Cyclone Game Engine Development: XNA Developer's Survival Kit Expanded

Image courtesy of Nelson Hurst

GAME FRAMEWORKS

General

XNA Framework - the XNA Framework installation files & more
MonoGame - Source Code for the framework and its tools
MonoGame Primitives 2D - this is the 2D XNA Primitives project ported to MonoGame by Jaap-Willem Dooge
FNA - Desktop unique reimplementation of XNA 4.0 apis. It can be used to build desktop versions and be sure to have the same behavior on all platforms.

RENDERING, GRAPHICS & GAME ENGINES

2D & 2.5-D Game Engines

Jemgine - An extendable 2d Game Engine with an level editor
DEngine - a 2D game engine with an easy to use interface
Ianprime - a 2D XNA engine to help quickly develop games with less repetitive tasks
Phone 7 Tile Engine - a Tile Engine solution by Gareth Williams

Flat-Red-Ball Game Engine
FlatRedBall - this engine is open source and will help you make 2.5D games (Main Website)
flatredball-js - an HTML5/ JavaScript port of the FlatRedBall engine (Documentation)
flatredball-spriter - a Glue plugin designed to make it ridiculously simple to load and use animations created with the Spriter tool in a FlatRedBall game (Main Website)
AnimChainsGenerator - automatic AnimationChains generator for FlatRedBall Game Engine
AnimChainsSheetPacker - sprite sheet packing of AnimChainList files (.achx) for FlatRedBall Game Engine
FRB-TexturePackerExporter - a TexturePacker exporter for the FlatRedBall game engine, with file build tool included
Model Plugin - a model-rendering plugin for the FlatRedBall game engine
FRB-TicTacToe - a TicTacToe game built using the FlatRedBall game engine and toolkit
FishKing - a simple fishing game created using the FlatRedBall engine and using resources from OpenGameArt

3D Game Engines

Meteor Rendering Engine - a custom graphic engine for XNA created by Chris Cajas
Xen Graphics API for XNA – rendering tools and much more (article)
Ploobs Engine – loaded with shader effects , deferred rendering, lighting, soft shadows, the works.
Protogame - a powerful cross-platform engine for MonoGame devs
XNA Final Engine – rendering, post screen effects, and more
Engine Nine – includes, animation, post fx, AI, custom materials, scene management, deferred lighting and more
Hilva XNA Graphics Engine – Rendering Engine, Animation, and more
Indiefreaks Game Framework - Incredible Addition for SunBurn Engine Users
Jcoluna XNA Samples – If you’re trying to make your own engine, start here. (Shadows, SSAO, Lights, culling…)
Tomato Renderer – Open Source Engine with light pre-pass, ssao, depth of field and more (includes user interface)
Nez - Source code for the framework and the tools
Synapse Gaming SunBurn Engine 2.0 – Nice Game Engine loaded with features and the Best Support & Community Ever (Article: XNA to Sunburn)
Digital Rune Engine – Great Game Engine (physics, animation, math, multi-threading and more. open-source version here and check out the documentation)
Delta Engine - A fantastic game engine created by Benjamin Nitschke with the mission to create a really easy way to write and convert games to any platform. (home)
Axiom - a cross-platform 3D engine for .NET and Mono
Ox Game Engine - a free open source 3D engine for XNA
Xi Game Engine - an open source 3D engine for XNA with many features
QuickStart Game Engine - start your own from this library
Persian Engine -created and adapted for a range of video game genres
Phoenix XNA 3d Engine - has lots of potential
Titanium XNA Game Engine - a work in progress
Tomahawk XNA Game Engine - too many features to list (Nice Engine)
NOVA - a C# 3D framework with an emphasis on augmented reality
Innovative Games - simple open-source engine to start with
BetaCell Toolkit - achieve your objectives more quickly (XNA 3.1)
X-Engine 2 - a 3D graphics and physics engine (no xbox support :-( )
Xploit - quickly and easily develop polished 3D games
Illuminati Engine - an open-source engine created by Charles Humphrey and Nark Neale (more information about it can be found here)
Temporal-Wars - an XNA indie game engine
This Is Neat. - a collection of Utility Classes to help make games in XNA a lot easier
XNA Simple Game Engine - make projects easily with XNA 4.0
ELSEngine - designed to handle and make interfaces and interface assets
Graffiti - a high-performance rendering engine built specifically for the Reach profile on top of XNA/ Monogame with a very specific feature set
Voxel Engine - a Minecraft style terrain engine in C#, SharpDX, SlimDX & XNA 4.0
LeCotteGame XNA Engine
C3DE - an 3D engine powered by MonoGame with cool features
Kailash Engine

Rendering & Graphics

Cameras & Scenes

XNA Camera - this will help you understand how the XNA camera works
ArcBall Camera - learn how to create your own arc-ball camera in this blog post by Roy Triesscheijn
Chase Camera - learn how to create a simple chase camera with spring physics
Camera Shake - learn how to increase immersion by shaking the game's camera
Simple FPS Camera - learn how to create a simple First-Person camera in MonoGame
Split-Screen - learn how to render the same scene to multiple viewports
Safe Area - learn how to make your game display correctly on a wide range of TV screens

