Book Image

XNA 4 3D Game Development by Example: Beginner's Guide

By : Kurt Jaegers
Book Image

XNA 4 3D Game Development by Example: Beginner's Guide

By: Kurt Jaegers

Overview of this book

Move beyond the world of flat 2D-based game development and discover how to create your own exciting 3D games with Microsoft XNA 4.0. Create a 3D maze, fire shells at enemy tanks, and drive a rover on the surface of Mars while being attacked by alien saucers."XNA 4 3D Game Development by Example: Beginner's Guide" takes you step-by-step through the creation of three different 3D video games with Microsoft XNA 4.0. Learn by doing as you explore the worlds of 3D graphics and game design.This book takes a step-by-step approach to building 3D games with Microsoft XNA, describing each section of code in depth and explaining the topics and concepts covered in detail. From the basics of a 3D camera system to an introduction to writing DirectX shader code, the games in this book cover a wide variety of both 3D graphics and game design topics. Generate random mazes, load and animate 3D models, create particle-based explosions, and combine 2D and 3D techniques to build a user interface."XNA 4 3D Game Development by Example: Beginner's Guide" will give you the knowledge to bring your own 3D game creations to life.

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XNA 4 3D Game Development by Example: Beginner's Guide
Kurt Jaegers
Sep, 2012 | 322 pages
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Table of Contents (16 chapters)
XNA 4 3D Game Development by Example Beginner's Guide
XNA 4 3D Game Development by Example Beginner's Guide
Credits
Credits
About the Author
About the Author
About the Reviewers
About the Reviewers
www.PacktPub.com
www.PacktPub.com
Preface
Preface
Free Chapter
1
Introduction to XNA
Introduction to XNA
System requirements
Installing the Windows Phone SDK
Time for action – installing Windows Phone SDK
Speller – Our first XNA game
Time for action – creating an XNA project
Managing content
Time for action – creating content assets
Member variables
Time for action – declaring new member variables
The Game1 constructor
Initialization
Time for action – customizing the Initialize() method
Loading content
Time for action – creating a square texture
Updating
Time for action – customizing the Update() method
The Draw() method
Time for action – drawing Speller
Helper methods
Time for action – words and letters
Time for action – completing the Speller project
Summary
2
Cube Chaser – A Flat 3D World
Cube Chaser – A Flat 3D World
Designing the game
Creating the project
Time for action – creating the Cube Chaser project
Our view of the world
Time for action – beginning the Camera class
The Projection matrix
Looking at something
Time for action – implementing a look-at point
The View matrix
Time for action – the View matrix
From the ground up
Time for action – creating the Maze classes
Drawing the floor
Time for action – drawing the floor
Moving around
Time for action – expanding the Camera
Time for action – letting the player move
Summary
3
Cube Chaser – It's A-Mazing!
Cube Chaser – It's A-Mazing!
Maze generation
Time for action – defining a MazeCell
Time for action – generating the Maze class
Constructing the walls
Time for action – building walls
Time for action – drawing the walls
Solid walls
Time for action – bouncing off the walls
Summary
4
Cube Chaser – Finding Your Way
Cube Chaser – Finding Your Way
The cube
Time for action – placing the cube
Time for action – rotating the cube
Matrices – big scary math things?
Positioning the cube
Time for action – randomly positioning the cube
Catching the cube
Time for action – catching the cube
Summary
5
Tank Battles – A War-torn Land
Tank Battles – A War-torn Land
Creating the project
Time for action – creating the Tank Battles project
An arc-ball camera
Time for action – the ArcBallCamera class – part 1
Time for action – finishing the ArcBallCamera class
Building the playfield
Time for action – generating the terrain
Time for action – adding the ReadHeightMap() method
Time for action – adding the BuildVertexBuffer() method
Time for action – the buildIndexBuffer() method
Let's see the terrain already!
Time for action – drawing the terrain
Adding texture – a gentle introduction to HLSL
Time for action – HLSL declarations
Time for action – Vertex Shader Input and Output definition
Time for action – the vertex shader
Time for action – the pixel shader
Time for action – utilizing Terrain.fx
Moving the camera
Time for action – moving the camera with the mouse
Summary
6
Tank Battles – The Big Guns
Tank Battles – The Big Guns
Adding the tank model
Time for action – adding the tank model
Building tanks
Time for action – building the Tank class
Time for action – terrain heights
Time for action – tank animation
Time for action – positioning tanks
Summary
7
Tank Battles – Shooting Things
Tank Battles – Shooting Things
Interface components
Time for action – creating the UIWidget class
Time for action – creating UITextblocks
Time for action – creating buttons
Time for action – adding the UIHelper class
Time for action – creating the UI
Time for action – responding to events
Time for action – ShotManager-part 1
Time for action – the Particle class-part 1
Time for action – finishing the Particle class
Time for action – the ParticleManager class
Time for action – building Particles.fx
Time for action – implementing particles
Summary
8
Tank Battles – Ending the War
Tank Battles – Ending the War
Managing game states
Time for action – implementing a title screen
Time for action – detecting hits
Managing turns
Time for action – managing turns
Visual improvements
Time for action – computing normals
Time for action – HLSL for lighting
Time for action – using ambient light
Time for action – multitexturing
Summary
9
Mars Runner
Mars Runner
Design of Mars Runner
Getting started with the GSM sample
Time for action – creating the Mars Runner solution
Time for action – customizing the BackgroundScreen class
Time for action – updating the menu
Time for action – creating the MarsRunnerPlayScreen class
A new camera
Time for action – the stationary camera
Creating the background
Time for action – creating a skybox
Building the Martian surface
Time for action – beginning the MarsTrack class
Time for action – generating the track
Time for action – drawing the track
Summary
10
Mars Runner – Reaching the Finish Line
Mars Runner – Reaching the Finish Line
Abstracting support for 3D models
Time for action – the GameEntity class
Building the rover
Time for action –building the rover
Time for action – accepting user input
Animating the planet
Time for action – moving the world
Animating the rover
Time for action – animating the rover
Crashing into craters
Time for action – detecting craters
Adding an enemy
Time for action – the basic flying saucer
Time for action – flying the saucer
Shots and collisions
Time for action – Shot classes
Time for action – the ShotManager class
Time for action – enemy shots
Time for action – player shots versus aliens
Time for action – enemy shots versus the rover
Scoring
Time for action – scoring
Time for action – the GameOver screen
Sound effects
Time for action – building the SFXManager class
Time for action – playing sound effects
Summary

Time for action – adding the BuildVertexBuffer() method

  1. 1. Add the Vertex Buffer region to the Terrain class as follows:

    #region Vertex Buffer
private void BuildVertexBuffer(
    int width, 
    int height, 
    float heightScale)
{
    VertexPositionNormalTexture[] vertices = 
        new VertexPositionNormalTexture [width*height];
            
    for (int x=0; x<width; x++)
        for (int z=0; z<height; z++)
        {
          vertices[x + (z*width)].Position = 
            new Vector3(x, heights[x,z], z);
        }

    vertexBuffer = new VertexBuffer(
        device, 
        typeof(VertexPositionNormalTexture), 
        vertices.Length, 
        BufferUsage.WriteOnly);

    vertexBuffer.SetData(vertices);
}
#endregion

What just happened?

After creating an empty array of VertexPositionNormalTexture objects, we loop through the width and height of our terrain, creating a new VertexPositionNormalTexture for each vertex. The X and Z coordinates of the vertex are directly equal...

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