via email or leave a comment. We appreciate any feedback you might have.

Thanks again to all of our sponsors and everyone who came. I’m looking forward to meeting even more game development enthusiasts in the future. If you’re in the Portland/Vancouver area, make sure to get the word out, I’m really hoping to see the numbers grow for our next meeting.

April 23rd, mark you calendars and hope to see you there!

Our first meeting is coming closer, and we have some more information.  Our local XNA MVP, George Clingerman , has agreed to give an Introduction to XNA presentation.  This is a great opportunity if you are just getting started with XNA, or even if you are just curious about what it is, and why you should be excited about it.

Please RSVP by leaving a comment, so we can know how many to expect.

See you there!

The first ever Portland Area XNA User Group (henceforth referred to by the shorter, but harder to pronounce PAXNUAG) meeting is almost upon us.

What? You mean you thought you missed it? Well breath a HUGE sigh of relief because your worst fears were unfounded! However, if you don’t show up on March 26th at 6:30 PM, you will be living your worst nightmare.

You don’t want to be living in a nightmare do you?

So just what is PAXNAUG?

Microsoft has released a gaming framework called XNA. With this framework hobbyists, indies, students and guys who mistakenly think they can write World of Warcraft can create games not only for the PC, but for the XBox360 and now for the Microsoft Zune!

PAXNAUG was formed to give people interested in the XNA framework and games produced by the XNA framework an opportunity to meet and talk about everything XNA.

Ok, sounds cool (it does doesn’t it!), so where do I need to go?

Just come on down to newly renovated River East building located on Water Avenue and head up to the third floor. We will be in the Mt. Adams conference room (we will try to make it obvious). Just come in and starting making friends.

Here’s the directions to the River East building for you.

Google Map

Try to get there before 6:30 because the outside doors into the building lock at 7PM (if you can call someone inside, we can come down and get you if you’re REALLY late).

So yeah, um..what are we going to do there?

Well, we’re not too sure on the format just yet. For this first meeting, we’re looking to do more of just a meet and greet see who’s who in the Portland area that’s interested in XNA.

At later meetings, we’ll try to have more formal talks planned with demos. We’ll play it by ear though and see what people want.

Our local XNA MVP, George Clingerman, has agreed to give our first presentation! He will be giving us an Introduction to XNA, so if you are new to XNA or wondering what you are missing, be sure to check it out.

Anything else?

Yeah, please RSVP by leaving a comment in this post so we can get an idea of who is planning on showing up. We are going to try and get some pizza and sodas so we can munch while we talking about everything XNA. Since we’re paying for this out of pocket, it will help to know just how many people are expecting to come.

So in summary…..

Who? PAXNAUG

What? XNA Meet and Greet

Where? River East Center

1515 SE Water Ave

Portland, Oregon 97214

When? Wednesday March 26th, 2008 at 6:30PM to no later than 9 (probably earlier)

Why? Because we are loving what Microsoft is doing with the XNA framework and you are too!

Hope to see you there!