Effects, Lighting & Shaders

Shaders & Effects - learn the difference between pixel and vertex shaders and how to develop your own using FX Composer
Custom Model Effect - learn how to apply a custom effect using the XNA Framework Content Pipeline
Distortion - learn how to implement a variety of screen-space distortion effects
Fluid Shader - real-time fluid dynamics (give the author credit if used!)
FX Composer - a powerful integrated development environment for shader authoring
NShader - Syntax Highlighting for your HLSL files
Non-Realistic Rendering - learn how to implement stylized non-photorealistic rendering techniques
Real-Time Fur - learn how to create and apply real-time fur to a model
Shatter Effect - learn how to apply an effect on any model and shatter it apart
Color Grading Filter - a color grading/ correction filter for XNA and MonoGame
XNA Shader Programming Tutorials - Need help with HLSL (High-Level-Shader-Language)? Check out these tutorials by Petri Wilhelmsen. They are also listed below
XNA Shader Programming (Old) - this is Petri Wilhelmsen's source code for his XNA Shader programming tutorial series for XNA 3.1. They are also listed below
Weaver - HLSL surface shader parser for XNA/ MonoGame
Compile for Pixel Shader 3.0 - an excellent blog post by John Pile Jr
ShaderGen - Proof-of-concept library for generating HLSL/GLSL shader code from C#
2MGFXGuiConverter - a drag'n drop shader converter created by Yannick Comte to use with 2MGFX. Convert all your effects without the use of the command line.

Depth of Field

Depth of Field Sample - an open source sample created by Matt Pettineo

Motion Blur

What is Motion Blur? - an excellent article by John Chapman
Pre-Object Motion Blur - learn about a new motion blur technique
Motion Blur - learn how to implement a motion blur effect based on GPU Gems 3
Motion Blur Article - an article originally posted by Sean Hargreaves Blog on MSDN
Motion Blur Sample - a sample created by Matt Pettineo
Motion Blur & Independent Transparency - great post by Kosmonaut Games

Lighting

Basic Effect Lighting - a tutorial by RB Whitaker on creating a basic lighting effect
Diffuse Lighting - a tutorial by RB Whitaker on creating a diffuse lighting shader
Specular Lighting - a tutorial by RB Whitaker on creating a specular lighting shader
Stock Effects - Stock effects provides source code for the five effects (BasicEffect, SkinnedEffect, EnvironmentMapEffect, DualTextureEffect, and AlphaTestEffect), and the default shader used by SpriteBatch (SpriteEffect), built into the XNA Framework. There's also a command-line utility (CompileEffect) that uses the Content Pipeline to compile a .fx source file into a binary blob that can be passed directly to the XNA Framework Effect class constructor.
Rim Lighting - learn how to implement a rim lighting effect by using the standard graphics effects
XNA Sun Shader - learn how to create a sun effect in this tutorial by Nicolas Menzel
Bazier Path Lighting - an experimental extension to traditional Phong point lighting by Luke Thatcher
Lightning Sample - learn how to create a lightning effect for your games

Lens Flare
XNA Lens Flare - an XNA and MonoGame lens flare effect tutorial with lighting by Jason White. He founded Alien Scribble Interactive
XNA Lens Flare Part 2 - obstructing light effects continuing from the previous tutorial
Lens-Flare - learn how to create an awesome lens-flare effect for your game

2D Lighting
2D Lightning - learn how to generate shockingly good 2D lightning effects by Michael Hoffman
2D Spotlight - learn how to implement a 2D spotlight in XNA created by Vincent. Also, check out a continuation of the 2D lighting here
2D Lighting & Shadows - an excellent sample created by Roy Triesscheijn, based off of Catalin Zima's 2D lighting and shadows sample
Dynamic 2D Lighting - an example using Managed DirectX to perform normal mapping, bloom post-processing, and dynamic shadows in 2D (not XNA)
Example of 2D Lighting - a great article on a simple way to make lighting for a 2D game
Penumbra - created by Jaanus Varus, this is an excellent open-source 2D lighting program with soft shadows for MonoGame
DarkLight - a 2D lighting engine in XNA that allows you to create 2D shadowing effects
Illuminant - a real-time 2D lighting and particles system library
XNA 2D Lighting System - a 2D lighting system which supports point lights, spot lights, soft shadows, and colored lights

Bloom
Bloom Post-process - learn how to use bloom post-processing filters to add a glow effect over the top of an existing scene
Bloom Filter - a bloom filter module for XNA and MonoGame which can easily be added (check out this community forum post and more here)
Bloom Effect - MonoGame community bloom effect forum post

Deferred Rendering
Deferred Rendering – Roy Triesscheijn updated Catalin Zima’s Tutorial to XNA 4.0/ (also, check out my blog post here)
Deferred Engine for MonoGame - a deferred engine created with MonoGame by Kosmonaut Games
Project Vanquish - a deferred rendering engine, extending on Catalin Zima's deferred engine (check out the video of it in action)

Ray Tracing
Ray Tracing - a tutorial by Paul Varcholik
Realtime Raytracing - an excellent post by John Pile Jr
rasteracer - a hybrid ray tracer created by Tim Jones (github)
Simple Ray Tracing in C# - a great tutorial by Anderson Almeida
MonoGame Ray Tracer - a work-in-progress ray-tracer using MonoGame by Yannick Comte

God Rays & Volumetric Lighting
2D Crepuscular (God) Rays - learn how to implement God rays in this tutorial by Charles Humphrey (MonoGame version)
Light Shaft Rendering - an implementation of light shaft rendering in XNA with custom HLSL shaders by Luke Thatcher
Volumetric Lighting - check out this awesome tutorial on volumetric lighting (or Crepescular Rays, Light Shafts or God Rays) by Nicolas Menzel
Light Shafts - this is a port of the volumetric lighting tutorial by Nicolas Menzel to MonoGame

