XNA 3.0 Game Programming

XNA 3.0 Game Programming

When Microsoft released XNA in December 2006, it immediately became clear that this

new technology would have a major impact on the possibilities for game developers. XNA was

designed from the ground up with ease of use in mind, while not sacrificing performance or

capabilities to achieve this goal. As a bonus, any game you create in XNA for the PC also runs

on the Xbox 360 console! With the coming of XNA 3.0, you can even run your 2D game on the

Zune handheld device.

In the span of two years, a large user community has grown around XNA. You can find

code examples on a vast number of sites, ask your questions in one of the lively forums, or

even meet local people who share the same passion in one of the XNA user groups. Whether

you want to get up to speed with XNA quickly or you have tried some of the tutorial sites and

are looking for the next step, this book is for you. With almost 100 recipes dealing with various

challenges you may encounter during your journey with XNA, this book covers each corner of

the XNA Framework.

The first recipes of the chapters in this book explain some stand-alone concepts and

have been kept as clear as possible. As an example, a recipe explaining how to load a 3D

􀁉􀁫􀁠􀁡􀁨 from a file and render it to the screen will not render any trees in the background to

make the final result look nicer, because this would clutter the code and make it more complex

than it should be.

On the other hand, each chapter ends with some recipes that combine all you’ve learned

thus far into something new and powerful. As such, you can step through the recipes, building

up your experience in XNA as you move to the next recipe.

This book explains the functionality of the XNA 3.0 Framework.

. If you have any questions regarding the text or code examples found in this book, I kindly invite you to post them on the forum on my site so you can get an answer as soon as possible.

The XNA Framework is roughly divisible into three parts. The main part contains your

XNA project and its code. Next in line is the content pipeline, a flexible component allowing

you to preprocess any art assets you want to load into your XNA project. Last, but definitely

not least, are the High-Level Shading Language (HLSL) effects, which are used mainly to

improve the visual quality of the final image you render to the screen.

Each chapter starts with some recipes that cover the XNA functionality related to the

chapter. However, this book can also be used as a detailed guide to the content pipeline and to

HLSL effects. Whether you’re brand new to XNA or looking to take the step from 2D to 3D, this

book will help you on your way.