Microsoft Silverlight Books

Build a game step by step in Chapter 4

Starting with Chapter 4, you can use each section to begin building your game step by step, from creating the game loop and enabling full screen, to loading images and detecting mouse double-clicks.

Of course, not all scenarios are covered, but you can use the discussions at [...] to ask questions or ask for suggestions about implementation.

Yes, some of the downloadable source code is buggy, but people are posting solutions as they find them to [...].

I would've given the book 5 stars if it weren't for the fact that Silverlight coders with less experience might have trouble figuring out how to implement some of the scenarios. For example, in the section about Putting Your Game in Full-Screen Mode, you see the code for the event handler method that will do the work, but not how and where to attach the handler to an event. I looked in the source code and couldn't find any use of the IsFullScreen property, so there wasn't help there. But hey, the discussion board is pretty active, so that should help.

Love the book!

JanetFi
21 August, 2010

It's OK. But the code is incomplete.

I enjoyed reading this book, however, the code in this book uses many custom coded helper methods and static classes that are unmentioned and undefined. The Author does not tell us that the definitions of these helper methods (1) are not in the book & (2) cannot be downloaded using the links that he provides in the book. For example, the code in this book uses Utils.GetImageFileName(Image), Consts.TerrainLayerCount, Consts.Unknown and Consts.None to name a few. Although these could probably be implemented intuitively by most readers, including myself, I would have preferred that the code was included in the book. Even more, I'd would have preferred to be informed that this code was simply not available rather than for me to waste time flipping through the book and searching the internet, only to find out for myself.


James M. Mantooth
31 May, 2010

Fantastic Book

I really enjoyed Mike's book. The content is great and the sample code that is provided is very helpful. Causual gaming is clearly going to be a big role for Silverlight and this book does a great job in getting developers ready for the task.

Michael Hanley
08 May, 2010

Good book

A good book covering an array of topics related to 2D game programming with Silverlight 3.0 . The chapter with Networking is a very nice addition to the book. I rate it as an overall good read.

Maciej Misztal
30 March, 2010

Average Book - Worth a quick view

I purchased this book in order to ascertain whether or not it was worth attempting to write complex multi-player games like RPGs with Silverlight. I think the first third of the book basically gives you a primer on Visual Studio, Silverlight, and Expression Blend. The second two thirds of the book provided more relevant material. However, I came away feeling like Silverlight was not the platform on which I wanted to work. That's a personal choice because I prefer 3D graphics, and Silverlight is too weak in this area.

The book was interesting, but I couldn't put it to use in my development environment.

Rob
02 March, 2010

Better book if it didn't have the words Game Programming in the title

Much of this book is an introduction to Silverlight and not specific to game programming. As for an introductory book, there are several others on the market which do a much better job of teaching the basics. If you're already versed in Silverlight from a website or business app development background, you'll be hard pressed to find the nuggets of actual game development techniques and best practices in this book.

B. Owczarzak
18 January, 2010

Only Loosely Does What It Says It Will

I purchased this book with the intention of using it for guidance in (random) map generation in Silverlight. But the book fails to offer much guidance in game programming at all. Rather, the author has opted to provide a overly detailed introduction to Silverlight 3 in the first 106 pages and then only "snippets" of code from various other functions and utilities in the remaining 145 pages to show off his game. The snippets provided aren't even representative of the challenging or creative aspects of coding such an application but rather a seemingly self-indulgent glimpse of the author's musings as he writes about specific elements that strike a chord within a category, or are just easier to detail. Overall, its fodder best documented in a blog or in a source-accompanying document online and NOT a guide to be bought, paid for and kept within easy reach on anyone's handy reference shelf.

Jay White
22 September, 2009

Any interested in game design will find this offers a fine survey

Learn to program games using Michael Snow's Game Programming with Silverlight, a web-based application ideal for game development. Any interested in game design will find this offers a fine survey of all the features of Silverlight 3 used in game creation, teaching application basics and then how to create objects, animate them, network a game to make it a multiplayer experience, and more. The complete source code for the book is also available for download in a fine guide for any game programmer.

Midwest Book Review
17 September, 2009

No code as advertised

This book covers a topic that can prove to be very useful for game developers; however, important information about game development (Client/Server network programming) is rushed and is missing vital parts, and worse than that, the complete code that the book CLAIMS is downloadable is NOT. AND IT IS AT LEAST 6 WEEKS SINCE THE BOOK HAS BEEN PUBLISHED!




Shane Boucvalt
30 August, 2009

Good bases for beginners

This book is very good for the one who wants to learn the basics of programming games via Silverlight 3. It's easy to read and well illustrated, even if you're not english/amercian. I've not finished it yet but at more than the half of it, I've learned tons of things and have a good base for developping games and applications (the book speaks about UI as well).

Arnaud Wissart
14 August, 2009

The code is worth the money

Good information in the book and the code for the book is worth the purchase price alone.

Jessie C. Srader
29 July, 2009

Not worth the money

Just go and download the source code for the book and read that; in fact that is basically what the author tells you to do. The first half of the book is a general overview of Silverlight that could (should) have been 1 chapter. The second half is a little more useful, and gives a brief explanation of some issues that the author ran into while writing the game that the book was written about.

Overall, I felt like the book was more a log of the development of the demo game, and does not do a very good job as an introduction to game programming with Silverlight.

Robert Hollencamp
23 July, 2009