Virtual Realm

XNA Game State Sample for the Zune

Monday, May 12 2008 - xna, zune

On the Creators Site you have access to lots of different samples that can assist you with your projects, or at least help with those small problems. One of the Samples which I use a lot are the Game State Samples, so I thought is would be a good exercise to convert the main sample over to the Zune and XNA 3.0 Platform.

I have also made a couple of changes to make the system work a little better with the Zune System.

1. The input system has been changed to allow the developer to work on the game inside the windows environment. To do this I have used the standard Zune Mapping of the Controllers and integrated them into the application, I have also set up the system so that the Windows Version would include Keyboard support, but have it removed when deploying to the Zune.
2. I have changed the menu systems so that all of the menus will now draw towards that bottom of the screen. This will free some of the Screen space to add your title graphics.
3. The Textures for the background have been reduced and coded to the size of the Zune Screen, this will reduce the size of the package that is deployed to the Zune Device.
4. The Message Box system has also been changed. I have changed the system so that it no longer renders to the centre of the screen and now uses the full screen. The Usage Text for the Message box now renders on the bottom of the devices screen and is controlled separately to the main message text. I have added an override to the message box class that will now allow you to display the ok instructions, the ok and Cancel Instructions or none. That last change I made is that the message text now renders from the top of the screen and has some word wrapping functions so that longer messages can be displayed on the screen.
5. The last change that I have done is to merge the threaded loading screen from the Network State Sample.

For the moment the system works and actually works well, now it is time for me to start pushing some games out using this new base framework. If you do have any suggestions for the system please forward them on so that I can look at adding them in.

Here is a link to the Sample Application.