What are my options for 2D games on Windows Phone 8? - c#

So I've been playing around with XNA and after all this time, I finally made a game that's worth buying!
And to my surprise, I see this on MSDN:
XNA Game Studio 4.0 apps that target Windows Phone OS 7.1 remain fully
supported and continue to run on Windows Phone 8 devices.
•You can continue to develop and maintain new or existing XNA
Framework apps that target Windows Phone OS 7.1.
•You can’t upgrade existing XNA Framework apps that target Windows
Phone OS 7.1 to target Windows Phone OS 8.0.
•You can’t create new XNA Framework apps that target Windows Phone OS
8.0.
When you select an XNA Game Studio 4.0 project template, you can only
choose Windows Phone OS 7.1 as the target operating system.
•You can use certain XNA Framework assemblies in apps that target
Windows Phone OS 8.0.
You can reference and use the following XNA Framework assemblies in
apps that target Windows Phone OS 8.0. You can’t reference or use
other XNA Framework assemblies that aren’t in this list in apps that
target Windows Phone OS 8.0.
•Microsoft.Xna.Framework.dll
•Microsoft.Xna.Framework.GamerServices.dll
•Microsoft.Xna.Framework.GamerServicesExtensions.dll
•Microsoft.Xna.Framework.Input.Touch.dll
•Microsoft.Xna.Framework.Media.dll
•Microsoft.Xna.Framework.MediaLibraryExtensions.dll
http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-US/library/windowsphone/develop/jj207003(v=vs.105).aspx
I'm only interested in making 2D games. I don't have the slightest idea about Direct X or Direct 3D (I would love to get into 3D but that will be yet another huge set back).
From the quoted text above, I see two things that really get on my nerves:
I can create new or maintain existing XNA games that target Windows Phone 7.1
But I can not create new XNA games that target Windows Phone 8! Why??? Where is the sense in that???
So, naturally, my question now is:
What are my options for making 2D games (in Visual Studio) for Windows Phone OS 8? I think I saw an option that lets you use XAML for 2D games, correct me if I'm wrong about that but that feels extremely weird to me. I mean, XAML is very structured, I cannot imagine so much freeform objects being trivial to setup for a game.

Try using Cocos2D and Monogame. The were born from iOS and Android development but now support WP8 and Win8. In addition you write your code once (C# + VS) and have a game for all platforms.

If you have XNA skills (or exising code) Monogame allows you to reuse that and port it to Windows, iOS, Android very quickly.
If you are new, a popular new option is Unity. Their 4.3 beta has 2D support. They have a free intro SKU for indies, and you can get their add-ins to target Windows Phone and Windows for free.
Finally, if you are only targeting Windows Phone 8 (and maybe Windows 8) you can also use DirectX/Direct3D straight up.

Related

Can Microsoft XNA run on Windows 10?

I have created a game using C# and Microsoft XNA 4.0. It works on fine on Windows 8 and 8.1, but my friend tried downloading it for a computer running Windows 10 and found that it wouldn't open. It wouldn't even appear in Task Manager when opening it was attempted. The computer in question has the Microsoft XNA Framework Redistributable 4.0 installed on it, so it should be working. Is Windows 10 simply not compatible with XNA?
XNA is no longer supported on newer versions of windows, it was discontinued and isn't supported on platforms newer than Windows 7. Luckily there is an open source implementation of XNA which is essentially the exact same thing and that is currently supported on all windows versions. It's called "MonoGame", here's the link to their website:
http://www.monogame.net/
I know this is a older post but just for those looking for an option like I was today (this post is still a top hit in google) its a bit of work to get setup, but XNA will in fact run on windows 10 just fine, and there is a way to actually use Visual Studio 2017 with XNA just fine as well:
http://flatredball.com/visual-studio-2017-xna-setup/
so if you have code for XNA or like the XNA framework (Like I do, I prefer the pure c# way not c# to some other bloated bridge like Unity) for 2D games then this will be your savior.
Enjoy :)
Some updates:
On March 14, 2016, ID#Xbox announced that MonoGame is coming to Xbox One:
* https://mobile.twitter.com/ID_Xbox/status/709402975051980800
In the FB group Xbox One Indie Devs, Tom Spilman from the MonoGame team had some information to add, more info coming soon.
* https://www.facebook.com/groups/XboxOneIndieDevs/permalink/852775944827686/
Stay tuned to the Twitter account and FB group mentioned above, for new info when available.
Hope that helps!
XNA does work on Windows 10 and even Windows 11. In 2021 I released a game using XNA Framework and it works but the user will have to install XNA Redistributable 4.0 for the game to run on their system so that's not ideal.
But then I ported my game to FNA Framework which is an open-source, identical, reimplementation of XNA. My codebase required almost no changes to work under FNA so I highy recommend it to you.
FNA requires no additional library installation. The DLLs need to be in the same directory with your executable and it will work.
You can see my game here if you are curious about the subject: https://cyon4d.itch.io/cozy-days
To add on what x2kpb said, your best bet at this point is to look at MonoGame for certain platforms, and FNA for others.
XNA, in its pure form, will not work as a new Windows 10 application. The platform to bring win32 (XNA) games to Win10 is called Project Centennial
Both Xbox One and Windows 10 will support MonoGame, per this video at last year's BUILD conference.