SSAO (Screen Space Ambient Occlusion)
SSAO Article - check out this article on GameDev.net and see more on Wikipedia here
Screen-Space Ambient Occlusion (SSAO) - useful next-gen technique
Ambient Occulsion for Dynamic Objects - excellent article by icefall Games

digitalerr0r XNA 3.1 Shader Programming Tutorials (GitHub)
1. Intro to HSLS, ambient light
2. Diffuse Light
3. Specular Light
4. Normal Mapping
5. Deform Vertex Shader
6. Simple Ocean
7. Toon Shading
8. Gloss Map
9. Wiggle Post Process
10. Invert Post Process
11. Grayscale Shader
12. Pixel Distortion Shader
13. Alpha Mapping
14. Transmittance/ Depth Buffers
15. Dynamic Environment Mapping
16. Refraction
17. Point Light & Self-Shadowing
18. Multiple Point Lights
19. Hemispheric Ambient Light
20. Depth of Field
21. Transition: Fade
22. Transition: Cross
23. Blur
24. Bloom
25. Perlin Noise on the GPU
26. Bump Mapping Perlin Noise

digitalerr0r XNA 4.0 Shader ProgrammingTutorials
1. Ambient Light - an introduction to HLSL shader programming in XNA 4.0
2. Diffuse Light - second tutorial explaining how to implement diffuse lighting
3. Specular Light - learn how to implement specular lighting in this third tutorial
4. Normal Mapping - learn how to implement normal mapping in this fourth tutorial
5. Deform Shader - learn how to create a pure vertex shader for deforming objects
6. Simple Ocean - learn how to create an ocean shader

Texture Mapping Techniques

Normal Mapping - learn how to apply a normal mapping effect to a mesh based on the Custom Model Effect Sample
Normal Mapping Demo - learn how to demonstrate tangent space normal mapping
katsbits - create normal maps from 2D textures
Parallax Normal Mapping - learn how to demonstrate parallax normal mapping
Parallax Occlusion Mapping - learn a more complex way to make textures pop out
XNA Parallax Mapping - Here is a sample of using Parallax mapping in XNA using the sample shader provided in the August 2006 DirectX SDK from Microsoft

Reflection

Real-Time Reflection - learn how to create real-time reflection in your scenes
XNA 4.0 Dual Paraboloid Reflection Mapping

Plants & Vegetation

Billboards - learn how to efficiently render large numbers of billboard sprites on the GPU
Billboards Demo - learn how to draw an alpha blended textured quad that is always facing the camera
Billboards Demo 2 - learn an alternative based billboarding technique based on the first demo
Billboards Demo 3 - learn how to add animation to the vertices of the billboard
Billboards Demo 4 - learn how to render lots of billboards
Making Trees - a nice brief article by icefall Games
More Trees & Texture Tricks - an excellent article by icefall Games
XNA Procedural LTrees - creates natural looking tree models in real-time (Article by icefall Games)
MonoGame Procedural LTrees - MonoGame version of the Procedural L Trees library converted by Tim Jones
Vegetation Improvements - great article by icefall Games
Wind Animation for Vegetation - learn about vegetation animation from icefall Games
XNA Dynamic Grass - learn how to make grass that moves in response to a character's movement by Jason White. Check out his MonoGame version of the tutorial here: MonoGame Grass

Terrain & Heightmap

Generated Geometry - learn how 3D models can be generated by code during the build process
Multitexturing - learn how to attach different textures according to the height level of each vertex
Multi-Textured Terrain - a simple yet fast GPU-driven terrain multi-texturing approach
Terrain Texturing Demo - learn how to demonstrate procedural terrain texturing using 4 textures and a heightmap
Terrain Lighting - add normals to a terrain
Terrain Normal Mapping Demo - learn how to extend the Terrain Texturing Demo by adding tangent space normal mapping
Landscape Modeling - Game Creation with XNA/3D Development/Landscape Modelling
Steepness - an article which explains how to detect the area of steep slopes
Osiris - a GeoMipMapping Terrain Processor created by Tim Jones
Large Terrain
Quadtree Terrain - created by George Kristainsen, this program is a dynamic quadtree terrain used to render very large-scale worlds. Also, take a look at this article which explains the algorithm in-depth. For a similar terrain system which uses chunks, check out his chunked-terrain program. Also, check out magrathea to see his adaptive terrain algorithm applied to full-scale planets
Chunked-Terrain - created by George Kristainsen, this is a C#/ MonoGame program demonstrating a dynamic, unlimited, procedural terrain demo which can be used to render very large-scale worlds.
Magrathea - created by George Kristainsen, this program is an open-source dynamic, prodecural 3D full-scale planet demo. Its a scaled up adaption of the Quadtree Terrain project.
Genesis Engine - created by Eric Lee, this is an open-source experiment with procedurally-generated worlds in XNA/ MonoGame from the ground level all the way out into space.

