Book Image

Microsoft XNA 4.0 Game Development Cookbook

By : Luke Drumm
Book Image

Microsoft XNA 4.0 Game Development Cookbook

By: Luke Drumm

Overview of this book

Microsoft XNA attempts to free game developers from writing "repetitive boilerplate code", allowing them to focus on producing enjoyable gameplay rather than tedious and complicated setup. The Framework has reduced the once steep learning curve for game development, transforming it into something more attainable, and this cookbook will help you to take full advantage of XNA to bring reality into your virtual worlds. "Microsoft XNA 4.0 Game Development Cookbook" is the perfect resource for propelling your game development capabilities from the simple 2D demo towards engaging and exciting, professional looking games. With a diverse selection of game-related topics covered, discover how to create rich 2D and 3D worlds filled with interesting characters, detailed scenery and dynamic special effects applicable to PC, Xbox 360, and Windows Phone 7 game play. There is no shortage of introductory texts available for XNA, a number of which are fantastic for getting started with simple 2D games, but "Microsoft XNA 4.0 Game Development Cookbook"ù will help you take the steps to start producing games that have deeper gameplay, compelling graphics and that little bit of extra polish! The book's recipes will get you up and going quickly with the next level of game features such as 3D graphics, AI, and network play. With this practical cookbook to hand, even the more experienced developer will be better equipped to achieve high level tasks with XNA in a quick and efficient manner.
Table of Contents (15 chapters)
Microsoft XNA 4.0 Game Development Cookbook
Credits
About the Author
About the Reviewers
www.PacktPub.com
Preface

Creating dialog wheels


Games such as BioWare's Mass Effect series have propelled the dialog wheel style of option selection to the forefront of modern gaming UI.

While it's essentially a dropped-down list in terms of functionality, the ability for a player to easily select an option via a gamepad, and the possibility of developing a "muscle memory" for popular or regular options, makes it a compelling choice for console games developers.

Getting ready

This recipe requires a SpriteFont file along with six images, with each image containing one grayscale segment of the wheel.

Here's one example of a complete wheel:

Here's one of the segment's images:

Note how the image of the individual segment hasn't been cropped or moved from its original position. Keeping each segment in place allows us to reconstruct the entire wheel easily by just layering the images directly on top of each other.

I constructed the example segments in a 3D rendering package, but any style of interlocking 2D imagery will...