Getting started with XNA

I'm sure thousands of XNA bloggers have made blog posts similar to this one but for the sake of being complete I'm going to add it to my blog too.

To get started with XNA development you'll need the following:

1) Windows XP
2) Visual C# Express Edition
3) XNA Game Studio Express
4) Optional but very handy: XBox 360 controller

First things first--install Visual C# Express Edition, and then the XNA Game Studio Express. Once they're both installed run Visual Studio C# Express. Create a new project and choose the Windows Game option from the templates screen.



Select a name for your game and proceed to create the project. Once you've created your project simply hit F5 to compile and run the game. If all went well, you'll be greeted with a wonderful blank window filled with Cornflowerblue (the default XNA blank window colour).


That's it. That's all there is to creating your first XNA game. It doesn't do much right now but it's wonderful to know that it works.