Water

Dynamic 2D Water - make a splash effect with dynamic 2D water effects in this tutorial by Michael Hoffman
Dynamic Water Pixel Shader - a fairly advanced water shader tutorial for MonoGame or XNA by Alien Scribble based off Michael Hoffman's 2D water splash tutorial
XNA 4.0 Water - Learn how to create water with reflection for your games. The original source code was written in XNA 3.0 by David Mariscal Fernandez. It was updated to XNA 3.1 by Canton Javier Ferrero and I have successfully updated it to XNA 4.0. For more information, see my blog post here. Enjoy!
HLSL: Water Shader - a water shader created in XNA by Dmitry Timofeev (video)
Ocean Scene - check out this water shader by Kosmonaut Games
Water Flow in Portal 2 - by Donghyun Kim

icefall Games
Water Part 1 - learn about faking water reflections with fourier coefficients
Water Part 2 - water shader follow up
Water Part 3
Water Waves
Water Flow Shader - learn how to show water flowing realistically

Shadows

Avatar Shadows - learn how to cast planar shadows
Cascaded Shadow Maps - learn how to create this shadow mapping technique (Also look here)
Deferred Shadow Maps - an open source sample created by Matt Pettineo
Dynamic 2D Soft Shadows - article by Orangy Tang describing an accurate method of generating soft shadows in a 2D environment
Dynamic 2D Shadows - implement 2D shadows in XNA
Shader-Based 2D Shadows - a great sample on 2D Shadows by Catalin Zima
Shadow Mapping - learn how to implement basic shadow mapping from a directional light
XNA 4.0 Shadow Mapping Demo - learn how to cast shadows from a light source using filtering to soften the shadows and reduce their aliased appearance
XNA 4.0 Variance Shadow Mapping - apply any kind of texture filter onto the shadow mapping image to give it an overall smoother look

Skybox & Clouds

Skybox - learn how to add a skybox to your game
Volumetric Clouds - Learn how to implement volumetric clouds in XNA 4.0 in this tutorial by Charles Humphrey. You can find his original code base here

Snow

Rendering Snow on the Ground - an excellent article by icefall Games
Steps in Snow - an excellent article by Catalin Zima

Decals

Decals (Deferred Rendering) - an excellent article by icefall Games

ANIMATION

2D Animation

MeoMotion - a great 2D animator for creating smooth distortable animations created by Jason White (see more here)
ToonBoom - a great article on loading ToonBoom animations in XNA
2D Skeletal Animations - an awesome sample on 2D animation

Spine 2D
Spine Test - This is a quick test solution created by Gareth Williams that combines the Spine XNA runtime with a tile engine to create a simple platform engine. (Video) (Climbing)
Spine Runtimes - 2D skeletal animation runtimes for Spine (XNA & MonoGame)
Spine Articles
Ghost Renderer
Tweaking the XNA Runtime
Feedback on the awesome xna runtime
Rendering Using Only SpriteBatch in XNA
Handling Collisions with Spine
Using the XNA Content Pipeline with Spine
Integrating Spine Runtimes in MonoGame

3D Animation

Avatar Usage Guidelines
Avatar Animation Rig - download this model setup for custom avatar animations
Avatar Animation Pack - a set of animations for your avatar ready for use in your games
Avatar Animation Blending - learn how to blend between two avatar animations over a fixed period of time
Animation Blending in MonoGame/ XNA - an excellent demo created by Marko B. Ludolph which handles smooth blending of skeletal animations
Character Animation - article by icefall Games
Avatar Multiple Animations - learn how to play two built-in avatar animations at the same time
Custom Avatar Animation - learn how to load and process a custom animation for your avatar
Object Placement on Avatar - learn how to attach models to your avatar
Digital Rune Animation – Support 2D and 3D animation, Incredible skinned animation pipeline
SGMotion Animation Library – XNAnimation Library integrated with SunBurn
Communist Games Animation Library – Animation blending, shared skeletons, and more
XNAnimation Library – Too many features to list. (Check out my posts here) (View Online Documentation)
XNA Animation Component Library – one of the first animation engines, still awesome
Simple Animation - learn how to apply simple program-controlled rigid body animation to a model
Skinned Model Sample - learn how to process and render a skinned character model by using the XNA Framework Content Pipeline
Skinned Model with Extensions – learn how to extend the skinned model sample by directly accessing and manipulating the positions of specific bones to add three new features.
Skinned Model MonoGame - learn how to get XNA's Skinned Sample working with MonoGame
MonoGame Skinned Model Sample - Skinned 3D Model for Monogame
A Better Skinned Sample - an alternate skinned model sample
Engine Nine – has an easy to use animation system, for skinned and non skinned models.
Helium - a fast XNA animation library which has more features than the XNA Skinned model sample created by Zelimir Fedoran
GoGo-Robot - learn how to define difference animations for different parts of the animation timeline based on the Skinned Model Sample
Merge FBX Animation Files – hate XNA FBX only uses 1 Take? here’s a solution (Also, see how to fix this from my blog post here)
Better Animation - METLAB BetterSkinnedSample extended to work with one FBX file with multiple animations.
Inverse Kinematics Sample - learn to create dynamic animation
KiloWatt Animation - nice system, fast and save room on file size (also here)
XNA Multiplatform Animation System - similar to Unreal Animation Editor
XNA Mixamo Importer - content pipeline tools for importing animated models from mixamo.com
ColladaXNA - This is an open source collada importer for XNA used to load .dae files (article and git)
3D Animation Using Maya - learn the keys to animation in Autodesk Maya
3DS Max - learn how to export models from 3D Studio Max for XNA
XNA Utilities Max Script - learn how to fix FBX models exported from 3D Studio Max with the correct pivot points
XNA Model Viewer - a program which allows you to load an FBX file and view it in XNA. It's great for testing a model and for seeing all of the bone information
Model Viewer for MonoGame - an open-source model and animation viewer for MonoGame created by Kosmonaut Games (see more on this blog post here)