Path to Windows 8/10 app from win 7/xna/monogame/xamarin

I've made an educational game for Windows Phone 7 with XNA - which is now a dead technology. But through MonoGame and Xamarin I have been able to port it to Android. Now I need it as an app for Windows tablets, windows 8 app or windows 10 universal app.
What is the best route to this? I'm using Visual Studio 2013 with Xamarin Business edition. And I don't know enough about my options. Should I start with the XNA version or the Android/Xamarin version? What template or architecture is best. Or do I need to do a complete rewrite (only keeping the C# business logic)?

Substitute for XNA

I learned to program in C# and later on picked up XNA. To my disappointment I found out that XNA isn't supported in Windows 8 anymore. So I guess XNA is dying out. I would love to find something similar to it. I would love to find something that deals with 2D graphics (3D is little too much for me now) kinda like XNA did, because that's something I can't do in bare C#.Just the managing of pictures and audio. Thanks for help.
XNA is supported on windows 8 (in the desktop), just not for windows store apps.
If you want to create windows store apps then MonoGame was built to be a drop-in replacement for XNA. At the time of writing most is implemented, the notable exception being the content pipeline (you need to use XNA Game Studio to create the xnb files).
MonoGame is an Open Source implementation of the Microsoft XNA 4 Framework. Our goal is to allow XNA developers on Xbox 360, Windows & Windows Phone to port their games to the iOS, Android, Mac OS X, Linux and Windows 8 Metro. Windows Phone 8, OUYA and PlayStation Mobile development is currently in progress.
You can use MonoGame. MonoGame is a cross-platform, drop-in replacement for XNA on Windows, Linux, WinRT, Windows Phone 7/8, iOS and Android.
It is a mature project and many commercial, successful 2D/3D games have been created using this library.

can a C# windows application be run on a windows 8 based tablet well?

Recently I was asked to work on a project which was developed for an aviculture company.
The client asked if I can make the application which was being developed in C#, to work on a tablet.
So i want to know if i finish the application in c# normally Will I be able to:
1.Use the mono for android and compile the whole project with that and get an android app easily for being used in android devices?
2.Use the executable project on a Windows 8 tablet without any changes?
I would be grateful if any one could answer these two questions.
It depends which tablet you're talking about.
On a Windows RT (ARM based) tablet like Surface, only Metro apps are supported. There are a few desktop apps, but only Microsoft can make them. So if your app is a desktop app, it won't run on Surface RT.
On a tablet with the "real" Windows 8 (x86 based, e.g. Surface Pro), you can run the same apps as on a PC.

Compatibility problem with XNA

I have a game in development in XNA 4.0 + Windows 7. On the Windows 7 OS the game runs with no problem but when I move the project on Win XP with .Net 4.0 installed the game doesn't work. What can be the problem?
The Windows Phone 7 Developer Beta Tools (which xna is a part of) don't work on windows xp. I think somewhere I read that there shall be a standalone version for xp with xna support only but I I'm not sure if this was already released *you might check out the apphub).

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