Microsoft Launches Kodu Game Lab and Design Competition

(3BL Media / theCSRfeed) Redmond, Wash. - March 16, 2011 - Microsoft Corp. today announced the full availability of Microsoft Kodu Game Lab for the PC and the launch of the nationwide Microsoft Kodu Cup 2011 competition. Kodu Cup invites students, ages 9 to 17, to design, build and submit their own video games using the Kodu Game Lab software — no previous programming experience necessary! Starting today, kids can enter the competition, read the Official Rules and learn more at http://koducup.us.   Microsoft Kodu Game Lab, available at http://fuse.microsoft.com/kodu, is a free game design tool that enables kids to easily build their own video games for the PC within minutes by dragging and dropping images and simple icons, rather than using complex programming languages. The tool builds real-world skills by encouraging kids to analyze a problem and develop a solution. They do this by building virtual cartoon characters and the worlds in which those characters live. The full release of Kodu Game Lab for the PC includes new features, such as an interactive system that guides users through each step of making games — creating terrain, adding characters and programming them. It also includes a community feature that allows users to share games with other PC-based Kodu Game Lab users.   “Today’s kids have a natural passion for video games and video game design,” said Michael H. Levine, Ph.D., executive Executive Ddirector of the Joan Ganz Cooney Center at Sesame Workshop. “Microsoft’s Kodu Cup is a great way to harness that passion and apply it in a way that helps improve academic achievement, skills and interest in the careers of the future, which are going to fuel our country.”   Read on at Microsoft's News Center.    MSFT12449