If you look in the Solution Explorer, you'll see at the top, your solution. If I called my game Purple Monkey Dishwasher, I'd expect my top level solution node to be labeled something like "Solution 'PurpleMonkeyDishwasher' (2 projects)". (I'm going from memory here.)

You should see immediately under that, your two projects. Each project will have a whole pile of different junk under it (things like References, Properties, your Program.cs file, your Game1.cs file, etc.). But there should be two projects. The first one will probably be called "PurpleMonkeyDishwasher", not to be confused with the top level solution, which has the same name. The second project will probably be called "PurpleMonkeyDishwasherContent". And it might say something about being a content project. This is where you've been putting your content, like your images, 3D models, sound, etc.

The new code file, AnimatedSprite.cs, needs to go in the first project, by all of the other code. You don't want it in the content project.

The problem you're describing sounds very much like the new file got put in the wrong place, and XNA is thinking it must be some sort of content for your game, but it can't figure out what to do with it.

So check and see if the file is in the wrong project, and move it to the first code-based project, and let me know if that fixes things.

Could you please help me?

Tile tile = (Tile)currentLevel.GetTile(row, column);

I get the error "Index was outside the bounds of the array.". What is it and how do I fix that?

In practice, though, there may be a little more work to do than just code a different input device. For instance, you want to think through how the devices are different, how the user bases are different, and how the thing is actually used. Not every game that's good for the PC is good for a console, and not every game that's good for a console is good for the PC.

As an example, RTS games are usually not a good fit for consoles. You just don't have the right input (mouse and keyboard) to select units and give them specialized orders very well. (The only console RTS game of consequence that I've seen is Halo Wars. They clearly did everything they could to design it for a console, and I'm not sure if it would be very useful, in exactly the same format, on a PC. It requires a different strategy.

So while the code itself will work on both platforms, there's more to consider than that. I suspect whatever game you want to make, it is worth spending time thinking about what platforms you want to target, and consider how things will be different among them.

Hmm… one other area that is worth pointing out, which you'll likely find will require different code is any networking for multi-player. On the Xbox, they've got things strapped down pretty tightly. You have to code things the right way (I apologize that I don't really have networking tutorials here yet) and your users will likely need to pay for a subscription to use the network on the Xbox. The rules are very different on the PC. Of course, this all depends on you wanting networked multi-player games to begin with.

I've probably gone on long enough for now, but just to summarize, with only a few exceptions your code will work in both places without requiring changes, but you should still consider how the different platforms are commonly used, and their limitations when designing your game.

So the question that remains to be answered here is, what constitutes my game state?

When I wrote this code, I had in mind that the game state defined these three objects by a distance and direction from the origin. That is, everything was essentially defined in polar coordinates. So in my Update method, I simply update those polar coordinates. When I'm drawing, I need things in the normal Cartesian coordinates (because that's what the screen works with) so I convert it to Cartesian at the last moment, in the Draw method. In this case, I treat it as a part of getting stuff drawn to the screen, and not a part of the underlying model for my game.

In fact, what I did is not all that different from building a world transformation matrix in 3D, which is a normal operation to do at draw time. I'm simply converting from one coordinate system to another.

Obviously, not everyone is going to use polar coordinates for their underlying game model. (I'd say, more often than not, you'll be using Cartesian instead.) In the event that you see your game state as being done in Cartesian coordinates, this computation with the sines and cosines should most definitely be done in the Update method, as you suggest.

riemers(dot)net/eng/Tutorials/XNA/Csharp/Series3/Shadow_map(dot)php

Actually there are 11 items in it :)

PS: I browsed and borrowed quite a few C#/XNA books and so far I like your way of writing and teaching best. Maybe your viewpoint as a game developer clings to me more than others.

I'm glad to hear you're interested in my book. As of right now, there's no ebook. I'd really like there to be. My plan all along was to make one.

But when I got done publishing, and went to make an ebook out of it, I learned that it wasn't so simple. Basically, things are set up in a way to encourage $1-$5 books. That works for novels, but not for books like this. All price points up to and including the $25 that the physical book costs. It's quite strange, I know. So I want to find another avenue for selling an ebook version, but that's probably not going to happen in the next few weeks.

The only thing I can think if might be to just email you a PDF (does that meet your needs) of the book that I had intended to publish as an ebook, and then send you a PayPal payment for the $15 that I had intended (still intend) to sell the ebook for. I have never done that process before, so we'd both be figuring it out as we go. I know PDFs don't work for some people, and I know PayPal doesn't work for others. That's fine, if that's the case with you, too. I just wanted to put it out there, in case you thought it might be worthwhile.

