Building XNA 2.0 Games: A Practical Guide for Independent Game Development (Books for Professionals by Professionals) [Paperback]

James Silva (Author), John Sedlak (Author)

Book Description

ISBN-10: 1430209798 | ISBN-13: 978-1430209799 | Publication Date: September 24, 2008 | Edition: 1

XNA is a Microsoft software framework that game developers use to create commercial games for the Xbox hardware, and other hardware that supports XNA. XNA 2.0 is an exploding technology, and on the verge of a large consumer breakout.

Microsoft has devoted an increasing amount of resources to expand the XNA Community. Not only does XNA appeal to game developers, but many “rank and file” developers are showing more interest in XNA as well.

The author, James Silva, won a prestigious Microsoft XNA gaming competition (the Microsoft Dream Build Play competition): the book walks the reader through the process he took in creating the award-winning XNA game.

Editorial Reviews

About the Author

James Silva is the creator of The Dishwasher: Dead Samurai, winner of the Microsoft Dream Build Play XNA development contest.

Product Details

• Paperback: 464 pages
• Publisher: Apress; 1 edition (September 24, 2008)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1430209798
• ISBN-13: 978-1430209799
• Product Dimensions: 9.2 x 7.1 x 0.9 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.7 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.1 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (11 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #864,807 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

6 of 6 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Poor choice of title for an otherwise good book., September 26, 2008

By 

J. Chounard (St. Louis, MO USA) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Building XNA 2.0 Games: A Practical Guide for Independent Game Development (Books for Professionals by Professionals) (Paperback)

This book is clearly a series of tutorials on how to build your own game similar to The Dishwasher: Dead Samurai. (The author's award winning game.) I think the title is therefore a little misleading. This would be helped a bit if the publisher had included a browsable table of contents here or on their own website.

There's tons of useful information in the book, but it is not a general introduction to building XNA games. For example, there's nothing in this book on 3D programming. So if you're looking for a book that covers that sort of stuff, look elsewhere. If you're looking to learn how The Dishwasher was made, and how you can build your own similar game, this is exactly the book you want and I would recommend you buy it.

1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Informative and Entertaining, October 20, 2008

By 

N. Gravelyn "Microsoft MVP - XNA/DirectX" (Seattle, WA, USA) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Building XNA 2.0 Games: A Practical Guide for Independent Game Development (Books for Professionals by Professionals) (Paperback)

This book is simply spectacular. Not only was I hooked by the entertaining aspects of the book (kudos to the authors for that), but I was able to extract quite a few great ideas for my own games. I'm no beginner in the realm of XNA, so having a book that really focused on making a game (rather than introducing and teaching XNA like most other books) was really quite a welcome change to the market.

If you have some of the basics of XNA and C# down, I'd highly recommend this book if you are ready to really make a game. It has lots of real world advice and lots of great ideas. I know it's going to improve my future games.

5.0 out of 5 stars Great Book From First to Last Page!, January 28, 2011

By 

Alessandro Negri (Cambridge, MA) - See all my reviews

Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: Building XNA 2.0 Games: A Practical Guide for Independent Game Development (Books for Professionals by Professionals) (Paperback)

I am really glad Silva wrote this, it help me fill a lot of gaps I had developing small games. It also taught me a lot on using the XBox 360 networking features, sending data across clients, create my own map and sprite editor. I would say this is one of the best books for my own personal self development that I have bought in the last 10 years.