Motion-Capture

Mixamo – need Animation for your Characters?
CMU Mocap Database - need the largest collection of free Mocap available?
DIY Kinect Motion Capture Studio | Blender
Kinect Motion Capture

PHYSICS

2D Physics

Farseer Physics Engine – a 2D Physics Engine (Farseer Physics Platformer 3.3.1)
Box2D.XNA – a C# XNA port of Box2D
Simple 2D Collision - this is an excellent 2D collision for XNA and MonoGame (article)

3D Physics

DigitalRune Physics – A module from DigitalRune Engine - Physics with lots of features, (fast)
Bepu Physics – Nice Physics engine with many features, (fast, FREE) (blog) (forum) (FAQ)
BEPU Physics MG - This is a MonoGame 3.4+ version of the 1.4 verison of BEPU Physics.
Also, check out my blog posts here on BEPU.
BEPU Physics V1.5.0 - MonoGame port of BEPU physics
BEPUik v0.3.0 - 64 bit Blender builds with the latest BEPUik full body inverse kinematics addon
Bubble Physics - soft-body physics engine for XNA
Jitter Physics – A real-time Physics Engine for .NET created by the author of JigLibX (fast, FREE) The Google Code Archive can be found here
Oops! Framework - fast on the PC and Xbox 360 (good, but needs more features)
Matali Physics -fast with lots of potential (fast on PC, average on Xbox 360, $130 – $260)
Henge 3D Physics – Lot of Features and multi-threaded (okay on PC, slow on Xbox 360, FREE)
JigLibX – a C# port of the C++ JigLib physics engine, formerly known as JiggleX. Initially its not multi-threaded and runs slow however its FREE. Many developers recommend using Jitter instead. You can download the XNA 4.0 version of JigLibX here.
Also, check out my blog posts here on ways I improved the JigLibX physics engine. Also, see Nikescar' vehicle class modifications
Bullet for XNA - loaded with features (slow on PC and Xbox 360) The physics library of the Visual3D.NET game engine is based on an early version of BulletX
Soft Body Physics in XNA - cloth, chains, slinky (awesome tutorial and samples)
XNA Havok - XnaHavok is simple wrapper for Havok SDK for use in XNA
Vectors & Matrices - basic facts about vector and matrix algebra when developing 3D games
MonoCollision Framework - a triangle sphere collision framework for MonoGame

Collision Series
1. 2D Rectangle Collision - learn several simple techniques for constraining motion and collision detection in two dimensions
2. 2D Per-Pixel Collision - learn how to perform per-pixel collision detection in 2D
3. 2D Collision with Transformed Objects - learn how to perform per-pixel collision detection in two dimensions on sprites that use linear transformations such as rotation or scale
4. Collision with a Heightmap - learn how to move objects along a heightmap
5. Heightmap Collision with Normals - learn how to use information about a heightmap's vertex normals to follow the contour of the terrain

AUDIO

3D Audio - learn how to position sounds in 3D space
Dynamic Audio - learn about the audio features to the XNA Sound Effect API
EasyXnaAudio – easy interface to load, play, and manage songs and sounds
XNA Final Engine – Audio engine included in framework
Microphone Echo - learn how to play back recorded sound with an echo effect applied to it
Audacity - a free multi-track audio editor and recorder
Sound Lab - a collection of more than 170 free audio files for use in your games
Sound & Music - learn the basics on sound and music for games on Windows Phone
Playing Sound Effects - learn the aspects of audio programming as well as using XACT
Scratchy Audio Fix - learn how to fix playing the same sound effect at a high rate

Music

Music Management - meet the requirements around music playback in Windows Phone games in order to be accepted into the Windows Phone Marketplace
One-line Algorithmic Music - learn how to generate a sound clip through a line of code by David Gouveia

Creating a Basic Synth by David Gouveia
Part 1 - introduces the reader to the world of sound synthesis with XNA 4.0 and cover some of the basic theory that should be understood before proceeding
Part 2 - introduces the DynamicSoundEffectInstance class present in the XNA 4.0 framework and how it can be used to play some simple waveforms. By the end of part II you should be able to create and reproduce a single waveform of different kinds (such as a sine wave, sawtooth wave, pulse wave and square wave).
Part 3 - guides the reader through the construction of a Synth class that allows the application to communicate with the low-level audio playback engine through a much simpler, music-oriented interface. The class will also be flexible enough for new sounds to be created and swapped easily. By the end of part II you should be able to play many musical notes simultaneously, while controlling their individual pitch, duration, volume and panning. You should also be able to create entirely new sounds and use them with minimal changes to the code.

ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE (AI)

Aiming

Aiming - learn how to turn one object to face another

Steering Behaviors

Steering Behaviors in XNA Part 1 - learn about some basic steering behaviors
Steering Behaviors in XNA Part 2 - learn about obstacle avoidance in this second part
Steering Behaviors in XNA Part 3 - learn about wall avoidance in this third part
Steering Behaviors, Obstacle Avoidance – good Example (in spanish)

Navigation
Navigation Behaviors - learn how agents move autonomously, that is, behavior that is not calculated
Waypoint Navigation - learn basic AI navigation using waypoints (2D)

Path-finding
Pathfinding - learn how AIs can navigate using three routines
Bing Maps with Pathfinding - This sample expands on the Bing Maps sample capabilities by combining the Pathfinding sample to enable the tank to drive to markers around the screen by using the streets on the map.
Sick Kreations - C# Port of Recast/ Detour Navigation Mesh created by Sick Kreations based on this
Navigation Mesh Pathfinding - a great blog post by John C. Brown on pathfinding
AStarPathfinding - A-Star Pathfinding Sample Application created by Ben Scharbach

State Machine

State machine-based behavior models - Good Article, sample old..
StateMachineXNA - XNA 4.0 port of Bryan Wagstaff's State Machine tutorial

Behavior Types & Decisions

Chase & Evade - learn how to implement several simple AI behaviors
Fuzzy Logic - learn how to create AI that makes decisions

Flocking
Flocking - learn how AIs use simple rules to move together

Engine Nine – has Path Finding and steering behaviors included
SharpSteer – I found a million and 1 uses for this…
AI in Games - from Game Creations With XNA
Intro to Finite State Machines - learn about finite state machines in this post by Jesús Bosch
AIGameDev.com - a community of game developers focusing on artificial intelligence, ran by experts in the field
AI Game Programmers Guild
GameDev.net - a collection of recommended AI Books and Sites (great for getting started)
GOAP - Goal-Oriented Action Planning
Botman's Bots - the bots used in Counter Strike
AI in FPS Games - some insight in this presentation
XGAE - (XNA Genuine Artificial Intelligence Engine) a port from C++ to C# of the artificial intelligence engine FEAR for XNA
Digesting Duck - a blog about AI and Prototyping
AiGameDev.com -
Diabolical - blog posts by John C. Brown on the artificial intelligence in his sci-fi action game

PARTICLES

2D Particles

2D Particles - learn how to draw 2D particle effects using the SpriteBatch
A 2D Particle System - tutorial by Charles Humphrey
XNA 2D Particle Engine - a flexible and extensible 2D particle engine in XNA 4.0

3D Particles

3D Particles - learn how to implement a 3D particle system by using point sprites
DPSF (Dynamic Particle System Framework) - tested and approved! Also, check out the source on GitHub. There is also a new git repository for DPSF v3 and you can also download the installer here. Full API documentation is provided in the help file, as well as in the online help documentation. Be sure to check out the demo videos to see it in action.
Mercury Particle Engine – great engine, has lots of potential. (You can also download it here and be sure to watch the video of it in action)(MonoGame port here
Nuclex Framework- multi-threaded particle system
XML Particle Sample for XNA Creator Club – still one of my favorites
DigitalRune Particles – Very Nice.…
XNA GPU Particles Tool - helps create particle effects based on the sample shaders in the XNA education catalog.
Particle Physics - a simple XNA particle physics demo
ProjectMercury

INPUT & STORAGE

EasyStorage - the easiest way to save games, store date, etc... (tutorial here by Robot Foot Games) Check it out on github for the latest updates
GamePad - This is a helper for simplified access to gamepad controllers modeled after the XNA Game Studio 4 (Microsoft.XNA.Framework.Input) GamePad class
XNAInput - nice library to handle input controls
XNA Input Handlers - library to handle mouse and keyboard input
CS_XboxOneController - use C# and XNA to get Xbox One or 360 controller input
Otaku Controller - this is a simple program simulation PC mouse with an Xbox 360 or Xbox One controller
Input Sequence - learn how to detect sequences of input such as combo series, cheat codes, and other multi-button functions
Keyboard Input Scope Sample - learn how to change the input scope of the on-screen keyboard to one of the many built-in options on Windows Phone
WP7 Saving/ Loading - a tutorial on saving and loading for windows phone based games
Joystick - learn how to get a joystick working in XNA 4.0
Access an Xbox 360 Joystick - an excellent tutorial created by Joel Ivory Johnson
PlusPad - learn how to simulate keyboard and mouse input with a Xbox 360 gamepad
WebCamXNA - learn how to use a webcam in XNA

GRAPHICAL USER INTERFACES (GUI) / LEVEL EDITOR TOOLS

DigitalRune Game UI – Basically Neoforce Controls on steroids, part of the Digital Rune Engine
Neoforce Controls - my 1st Favorite tool for Interfaces and open source (Also on GitHub) (Check out the monogame version)
MonoForce - an improved MonoGame based version of Neoforce Controls
XNA Interface Elements - my 2nd Favorite tool for Interfaces
Nuclex Framework- skinnable interface included
3D XNA Gizmo- you may need this for level editing (MonoGame Source)
XNA and Windows Forms – this article explains the best
XNA Integration Inside WPF - another way to integrate multiple XNA scenes inside WPF
Gemini - a WPF framework designed specifically for building IDE-like applications
RandomchaosMGUI - an open-source MonoGame user interface created by Charles Humphrey
GLEED2D - a 2D level editor for your XNA games (XNA 4.0 version)
XNA LED - a C# level editor created in XNA using xWinForms (has lots of potential)
tIDE - This a full-featured .NET based tile map editor using XNA 3.1 and 4.0 technology. The editors supports multiple layers (WYSIWYG parallax), tile animation and custom properties at map, layer, tile sheet and individual tile level. The editors works in tandem with xTile, an XNA-ready tile rendering engine. (click here for a quick tutorial for integrating xTile within an XNA game project) (Source Code) Automatic tile transitioning (autotiling algorithm described here)
World of Goo: Cursor - the shape and behavior of the mouse cursor
Pie Menu - a circular context menu where selection depends on direction
3D Game Editor - This is a 3D game editor created in MonoGame by Nate Bowman

