Microsoft has released a new CTP of the Robotics Studio environment that works as a plug-in for Visual Studio 2005 (including the free Express Edition). Microsoft has the beginnings of a pretty big push into robotics with this product. You can read more about it here and here.
One robotics hardware product that this is designed to work with is the Lego Mindstorms NXT, which is a huge improvement over the previous generation Lego Mindstorms 2.0 line. I have a Mindstorms NXT, but I have not had time to do much with it yet, beyond building the first starter robot, which does a good job of scaring my minature dachshund!
