a0005 building xna 2 0 games a practical guide for independent game developmen morebook vn 6627

Building XNA 2.0 Games
A Practical Guide for Independent
Game Development

■■■

James Silva and John Sedlak


Building XNA 2.0 Games: A Practical Guide for Independent Game Development
Copyright © 2008 by James Silva and John Sedlak
All rights reserved. No part of this work may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means,
electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage or retrieval
system, without the prior written permission of the copyright owner and the publisher.
ISBN-13 (pbk): 978-1-4302-0979-9
ISBN-13 (electronic): 978-1-4302-0980-5
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The source code for this book is available to readers at


This book is dedicated to my mom and dad,
who were always supportive of my game development obsession.
—James Silva


Contents at a Glance

About the Authors . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . xiii
About the Technical Reviewer . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . xv
Acknowledgments . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . xvii
Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . xix

■CHAPTER 1

A .NET Snapshot. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1

■CHAPTER 2

A Crash Course in XNA . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 19

■CHAPTER 3

Planning Your Game . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 41

■CHAPTER 4

The Map Editor . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 51

■CHAPTER 5

The Character Editor . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 93

■CHAPTER 6

Bringing It to the Game . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 127

■CHAPTER 7

Particle Mayhem . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 171

■CHAPTER 8

XACT Audio, Rumble, and More . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 221

■CHAPTER 9

Scripting, AI, and Depth (and Death) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 249

■CHAPTER 10

Menus, a HUD, and Deployment . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 291

■CHAPTER 11

Postprocessing Effects . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 333

■CHAPTER 12

Networking . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 361

■APPENDIX A

Designing the Wraith . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 399

■APPENDIX B

Storage . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 413

■INDEX . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 421

v

■I N D E X

creating AI class for, 402

XNA, a crash course in, 19–39

creating characters for the game, 399–411
designing with, 399–411

XNA Framework, eliminating classic
networking hassles with, 361

getting previous state and location of,
408–410

XNA Framework Remote Performance
Monitor for Xbox 360, 331

graphics, 400

XNA Game Studio, connecting the Xbox 360
to, 329–330

initialization script for, 401
wraith characters
definition script, sounds added to, 402
process of creating, 399–400
wrench triggers

adding new to appropriate frames of
animation, 210
defining, 209–210

XNA Game Studio 2.0
installing, 19
networking with, 361–362
working with pixel shaders in, 333
XNA Game Studio Connect
downloading and launching, 329–330
XNAPong

in character editor, 210

adding a background image, 33–35

putting to use for smashing zombies,
209–216

adding rumble to, 35–36

Write() function

adding the game logic, 27–32
ball logic for, 31–32

creating in character editor, 122–124

building, 20–39

making in Map class, 88

class-level (Game1.cs) variables, 28

using device and container to get a path,
415

coding audio for, 38–39
creating file for graphics in, 24

WriteToNet() function, 385–386

loading textures, 23

■X

paddles and gamepad logic, 28–31

XACT. See also Cross-Platform Audio
Creation Tool (XACT)
setting up game audio in, 229–231

task list for game logic, 27

■Y

XACT Audio, Rumble, and More, 221–248

you-are-dead screen, for ZombieSmashers
game, 325

XACT Auditioning Utility, for auditioning
sound files, 231–232

■Z

XACT project

zap cue object, playing from XNAPong, 38

creating new, 229

.zdx filename extension, 59

creating new wave bank file in, 229–231

zombie attack, adding animation for, 251

Xbox 360
deploying ZombieSmashers game on, 328
deployment, 291
storage container object, 413
Xbox 360 project
creating, 328
debugging, 331

zombie bloodsplosions, adding triggers for,
250–251
Zombie class, extending AI base class with,
265

zombie head splatter, 267
zombie hit trigger, adding in
CharacterEditor, 250–251

441


442

■I N D E X

Zombie Smashers XNA game, keeping
separate functions organized, 136

fields used in, 147–148

ZombieSmashersXna project. See also
ZombieSmashers game

in-game scoring, 327

adding CharacterEditor to, 93–94
building the game, 127–153
cleaning up odds and ends, 168–169
combat concept art, 46
creating, 51–53
hero concept art, 46
maps concept art, 47

implementing the action in, 210–216

initializing, 148
loading game content, 148
making enemies killable, 249–267
manually changing namespaces in, 128
parting word from author, 397–398
plugging everything into, 394–395
reorganizing the code, 322–326

naming, 49

setting character’s facing, scale, state and
starting animation in, 135–136

rough game plan for, 49–50

setting things in motion, 147–149

super simple scripting, 153–167

super simple scripting, 153–167

tool planning for, 47–48

updating, 320–326

zombie.zmx file, adding to ZombieSmashers
game, 199–204

updating frameTime calculating and
sound, 324–325

zombies

updating scroll and handling input,
148–149

adding animations to, 250–251
adding to ZombieSmashers game,
199–204
bringing into ZombieSmashers game,
202–204
in CharacterEditor, 199–201
making killable, 249–267
putting wrench to use for smashing,
209–216
shooting, 204
smashing, 204–216
ZombieSmashers game
adding a background image to, 150–153
adding the HUD and menu to, 320–321
bringing it all together, 285–289
bringing triggers into, 191–196
bringing zombies into, 202–204
class-level objects, 147
creating, 128
drawing one character for, 149

ZombieSmashers project
adding MapEditor project to, 52–53
creating, 51–53

ZombieSmashersXna project
adding audio to, 229–239
adding music to, 236–239
bringing audio functionality into, 233
sounds used for, 222–223
ZombieSmashersXNA.Particles namespace
creating BloodDust class in, 255–256
Zombie-Smashing game
choosing 2D or 3D for, 45
concept image for protagonist, 46
initial design, 46–47
maps, 47
planning, 45–50
tool planning for, 47–48