Anyway, I wanted to at least put the information out there, to give you an answer to your question. (You and I both, would rather have my answer be, "Oh, sure, just go over here and get it!" Maybe some day…)

Thanks again for your interest!

int dayAsInt = (int)DaysOfWeek.Sunday;
DaysOfWeek today = (DaysOfWeek)dayAsInt; // but this is an implicit cast, so…
DaysOfWeek tomorrow = (dayAsInt + 1); // so you can do this, without explicitly stating the cast

In the last line defining the 'tomorrow' variable C# marks this part as an error…
(dayAsInt + 1)

And gives this error description in the error list window.
Cannot implicitly convert type 'int' to DaysOfWeek'. An explicit conversion exists (are you missing a cast?)

I understand what the example is trying to teach. That you can increment and decrement enumerations like integers.
Which would be valueable in game programming such as the old Heroes of Might and Magic games where the days of
the week would be tracked because various things occured on different days. Such as new troops being hirable ever Sunday.

I tried on my own to get this line working and even went back to the type casting tutorial to see if I
could find anything there to help me out. I managed to get something that outputs the correct
results, in this case printing that tomorrow will be monday. But I still wanted to make sure I notified
you of the issue I encountered and also to ask if how I did it was correct.

I replaced this line…
DaysOfWeek tomorrow = (dayAsInt + 1); // so you can do this, without explicitly stating the cast

With this one…
DaysOfWeek tomorrow = (DaysOfWeek)dayAsInt + 1; // so you can do this, without explicitly stating the cast

Is there anything wrong with the way I did it?

Was I perhaps missing something with the way yours was in the tutorial that was causing it not to work?
(I did have the days of the week properly enumerated outside of the class.)

Thank you in advance for your time and thank you very much for the tutorials. They have been a god send!
For once I feel like I'm actually LEARNING programming and not just typing stuff in without any
understanding of the mechanics of it.

Great work on the tutorials so far. Maybe cover the differences between C# sockets and the XNA way of doing things?

 public RandomDirectionSprite(Texture2D textureImage, Vector2 position, Point frameSize, int collisionOffset, Point currentFrame, Point sheetSize, Vector2 speed, string collisionCueName, SpriteManager spriteManager, Random randomDirection) : base(textureImage, position, frameSize, collisionOffset, currentFrame, sheetSize, speed, collisionCueName) { this.spriteManager = spriteManager; this.randomDirection = randomDirection; DirectionTimer(); } 

Now, I also created a Sprite Manager which adds a sprite to a list like this:

 spriteList.Add(new EvadingSprite(Game.Content.Load<Texture2D> (@"images\plus"), position, new Point(75, 75), 10, new Point(0, 0), new Point(6, 4), speed, "skullcollision" , this,*//<Random should go here>//*)); 

I'm not sure how to put the Random parameter in. That is how do I add it in.

Here is the Timer that appears in my RandomDirectioinSprite class along with the other variables that are used to make it:

 private void DirectionTimer() { nextDirectionTimer = randomDirection.Next( directionTimerMin, directionTimerMax); } 

Anyway, I hope my question makes sense, and I thank anyone who can help!

This is what I ended up with.

public void update()
{
GamePadState current = GamePad.GetState(PlayerIndex.One);

if (current.Buttons.A == ButtonState.Pressed && previous.Buttons.A == ButtonState.Released)
{
for (int i = 0; i < 12; i++)
buttons[i] = false;
buttons[0] = true;
}

if (current.Buttons.B == ButtonState.Pressed && previous.Buttons.B == ButtonState.Released)
{
for (int i = 0; i < 12; i++)
buttons[1] = true;
}

previous = current;
}

public bool aPress()
{
return buttons[0];
}

Thank you so much. I couldn't take much more frying my brain over that one. I am more than likely going to buy your book as well.

Take care.

Ben

P.S. you should started on those networking tutorials :D

Basically, in this method, you're checking whether the old state and the new state are different. But because you're assigning current to previous, in the second method (bButtonPressed?) the two will be the same object. The button states will never be different, and you'll never see the button presses, as you're describing.

I'd structure it a little more like this (though note I'm not using a compiler, and things may not be exact or even compile):

 public void override Update(GameTime gameTime) // or whatever method you're calling this from... { GamePadState current = GamePad.GetState(PlayerIndex.One); bool aPressed = aButtonPressed(); bool bPressed = bButtonPressed(); if(aPressed) { // do something if A is pressed. } if(bPressed) { // do something if B is pressed. } // Only do this one time here, not in the other methods. previous = current; } public bool aButtonPress() { if (previous.Buttons.A == ButtonState.Released && current.Buttons.A == ButtonState.Pressed) { return true; } return false; } public bool bButtonPress() { if (previous.Buttons.B == ButtonState.Released && current.Buttons.B == ButtonState.Pressed) { return true; } return false; } 

Does that make sense? Does it accomplish what you were trying to do?

