Customer Reviews

Beginning C# Game Programming (Premier Press Game Development)

5 star:		(7)
4 star:		(3)
3 star:		(3)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(5)

 

 

"Beginning C# Game Programming" is Ron Penton's third effort in game book-authorship. It's a ground-up tutorial on the C# programming language, starting from the obligatory "Hello World" program and ending with a pretty rudimentary "spaceship at the bottom of the screen shooting at things coming down at you" game called "Generic Space Shooter 3000".

If you're already an old hand at similar languages like Java or C++, then the first half of the book won't be much more than a refresher for you. The first half of the book covers simple screen output, followed by primitive types, operators, looping, classes, arrays and file streams. It covers these topics fairly quickly (all in about 120 pages), so you won't be spending much time on each topic. Apart from one significant exception, the language tutorial is well-organized.

The "significant exception" raises its head with chapter 6 (creating a project). After spending 120 pages learning how to write, compile, and execute small bits of C# code, chapter 6 shows you how to set up a project in SharpDevelop (a free C# programming environment). If you need help compiling your code in chapters 1-5, the only help you'll get is a brief mention of Visual Studio.NET, SharpDevelop, or the C# command-line compiler. If you invest in a copy of "Beginning C# Game Programming", I recommend that you read chapter 6 first. Then go back to chapters 1-5. Finally, head over to chapter 7 and build yourself a space-shooter for the rest of the book.

The space shooter chapters are well-done, with good coverage of doing directX graphics in C#. The topics covered are a bit large for such a simple example game (alpha-blending, force-feedback, direct3D), but this is done with the understanding that you'll be wanting to write a more significant game than "Generic Space Shooter 3000" by the time you're done with the book.

If you want a good "ground-up" start with C# game programming, "Beginning C# Game Programming" is a good start. It takes you from the very beginning to a complete arcade game.

Just don't read it in order.

You will probably want some prior programming experience to make the first 5 chapters easier to digest. I'm a seasoned C/C++ programmer, and I was able to learn C# quickly with the help of this book (although admittedly C# is very much like C++). I knew a little about DirectX, but even if I didn't this book did a great job of starting basic and building on that foundation. What I like most about this book is the author goes step by step through a simple framework which gets Direct3D up and running. In about 150 lines of code, the author manages to make a Direct3D Windows application that does something. For Windows and Direct3D this is no small accomplishment given their complexity. Other books I have seen stick the Direct3D initialization into a helper library and never bother to explain it. Not here. Each line is explained well. This book will not, however, teach you advanced Direct3D topics. Only 1 chapter describes Direct3D, but it does a good job. You will want to get another book after this one to learn more advanced topics.

If you know nothing about C# or DirectX, but have some programming experience, this book is for you. The title is very fitting of the contents. Highly recommended.

I have read a lot of Premier books in my days. One thing is constant through all of their books: they are riddled with errors. They are not complex errors that only an advanced programmer would catch - they are stupid mistakes that an author who reviewed his work would catch. What's worse, most of the authors of these game programming books have about as much experience as I do - and I haven't even worked in the field yet! For a book that spends the first 5 chapters talking about the C# language, you would think the author would realize you can't have drop-through in switch-statments and that you can't have multiple type specifiers in a for-loop header. I read these books hoping for some entertainment and to learn some new skills. I definitely get a laugh! I will say that there are some decent programming books by this joke of a publisher, but it is like navigating a mine-field. My only suggestion to beginners is to go to a site like gamedev and see what they recommend. And for the experienced programmer, I don't recommend Premier books at all. Go for a book that is not split between the language and the gaming library. If you really want, I will give you some definite reads for anyone serious about getting a head-start. For such a large, growing industry, you would think there would be better books out there. All in all, I would not put this book down entirely - it does try to present the language and still has time to cover direct3D at some point. The reality is, though, the world is not ready for C# gaming yet and anyone serious about beginning game programming should find a book using C/C++. I hope this review has not aroused too much spite on my behalf.

I already read this book and I must say that I am more then satisfied. This book is not for people who never wrote a line of code but if you already know how to do basics like conditions, loops, switch etc. in some language you should be able quickly understand how to do it in C# (this is meaning of first couple chapters). After that the fun begins and you are going to play with Direct3D, DirectInput, DirectSound and finally you will make an interesting spaceshooter game. I think, this book is well written but I must lower rating by 1 stars becouse the source code is made for DirectX 9.0b and sometoimes didn't work with 9.0c. Ron Penton promised that he will update it someday but it looks like he already forgot :-(
Anyway try it, it will help you lot and you should instal Managed DirectX 9.0b from the CD and everything will be alright.

What you will learn:
how to setup your devices (3d, sound, etc)
how to use sprites in 3d (albeit you have to convert his sprite implementation to directx9.0c ... which is somewhat complicated, but not impossible)

what you won't learn:
using 3d meshes, 3d animations, terrain, etc.

This really is an introductory book, and i highly recommend it for the beginning C#/MDX programmer. Most of you will find it too novice for your tastes, but even though I gave up trying to convert Ron's sprites to directx 9.0c, i still learned a ton from all of the chapters up until the sprite drawer. (all of which compiled fine until using Direct3DX.dll)

Pick up the book if you're new, if you're new to MDX... but you know DX... skip this book.

This book is my introduction to C# and although the style of writing is reasonably clear there are enough errors or omissions in the accompanying software on the CD to make the examples difficult for a beginner. The examples are created for use with DirectX 9.0b, and although there is a disclaimer in the book saying that an update for 9.0c will be forthcoming it has not happened. Emails to the author go unanswered. Some of the code has errors and will not compile, even though I have gone to the trouble of removing DirectX 9.0c and replacing it with 9.0b. I eventually was able to find and fix the error in example 6.3, but only after considerable effort that was not of benefit in learning the subject material.
In summary, I do not recommend this book.

This is a good book for people looking to get their feet wet in C# and learn a little about DirectX. However, this is not recommended for persons past the beginner stage. The book shows limited amounts of DirectX and DirectX extensions. If programming games intrigues you and know nothing about a programming language, this is a great start. This book shows the beginning steps of C# using SOME DirectX.

This book is a great book for people starting out in game development. It covers all of the basic topics and leaves you wanting to explore all the possibilites with DirectX and C# game development. I would reccomend this book for people wanting to learn DirectX with C#, or anyone that is interested in getting into game development with C#. Game Development is a huge topic and this book is a great "Beginning Book" that just cracks the tip of the iceberg of game development, teaching fundamentals and leaving you wanting to explore with your new found knowledge.

I think it is the best intro book in the market. I already bought several C# intro books, but all of them always miss something while explaining topics, but this one very esily shows what the things are created for, how they are done, with easy to understand examples. I think the author has a brilliant talant in teaching, alredy predicting in his book the way you are thinking while understanding things. If only this book were more comprehencive, may be it would be the best C# book ever written. Anyway, before reading any other other C# books, I would recommend reading this book first.

I am very VERY inexperienced at programming. I got into C++ at a very young age, probably to young, all because I wanted to be able to make games. I'M now 23 and I'M trying to get back into the game. My biggest complaint to this book compared to all the C++ books I've read over the past five years or so, was his examples. He just gave you code snipets. What an inexperienced person like myself needs is for the an author to teach you a new trick, show you some examples, and then give you the source for a small full program showing you how it works. Most books I've read teach something, then they say now type all this and watch it compile, then they go over each peace line by line just to be sure you got it. I'M only into the fist half of this book but I'M already getting frustrated. I would recommend "C# programming for the absolute beginner". I have read the C++ version and it was a good one.