14 DAY TRIAL // A collection of free resources available from Microsoft is designed to streamline the development of social games running on top of the company’s Cloud platform. The Windows Azure Toolkit for Social Games can be downloaded from Microsoft CodePlex free of charge, but developers will need to read the license carefully, as the toolkit is not open source.
For the time being, devs that are leveraging.NET and HTML5 to build casual games with a social networking twist can also take advantage of the toolkit in order to simplify their work.
The Redmond company is looking into adding support for more languages in the future, although when exactly will this happen is anybody’s guess at this point in time.
“This toolkit includes accelerators, common libraries, and deployment tools to help developers quickly get started building social games. Additionally, the toolkit provides samples and guidance for other scenarios, such as using Facebook credits to monetize a game,” a representative of the Windows Azure team stated.
There are of course a variety of advantages over using Windows Azure as opposite to a server running under a desk somewhere. Cutting down backend costs and overhead and scalability are just some of the benefits of Windows Azure.
“The Windows Azure platform provides game developers with on-demand compute, storage, content delivery and networking capabilities so that they can focus on development as opposed to operational hurdles. The toolkit also provides unique capabilities for social gaming prerequisites, such as storing user profiles, maintaining leader boards, in-app purchasing and so on,” the Windows Azure team member added.
Devs curious about the kind of experiences made possible by the Windows Azure Toolkit for Social Games need to check out the proof-of-concept game that ships with the set of resources. Dubbed Tankster, the game was developed by Grant Skinner.
“This game is built with HTML5 and comes complete with reusable server side code and documentation. It also supports a variety of ways gamers can interact with each other, such as messaging, wall posts, and comments; player achievements and game stats are presented on a live leaderboard. After all, what’s a social game without being able to talk a little trash?” the company representative added.
Windows Azure Toolkit for Social Games is available for download here.