A high-level Microsoft executive made it clear recently that his company has no plans to release a portable gaming device. Instead, Microsoft will encourage game developers to create titles for handhelds and smartphones running Windows Mobile. To make this easier, the company is going to build a new group of gaming APIs into the next version of Windows Mobile.
Mark Spain, director of Microsoft's mobile devices division, told The Star Online that his company will add Direct 3D Mobile (D3DM) to its mobile operating system. This is a version of Microsoft's Direct X for handhelds and smartphones.
D3DM will allow developers to more easily control the graphics co-processors that are increasingly being added to these devices. Intel, nVidia, and ATi are all making multimedia accelerators for handheld devices.
D3DM will be built into the next major revision of Microsoft's mobile operating system, expected to be called Windows Mobile 2005.
|