Character Interaction & Gameplay
Mass Effect: Dialogue - looks and behaves like the dialogue system and wheel in Mass Effect
2D Pie Drawing - a useful pie for 2D game effects, such as enemy area visibility, flashlights and radars

GAME STATE MANAGEMENT

Xna Screen Manager – clean, simple and easy to use
Oops! Framework - has a game state manager included
Nuclex Framework – game manager included (nicely done)
The State of Things - learn how to use state to create game menus, display game screens and make your game characters come alive!
GameStateManager – a great starter to learn how to build your own game menu system. Learn how to manage transitions among menus and gameplay states
Multiple Columns - learn how to add multiple columns to the Game State Management Sample by adding left and right movement to your menus
MonoGame-UI Sample - a UI sample created by Fit Games using the game state management project
Splash-Screen - learn how to create a splash screen for your menu system (also be sure to check out my blog post here)
User Interface Controls - learn how to build on the Game State Management sample adding user interface elements with a look and feel
Dynamic Menu - learn how to develop a dynamic user interface that can be created in code or in XML, or a combination of both
Handle Multiple Controllers - learn how to handle multiple player controllers in your games
RPG Starter Kit - comes equipped with a Level Manager

NETWORKING

Network Prediction - learn how to use prediction and smoothing algorithms to compensate for network lag
Network Lobby & Chat Icons - a free set of images designed for displaying status within a networking game
Network Game State Management - learn how to implement the user interface for a multiplayer networked game
Network Architecture: Client / Server - learn how to implement a simple multiplayer network session by using a client/server network topology
Network Architecture: Peer 2 Peer - learn how to implement a simple multiplayer network session by use P2P network topology in which each computer is responsible for updating the state of its locally controlled players
Invites - this sample builds on the Peer 2 Peer sample by adding support for invites
Net Rumble - a 2D shooter where up to sixteen players compete online in a death match
Picking - learn how to determine whether a player's cursor is over an object and how to find out where on the screen the object it. This sample could be helpful for drawing text above a player's head if you want to display the name of players over their characters in online matches. Doing so helps players identify each other.
Network Engines - other useful networking resources
Making Networked Games - check out this helpful PDF by Shawn Hargreaves
No Membership Error - this post by John Pile Jr explains how to test XNA networking using a SystemLink without any difficulties

Lidgren
Lidgren.Network - a networking library for the .net framework which uses a single udp socket to deliver a simple API for connecting a client to a server, reading and sending messages
An Intro to Lidgren - an article introducing networking in C# games using Lidgren
How to: Lidgren Network - an example on how to use the lidgren networking library
Lidgren P2P - an article explaining how to implement Peer to Peer networking using Lidgren

MULTI-THREADING

ParallelTasks Threading Library- makes it easy to multi-thread your game
Multi-threading your XNA Game – great article and example
Designing the Framework of a Parallel Game Engine – just read it
DigitalRune Engine – Threading Library Included in Engine (RECOMMENDED)

CONTENT IMPORTERS & PIPELINE EXTENSIONS

3DS, OBJ, and NFF - three content importers for XNA content pipeline extensions
Custom Model Importer - learn how to implement a custom model importer in XNA
Custom Model Class - learn how to go beyond the limits of the Model class that comes built in to the XNA Framework
Tiff Importer - learn how to create a Tiff content importer besides the default XNA images
ColladaXNA - learn how to create an importer for animated collada 3d models (see more here and more about loading and rendering collada models here) (Git)
StichUp - an XNA 4.0 content pipeline extension which implements the idea of Shawn Hargreave's article Generating Shaders From HLSL Fragments (See an Introduction to StitchUp here)
Osiris - a set of XNA 4.0 content pipeline extensions
Weaver - an HLSL surface shader parser, implemented as a content pipeline extension for XNA/ MonoGame
XBuilder - This lets you preview your content assets right in Visual Studio
(See more here and version 0.2)
Xamarin Asset Previewer - lets you preview various MonoGame/ UrhoSharp assets in the IDE
Compiled XNB Content Format - learn how to load .xnb files into a programming environment other than XNA / .NET

GARBAGE COLLECTION & PERFORMANCE

Performance Utility - learn three tools you can add to your XNA projects for performance tuning and debugging
Performance Measuring - understand how to utilize the Performance Utility when adding 3D spheres to a scene as they collide with one another
Performance Tools - Performance tools including graphs to help measure garbage and CPU performance
Profiling -
Instanced Model - learn how to efficiently render many copies of the same model by using the GPU to reduce the cost of repeated draw calls
Speedup Rendering Model - learn a new approach to save processing power and speed up rendering 3D models
Xbox 360 Best Performance Practices - a great article which discusses ways to improve performance for XNA targeting the Xbox 360 (this article is helpful for less advanced hardware)
Remote Performance Monitor - a tutorial by stevepro studios on using the Remote Performance Monitor
Tips & Tricks for MonoGame/ XNA Developers - I highly recommend reading this blog post

CLR Profiler
Using CLR Profiler 2.0 with XNA 4.0

STARTER KITS & OPEN SOURCE GAMES

Starter Kits

NinjAcademy
Paddle Battle
Platformer
Racing Game
Robot Game
Role-Playing Game
Spaceshooter
Ship Game
Spacewar
XNA FPS Starter Kit
Card Game
Yacht - This starter kit is a dice game where the player rolls 5 dice in an attempt to create specific combinations.
Vector Rumble

Open Source Games

Awesome Game - a top-down racing game Tim Jones along with some of his friends created during a "geekathon" coding weekend
Bubble Bound
DSM - a mutliplayer shooter game in XNA 4.0 (See video)
Dungeon Quest
Mage Defender Deluxe
Space Defender - a complete XNA 4.0 game by Ghoshehsoft
Fuel Cell
Torq2 - A 3D car game created by Tim Jones
MonoGame Samples - this includes three sample games: Platformer 2D, Space War and Neon Shooter
ThirdPartyNinjas

USEFUL EXTRAS AND SERVICES

Fonts

Font Squirrel – need Free Commercial-Use Fonts for your game?

