It's gotta be free. It's hobby, after all, not a business!. Creating for-profit software isn't an issue, but anything that requires a hardware mod is out.
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606answers:
9
+5
A:
Nope, I don't think so. The only other .NET environment for consoles I know costs money and is called unity3d: http://unity3d.com/
I think it supports the iPhone and the Wii and uses Mono as runtime environment. 200 bucks and you are in :)
Armin Ronacher
2008-09-22 19:35:55
Sweet! That's a big +1. If you happen to spot any others, add them to your answer to stay on top.
Dustman
2008-09-22 22:44:19
From website: "You must be a an Authorized Developer for the Wii console and obtain a Wii development kit"
Joseph
2008-09-28 09:27:49
I have found the Nintendo development process to be somewhat of a headache, but not impossible. Unity3D staff will work with you to move it forward, but I recommend checking out http://www.warioworld.com/ as well.
bowditch
2009-05-31 23:08:43
+3
A:
No, all of the major consoles, except for the Xbox 360, do not have open development environments. There are various homebrew kits you can get, but these aren't sanctioned by the console makers (Nintendo, Sony, and Microsoft), so at best, you'll only be able to give away ROMs of what you make for free. If you try to sell anything, you'll get sued into the ground.
Adam Rosenfield
2008-09-22 19:41:50
+1
A:
Free and official? No. And XNA isn't free in the respect that you have to pay $99 to use it on the 360.
You're pretty much limited to hacked, homebrew development, coupled with hardware modification. There's at least one console out there where the hardware modification is not required but I'm not sure if we can talk about it.
On a historical note, Sony released something in Japan called Yarouze on the PSX which had a similar situation to the XNA Creators Club on the 360 (paid kit, only for hobbyists) but it never came to the USA.
Schnapple
2008-09-22 19:43:26
Actually, the Net Yaroze was available in Europe (I bought one), and I think the US too. The API was fairly limited compared to what you got with the proper PS1 development system, though.
James Sutherland
2008-09-25 14:06:48
A:
It depends what you classifies as a console. The iPod Touch and the iPhone has got the iPhone SDK with which it should be possible to develop quite good games and when you're done they can easily be distributed through App Store either fer free or for a price of which you will be given 70%.
VoxPelli
2008-09-22 19:44:43
+1
A:
Not as widely documented and supported as XNA, but here are some libraries with documentation/wiki's for the handheld consoles.
Evil Activity
2008-09-22 19:45:21
+2
A:
As Adam said, homebrew is pretty much the only way to do what it sounds like you want to do. A lot of times, using homebrew kits also involves modifying the console in some manner.
There is a Linux-based portable game device called the GP2X that might interest you, but I think that open source game development (or at least game development using open source tools) is more of a PC thing.
If you are a student at an accredited university, you can get a free 12-month trial subscription to the XNA Creator's Club through the Dreamspark site.
bhinks
2008-09-22 19:46:20
A:
as bhinks mentioned, there's the GP2X, but has been around for a bit, and there's a huge community of homebrew game developers for it. the GP2X has now ceased production, and it has 2 successors on the way, the WIZ by the same company, Game Park and the Pandora which is a proper enthusiast device.
the beauty is you can do games in SDL and build for all devices, including the PC
geocoin
2008-09-26 09:27:51
A:
Just pay your $200 for the Unity3D indie license and you can create games for Pc, Mac, the browser, iPhone and Wii. It's arguably a more powerful enigne than XNA because it has built-in collision detection, physics etc
Iain
2009-05-12 08:41:43