Both functions work independently so I'm only going to type one.

public bool aButtonPress()
{
if (previous.Buttons.A == ButtonState.Released && current.Buttons.A == ButtonState.Pressed)
{
previous = current;
return true;
}
previous = current;
return false;
}

If I put aButtonPress() over bButtonPress() then only aButtonPress() will execute and vice versa. Why is that?

Basically I'm making a top down shooter, and when the '2' key is pressed I want the playersprite to change to a player with a gun that can now shoot.

Any helpful Ideas?

thanks

I can't use Texture Atlas' or Sprite Sheets because the game is a Top Down Shooter, and I'm unsure how a spritesheet would affect player rotation.

I used a ship i drew tht was 150x150pixels, with a scale factor of .5f so, if i think that makes it 75x75pixels then. I figured out that it draws the pixle from the LEFT side, going 75Pixels to the RIGHT, so that helped me out. I'm good with tinkering/learning at same time.

My question was really just "Is what is happening on the right side of the screen normal or not." But, from what you've said, it sounds as if it should be doing the same on the Left side as well. Not sure why it's not. I've added nothing in to prohibit it.

So, guess I will just add those If Statements in to stop it. Thanks for the response and the lessons. The XNA tutorials are very helpful!

p s:

I think we will reach this material in school in about 3 years!! so I'm pretty much set for a while

I still am not understanding what's preventing the ship from moving past X=0. Do you have a line of code that is something like this?

 if(position.X < 0) { position.X = 0; } 

The same kind of code should work on the right side, but you should be using the window width instead.

One other thing that comes to mind in this discussion is that usually, the "origin point" of your ship is in the top left corner. If you draw at (0, 0), the full ship will be shown, starting from the upper left corner of the screen.

Let's say your window is 800x480. If you draw at (800, 480), you won't see the ship at all, because its top left corner is the bottom right corner of the screen/window. It's drawn entirely off screen.

So you'll want to account for that in your calculation. Let's say your ship is 32x32 pixels. The furthest to the right that you'd want to draw your ship, to ensure that it's completely on the screen, would be (768, 448).

(You'd, of course, want to design this better for any size screen and any size sprite, rather than just dumping in the magic number 768 into your screen, but that's the idea.)

I'm not sure we're really getting to the bottom of your question, yet, though, so keep asking questions until we do. :D

No, don't have any code to keep it going out of screen on the right. So, I just need to add If Statments to keep it from going off the screen on the right?

Was just wondering why it didn't do the same on the left. If this is normal fine, just want to make sure its not something I'm doing wrong. If i try to draw something past 650Width, in FullScreen Mode, it gets drawn out of screen. Thank you for the reply!

This is the code that I have in the Game Constructor:

 graphics.PreferredBackBufferWidth = 800; graphics.PreferredBackBufferHeight = 480; graphics.IsFullScreen = true; 

I did have the: "graphics.ApplyChanges();" part in there but read that I didn't need it(i've tried it with and without also.)
What am I doing wrong to get this extended screen. I have thought of limiting the mouse movement with If statements, and being wary of where I draw sprites but really would like to find out how to fix this problem. Thanks in advance!

Thanks again for the answer and your work.

For Example:

