If all the talk of Windows Phone 8 and the renewed focus on applications has piqued your interest, then you might want to check out a recent post on the official Windows Phone Developer Blog, laying out a number of tools and resources from their partners. Covering tools, UI development, and web API's, the list may not be comprehensive, but it has enough depth and detail that should let you find something to help your development.

To lift out one section of the post, Microsoft's JC Cimetiere talks about the resources available for game developers on Windows Phone 8, the majority of which are available to Windows Phone for the first time due to the addition of native code support to the operating system.

One significant feature of the Windows Phone 8 development platform is support for the native C++ programming model. Native code offers a number of benefits related to code reuse, and it opens up opportunities for game engines, physics, animation, audio libraries, and more. The following organizations are announcing Windows Phone 8 support:

And the gaming resources mentioned?

Unity Technology's tools and engine for WP8; Havok's vision engine; Marmalade SDK; Cocos2d gaming framework; SharpDX, an open-source C#/Managed DirectX API for.NET; Ogre, an open-source 3-D graphics rendering engine; FMOD Ex audio library; Autodesk Scaleform; and the Audiokinetic Wwise audio pipeline solution.

It's important to reduce the barriers to development at every point, and Microsoft gathering information like this into articles is a good step. Hopefully it's easy to find a few months down the line when someone who's never looked at the platform before goes looking for some tools.

You can read through Microsoft's full list on the official Windows Phone Developer Blog.