Beginning .NET Game Programming in C#

Quick Advice:Download C# Express from Microsoft's website, it is free right now. Also download the Summer 2003 edition of Direct X.Everything will compile except Space Wars 3D (I am so happy now, see below). I am missing files, its 3:00 am, I will look for my (or their mistake) in the morning.Also go to the Apress website to download all the code including the VB.Net version of the book. It seems they left out key files (Like images for chapter 3) for the C# version that you can get in the VB.net download.My Story:I got this book because I wanted to learn C# and have some fun. I certainly enjoyed the first 3 chapters. They were very nicely written and friendly, which is why I bought the book. I also like that the book explained the basic concepts clearly (which is all I am looking for right now). So far, fairly self-explanatory, follows with what I already knew and expected (it confirmed how I thought it all worked procedure wise).However, when I tried the book code in visual studio 2003 I kept getting errors. Mostly from me copying what the book had. I then had to tweak everything to get it to work. I later found it much easier to just load the code from the website. However, this does not help learning if you just compile and view. The step-by-step examples for the later chapters would have been nice for these early ones.After a short hiatus (6 months of wasteful job searching, which I am still on) I came back to work on chapters 4 onward. I found these to be very difficult to work with. I kept getting errors. After a few 5:00 am nights, I discovered it's not the code it is VS 2003 it just won't run it for some reason. Gives me a .net compilation error. I bet it has to do with patches or version differences of the .net framework.I was about to bag the book and write a bad review (mostly because I could not find quick help anywhere) when I decided to check Microsoft's website. After downloading their tools and converting the files to VS C# Express everything ran great. By the way, online resources say to use this with 2003, but I keep getting a greater version used error when working with 2003, so they must have done this in 2004. My advice on what to get is above.So after a bit a fun and a lot of short-term frustration I am happy once more and can continue my studies. My goal is not video games, but research and development for engineering. I just wanted a pretty way to render my results.To note, Direct X has had some major changes so the book is now dated, but the logic on Direct3D, collisions, and general procedures is still good. Direct Play is out, I am not sure about Direct Sound or Direct Input.When you buy a book you expect to get higher quality material then what you would find online. Overall, I would say it is better then some information I have found online, but it certainly lacks in certain areas such as better explanation on DirectX functions, though it does a good job where needed. For instance some spots in the DirectX documentation is lacking, the book does a good job of explaining those parts.Microsoft has plenty of new resources online now including better explanations on what was missing before, so I am unsure if this book is a buy anymore. I will say it is a good first start.

I'm not sure the problem the previous reviewer had, but if you already know C# and want to dive into the world of Managed DirectX, this is a great recource.I've been playing around with DX for about 4 years now so I have a head start in understanding the topic. I thought that the material was perfect for a beginner, and actually wished I had this book back when I was first learning. David clearly states in the introduction that your book isn't there to teach you WinForms and maybe that's the problem the previous reviewer had. If you already know C# this book is a great introduction to Managed DX programming. If you don't know C#, go buy a book on that first.

Let me start by saying that I have no intention of being a game developer, but since I need .NET for my job, I thought this would be an interesting read. It doesn't disappoint at all.What stand out is the author's repeated advice that you need to "just do it" from end to end to understand the process of creating a game. I think that's true for most tasks in programming, but it's especially true here. There are a lot of basic concepts that apply to nearly all games, and it's funny because you begin to think about them when you play one!Clearly if you want to get deep into 3D math, you'll need another book, but this one gets you started at least with an understanding of the basic DirectX tools.

What is so cool about this book is that you can read it from start to finish and use it after as a reference book. The authors took a very difficult subject and made it easy to understand. After each chapter, you can code your own game with all the tips they gave you.A must have if you want to start writing small games in C#.

I got a used copy of David Weller's book: "Beginning .Net Game Programming in C#" from Amazon.First of all, using the word Beginning in the title of this book is deceptive. It's not a book for beginners in any way.The author not only assumes you are an experienced Windows programmer, but that you already know how to work with graphics and are more than familiar with Creating Event Handlers using OnPaint, etc.In the first chapter, in the classic Microsoft style of documentation, he begins by bragging about all the wonderful graphics things you can do with C# like; Gradients, Alpha Blending, Cardinal Splines, Transformation, etc. but doesn't have the courtesy to supply a single code example to show you how to do any of these wonderful things!In fact, if you leaf through the book page by page, you will find that there is not a single complete code example in the entire book. What the author refers to as "snippets" are nothing more than poor, incomplete code examples. As we reach the first code "example" the author says "The following code shows how to draw a simple red rectangle... " No it doesn't! All it is, is a lonely OnPaint method. The author doesn't bother to explain how to make it work, but proceeds to tack on one of those little Note: fields saying that you need to create an Event Handler. The example supplied however, is an Event Handler for something else entirely! The next example shows you how to create graphics objects from an image but doesn't bother to explain how to import the image! You are expected to magically how to do that I guess.It is clear that the author: David Weller doesn't even understand the topic material. What he did was go to somebody that DOES understand how to program and got a half dozen cheezy programs which he devoted a chapter each to, with a feeble attempt to tack a bunch of comments inbetween.If you want to make a Tetris clone and not much else, there's a very slim chance you might get something out of this book. Although you will have to type up pages of code yourself before finding out whether it will even run or not because there is no CD included with the book. The author assumes you know so much about programming already that, quite frankly, if you knew that much, you wouldn't need his lame book.The author is neither a programmer, nor a writer. I wouldn't recommend this book to anyone. It gives me a big knot in my stomach thinking how many other sincere beginners will end up wasting perfectly good hard earned cash on this complete waste of trees.Dillinger