BinaryJam

For some reason my blog appears high in the list of XNA blogs on particular topics.

One of the searches I get is step by step XNA, as I was bitching about the lack of docs from MS, probably a little harshly considering its a beta alpha.

There are plenty of resources out there most notably the Starter project, but for those unfamiliar with studio and c# that too can be daunting.

One good starting point for step by step is the XNA Book that LearnXNA has on its site.  This is quite good.  Its a shame its stopped at chapter four but then XNA is kinda stopped at chapter four till the next release comes out.

Take a good look round that site its pretty good.  There is also XNASpot

Also my delicious links have some handy resources there and I will add to this as I find good stuff. 

However there are many blogs out there “lets kill dave” being one I check up on a lot, worth reading, one for content and two for a jump off point.

So hope that helps anyone interested in XNA finding a better place to be than here.  Until I get more involved of course.

Oh yeh don’t forget Codeplex, this is filling up with XNA too, and the best way to learn anything is some else’s code, even if it is just to serve as a bad example. (Que jokes).

tags: xna, xna+resources

Can’t speak for it but I found the link on the forum and thought I’d publish it, just to raise its profile a little more.

Project is here

tags: XNA+Programming, Physics+engine, Game+programming

Haven’t tried these yet but as the family are away this weekend I will be trying them out, but if you want to beat me to it here they are.

X To SWM File Converter

Mesh Loader

tags: XNA+Programming, game+development

So I did my 2d now I’m trying to knock together a 3d.  I understand now that a mesh is essentially a pre-created bunch of triangles that save you coding things.

So first things first then.  Lets create a mesh file.

Can’t - Need tools.

Ok so Maya do a free to learn version, oh damn it plasters text over everything.
Ah found some free things, blender, an opensource 3d creator tool

Lets create a model then.

Can’t need talent.

Lets find a free one.

Great, hmm what’s this 3ds format, lwo format

Lets load it

Cant DirectX needs .x format

Convert it

Blender can export, great.

Lets Load it

Cant XNA only reads sml files all .x format capabilities, the original and most common are not in this release.

So convert that then

No tools to convert this yet, some hombrew version thats explodes but in XNA, nowt.

Sod it I’m gonna watch CSI instead.

Yesterday I finally managed to sit down, install and try the XNA framework.  After some initial struggle, more to do with my hardware than anything else its on.

I read the read me and decide to start with appropriately a starter kit. Wow, that’s a lot of code but it is a working game, not a very good one, but it works.  I had a look through and what struck me was the content folder and how many different types of file there was, from the TGA textures files and backdrops and sprite files, to the unknown SWM mesh format.  From this I concluded I have a hell of a lot to learn about 3d programming.

So I started with a blank project instead.  Whilst it’s nice to have a bells and whistles project to reference there is no substitute to starting from scratch.  Within minutes I had me a bouncy ball sprite program that ran very smoothly in next to no code very easy to understand.  This is the “Your first XNA program” in the help files so its no wonder the web is filling up with new versions of pong.  I haven’t gone as far as creating pong, it will be a good exercise, but I think I need to find out just what you get from the framework, all this talk of tools and I see nothing.

If you are brand new to DirectX programming and XNA then expect a very hard struggle and dust off those trig books from school you will need them from essentially what you could class as “lesson 2″.

In the forums people are complaining that they want more tools a kind of VB for games, drag and drop Doom, I don’t want this, that would be bad and we would end up with the same tired old excuse for a format with differing graphics.  What I DO want from MS and the XNA guys is a primer on what you need to do in a step by step guide with why you do it that way and where the tools are you need to do it, at least a link to tools you may need to purchase.

One tool you have to have is Paint.NET because the hobbyist can’t afford Photoshop.

I’m going to dig out my managed DX book and see if what I need is in there.

tags: xna, managed+directx, game+programming

There is a definate buzz about yesterdays XNA annoucement.  However the downloads (well the beta 2) version is not released but today (UK time) there is more information on the XNA site complete with forums. Still no depth to exactly how the xbox 360 stuff is going to work but at least a little more. So this is the last about it from me, well until I actually try some things, for those interested keep an eys onthe XNA team blog and the newly revamped XNA site. Tom Miller XNA Team Blog XNA Developer Center

tags: XNA, Game+Development

Having quite a few friends in the Games industry in Core, Gusto, Climax, Rare I keep an eye on things as once I looked into moving into this area but it did not pay enough for the hours worked, especially as I would have been moving from a lead role in business web development to general tool lackey in games. Even now I see the effort that my friends are “subjected” to and I really don’t want it. But that doesn’t mean that games writing does not still interest me, last year I bought the managed DirectX programming book. But down to the details. MS are announcing some cool things for the hobbyist in games, the ability to write your own, with managed DirectX you always could have a go but the XNA tool-set makes this easier, but the really cool bit here is to be able to write for Xbox 360, now that really grabs my attention. The Xbox stuff is not announced or released fully yet but keep an eye out for this imminently See Here http://blogs.msdn.com/tmiller/archive/2006/08/13/699131.aspx http://blogs.msdn.com/xna/default.aspx

tags: microsoft, games+development, xna, directx