Microsoft finally released Silverlight 5. As I mentioned in an earlier post 
the future of Silverlight seems to be in question. This is a shame, as I a really have a project in mind that Silverlight would have been a perfect fit for.
I know there is a big drive to eliminate Flash and Silverlight and move the world to HTML 5, but there are two problems with that.
First off, the developer experiences simply do not compare. I would much rather develop in C# than HTML5/Javascript, moving “back” to HTML feels like a giant jump backwards.
More importantly, HTML5 isn’t even close to either Flash or Silverlight in performance or even features. I am sure it will be eventually, especially given all the resources being thrown behind it, but that isn’t the case today. So I am still trying to decide if I go ahead with my Silverlight project or not… decisions decisions.
These are the new parts that will be of most interest to game developers:
Graphics
- XNA 3D API
- Improved Graphics Stack
- XNA 3D built-in effects
- XNA 3D Project Templates with full XNA Content Pipeline
- 3D surface composition settings
- 3D multi-sample anti-aliasing
Media
- Low-Latency Sound using XNA SoundEffect and SoundEffectInstance
- Hardware decoding of unprotected H.264 media
- Variable Speed Playback and Trick-play (new since beta)
- Remote Control and Media Command (Keys) Support
For those of you making tools, there are a number of key ( and handy ) data binding changes as well. You can get the full list of updates here. You can download Silverlight 5 tools here.
Now I have to wonder… is this going to be the final Silverlight release ever? I for one, hope not.
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