  public class Game1 : Microsoft.Xna.Framework.Game { GraphicsDeviceManager graphics; SpriteBatch spriteBatch; ParticleEngine particleEngine; Vector2 playerPosition; Vector2 playerVelocity = Vector2.One; Texture2D playerunarmed; Texture2D playerM1911; KeyboardState keyState; private SpriteFont font1; private SpriteFont font2; private Vector2 cursorPos; private Texture2D cursorTex; private Texture2D cursorTexHit; float angle; public Game1() { graphics = new GraphicsDeviceManager(this); Content.RootDirectory = "Content"; } protected override void Initialize() { base.Initialize(); playerPosition = new Vector2(400, 400); this.IsMouseVisible = false; } protected override void LoadContent() { spriteBatch = new SpriteBatch(GraphicsDevice); List<Texture2D> textures = new List<Texture2D>(); textures.Add(Content.Load<Texture2D>("GFX/EFFECT/circle")); textures.Add(Content.Load<Texture2D>("GFX/EFFECT/star")); textures.Add(Content.Load<Texture2D>("GFX/EFFECT/diamond")); playerunarmed = Content.Load<Texture2D>("GFX/PERSON/PLAYER"); playerM1911 = Content.Load<Texture2D>("GFX/PERSON/PLAYERM1911"); font1 = Content.Load<SpriteFont>("GFX/FONT/Font1"); font2 = Content.Load<SpriteFont>("GFX/FONT/Font2"); cursorTex = Content.Load<Texture2D>("GFX/EFFECT/Cursor"); cursorTexHit = Content.Load<Texture2D>("GFX/EFFECT/CursorHit"); LevelLibrary.Level level = Content.Load<LevelLibrary.Level>("level1"); particleEngine = new ParticleEngine(textures, new Vector2(400, 240)); } protected override void UnloadContent() { } protected override void Update(GameTime gameTime) { // Allows the game to exit if (GamePad.GetState(PlayerIndex.One).Buttons.Back == ButtonState.Pressed) this.Exit(); MouseState curMouse = Mouse.GetState(); cursorPos = new Vector2(curMouse.X +90, curMouse.Y); Vector2 mouseLoc = new Vector2(curMouse.X, curMouse.Y); Vector2 direction = mouseLoc - playerPosition; int x = curMouse.X; int y = curMouse.Y; angle = (float)(Math.Atan2(direction.Y, direction.X)); keyState = Keyboard.GetState(); if (keyState.IsKeyDown(Keys.D)) playerPosition.X += playerVelocity.X; if (keyState.IsKeyDown(Keys.A)) playerPosition.X -= playerVelocity.X; if (keyState.IsKeyDown(Keys.W)) playerPosition.Y -= playerVelocity.Y; if (keyState.IsKeyDown(Keys.S)) playerPosition.Y += playerVelocity.Y; particleEngine.EmitterLocation = new Vector2(200, 240); particleEngine.Update(); base.Update(gameTime); } protected override void Draw(GameTime gameTime) { GraphicsDevice.Clear(Color.SkyBlue); spriteBatch.Begin(); spriteBatch.Draw(cursorTex, cursorPos, Color.White); spriteBatch.Draw(playerM1911, new Rectangle((int)playerPosition.X, (int)playerPosition.Y, playerunarmed.Width, playerunarmed.Height), null, Color.White, angle + 90, new Vector2(65, 67), SpriteEffects.None, 0f); spriteBatch.End(); particleEngine.Draw(spriteBatch); base.Draw(gameTime); } } } 

As you can see this is my main Game1.cs, with stuff from your previous tutorials thrown in, but I want the player to be his own outside file (much like the .level files you made in this tutorial. I simply don't want the players movement controls and texture2D loads to clutter up the main game class.

Thanks!! Any help is appreciated, I'll probably be up all night trying to solve this.

I'm so friggin happy about this!!! You got a fan pal!!

Now you can dump whatever values you want into the various properties for each individual particle you create. Each one will be assigned its own unique value for velocity, size, etc. And when you're drawing a particular particle, it will use the values that are assigned to the property for the given particle.

Basically, what that means is you don't need to create a separate Color2 property. Just stick with the one color, and just fill some of them with red, and some with yellow.

That change would be back in the GenerateNewParticle method, over in the ParticleEngine class. In the tutorial, I have the following code for picking a color randomly:

 Color color = new Color( (float)random.NextDouble(), (float)random.NextDouble(), (float)random.NextDouble()); 

To randomly choose between two colors, you might do something like this:

 Color color; if(random.Next(2) == 0) { color = Color.Red; } else { color = Color.Yellow; } 

This code will pick a random number up to, but not including 2, starting with 0. If I had done 5, it would choose a number up to, but not including 5, including 0. Basically, it gives us one of 2 (or one of 5) options ranging from 0 to N-1. In the case of the code above, that will be 0 or 1, with pretty dang close to 50% probability of each one. If it's a 0, we use red, if it's a 1, we use yellow.

Note that you could throw in a third color like this:

 Color color; int randomNumber = random.Next(3); if(randomNumber == 0) { color = Color.Red; } else if(randomNumber == 1) { color = Color.Yellow; } else { color = Color.Blue; } 

It's worth pointing out that in this code, I've pulled out the random number generation from the if/else block. This is because we only want to pick the random number once, right before we decide which color the number represents.

One final thing is that you could also generate particles in an uneven way by going back to the NextDouble method:

 Color color; double randomNumber = random.Next(); if(randomNumber < 0.10) { color = Color.Red; } else if(randomNumber < 0.40) { color = Color.Yellow; } else { color = Color.Blue; } 

This gives us a 10% chance of building red particles, a 30% (0.4-0.1) chance of building yellow particles, and a 60% chance of generating blue particles.

As you can probably see, the possibilities with this kind of stuff are endless. :D

 using System; using System.Collections.Generic; using System.Linq; using System.Text; using Microsoft.Xna.Framework.Graphics; using Microsoft.Xna.Framework; namespace ParticleEngine2D { public class Particle { public Texture2D Texture { get; set; } public Vector2 Position { get; set; } public Vector2 Velocity { get; set; } public float Angle { get; set; } public float AngularVelocity { get; set; } public Color Color { get; set; } public Color Color2 { get; set; } public float Size { get; set; } public int TTL { get; set; } public Particle(Texture2D texture, Vector2 position, Vector2 velocity, float angle, float angularVelocity, Color color, Color color2, float size, int ttl) { Texture = texture; Position = position; Velocity = velocity; Angle = angle; AngularVelocity = angularVelocity; Color = color; Color2 = color2; Size = size; TTL = ttl; } public void Update() { TTL--; Position += Velocity; Angle += AngularVelocity; } public void Draw(SpriteBatch spriteBatch) { Rectangle sourceRectangle = new Rectangle(0, 0, Texture.Width, Texture.Height); Vector2 origin = new Vector2(Texture.Width / 2, Texture.Height / 2); spriteBatch.Draw(Texture, Position, sourceRectangle, Color, Color2, Angle, origin, Size, SpriteEffects.None, 0f); } } } 

Here is the code for my Particle class, I tried to add the Color 2 into the spriteBatch.Draw method, it hits me with the error "Error 3 No overload for method 'Draw' takes 10 arguments"

I assume that I must add the an overload for the number of arguments somewhere, but I don't know WHERE exactly, thanks for your time :D

Two things stand out to me here. In your /Particle class's constructor, you have this code:

 Color = color; Color = color2; 

Shouldn't that say the following?

 Color = color; Color2 = color2; 

You're assigning to the same Color property both times, which doesn't seem like what you actually intend.

Second, Color2 is never actually used anywhere in your draw code. So even if you get it assigned correctly, you wouldn't ever see that color.

So I'm not exactly sure what you want to do with the second color. Perhaps you want particles to fade from one color to another? From Color to Color2? Something like that could easily be done, but you'll, of course, need to write the code for it.

Anyway, the point is, Color2 isn't used anywhere (other than being defined, and after you make the first change, assigned a value) so you shouldn't be seeing it yet.

If you get hung up on how to use the second color, let me know what you're wanting to accomplish by having two colors, and I'll see how I can help.

Hope that keeps you moving forward though!

 using System; using System.Collections.Generic; using System.Linq; using System.Text; using Microsoft.Xna.Framework.Graphics; using Microsoft.Xna.Framework; namespace ParticleEngine2D { public class Particle { public Texture2D Texture { get; set; } public Vector2 Position { get; set; } public Vector2 Velocity { get; set; } public float Angle { get; set; } public float AngularVelocity { get; set; } public Color Color { get; set; } public Color Color2 { get; set; } public float Size { get; set; } public int TTL { get; set; } public Particle(Texture2D texture, Vector2 position, Vector2 velocity, float angle, float angularVelocity, Color color, Color color2, float size, int ttl) { Texture = texture; Position = position; Velocity = velocity; Angle = angle; AngularVelocity = angularVelocity; Color = color; Color = color2; Size = size; TTL = ttl; } public void Update() { TTL--; Position += Velocity; Angle += AngularVelocity; } public void Draw(SpriteBatch spriteBatch) { Rectangle sourceRectangle = new Rectangle(0, 0, Texture.Width, Texture.Height); Vector2 origin = new Vector2(Texture.Width / 2, Texture.Height / 2); spriteBatch.Draw(Texture, Position, sourceRectangle, Color, Angle, origin, Size, SpriteEffects.None, 0f); } } } 

I really like your tutorials btw, really helpful and trained towards noobs like me :D

I suspect something is going wrong inside of your Particle class. Would you mind posting your code for that? I think we'd be able to get to the bottom of it pretty quickly if we could see the code.

I am almost through your C# Players Guide book. Which I might add is an excellent book and when I am done I will give it a great review on amazon. I was wondering if you know any good books or websites that go over how to create applications for WPF?

I downloaded them and am trying them now.
I will let you know how it works.
I really like your tutorials I hope you keep expanding on them. I am a newbee and you are teaching me so much.