Art

Textures

CG Textures - Great resource for vast and high quality textures
Free Stock Textures - free textures by Paul Wozniak and Eva Sajdak
TextureMate - Free commercial or non-commercial great quality texture packs
Creating Photo-realistic Textures - 77 Techniques for creating photo-realistic textures.
Scratch Brushes - 32 High-Resolution Scratch Brushes in GIMP by ChrisDesign
Scratch Brush Pack 1 -
Scratch Brush Pack 2 -
cgskies - Sky Texture References
HDR Shop - This is an excellent tool designed to create, view and manipulate High-Dynamic Range images. HDR Shop was also used in the XNA Sun Shader program by Nicolas Menzel to transform from the planet to a cubic representation

Sound Effects

Freesound.org
soundbible.com
bfxr.net - online sound effect creator
soundsnap - cost varies

Music

HyperDuck Music Studios – need custom music for your game?
The Spin Wires - Need free instrumental tracks for use in your games, videos and other media. Check out this site here. The Spin Wires are a Punk/ Dance Rock band from Buffalo, NY. They embody the best elements of bands like Franz Ferdinand, The Black Keys and The Arctic Monkeys. If you use their tracks, please give them credit!
ccmixter - Royalty free music you can use in your games (check the licenses for how to credit people)
FL Studio Cookbook - learn how to make your own style of songs with Fruity Loop Studio

More

DigitalRune Math and Geometry Libraries- This comes with the DigitalRune Engine (RECOMMENDED)
Bob's Track Builder - Create tracks using simple mouse clicks for your racing game
TexturePacker - An awesome spritesheet creation editor
Wings 3D - A very useful simple 3D modeling program which is great for beginners. Its both free and open-source (Documentation & Community)
Helix - a 3D toolkit for .NET

Articles, Blogs, Tips and Tutorials

Allen Pestaluky - find helpful XNA tutorials
Alien Scribble Interactive - find helpful XNA and MonoGame tutorials here
AppWeek - an article by Shawn Hargreaves which utilized some of the App Hub Samples for to help create a game
Beware of 64 Bits! - the XNA Framework is a 32-bit (see more here)
Bounding Box - draw an XNA Model bounding box
Catalin Zima - an awesome game dev blog with tons of tutorials
Clone of Duty - a first-person shooter developed by Gary Ruddock
Created by: X - a page by Dean Lunz with XNA example projects and more
FX Composer Rocks! - an article explaining the benefits of using FX Composer
Riemer's XNA Tutorials - in-depth tutorials in XNA and DirectX
Game Developedia – Nice Beginner XNA 4.0 Tutorials
Tutorials by Robot Foot Games – nice 2D sprite Tutorials
XNA 4.0 Class Diagrams – extremely useful for programmers
RoastedAmoeba Projects – Awesome XNA 4.0 Projects
TileMap and Camera System Tutorial - good article
XNA Content Pipeline Debugging – helps you figure old those pipeline problems
Dot Net Perls – Best resource for looking for c# snippets and samples
Eliminate Garbage with CLR Profiler – optimize you game…
Gimbal lock free Arcball camera – nice camera tutorial
How to use Farseer in platform game – Platform Physics Tutorial
Parallax Starfield – great example of parallax scrolling
MVC in Games – Model View Controller advantages
XNA Questions – You may find your answer here
Sgt. Conker – Lots of News and Resources for XNA
Communist Games Blogs – Lots XNA 4.0 Code Snippets and practices
Shawn Hargreaves Blog- He Knows XNA 4.0 Personally
MyGimpTutorial - Some great tutorials using Gimp (useful for creating 2D backgrounds)
10 Tips for Promoting Your Indie Game - excellent tips
ROE XNA Game Engine Development Series - make a game engine
Graphics Runner - Kyle Hayward provides some awesome tutorials
XNA-UK: Randomchaos - Charles Humphrey provides some excellent tutorials
UnityXNA - XNA and Unity3D developers unite!
XNA Tutorials - little XNA projects by Tim Jones that he posted on his blog
The Door Problem - an article originally published by Liz England which helps get across what game designers actually do as well as a mundane example of the roles at a big company
3ds Max Model Rigging
Neon Vector Shooter - learn how to make a twin stick shooter, like Geometry Wars, in XNA by Michael Hoffman
dhpoware - check out his XNA demo series
The Danger Zone - great samples for rendering
Diary of a Graphics Programmer - blog by Wolfgang Engel
Wireframe Without Z-Fighting - render a wireframe together with a 3D model
XNA Tutorials - little XNA projects created by Tim Jones

Not XNA Exclusive Articles, but Handy

General Game Networking – learn more building online multiplayer games
Game User Interfaces – What players wants
Nucleus High Level Engine Design – Great Design notes

XNA 4.0 & MonoGame Books

Building XNA 2.0 Games
3D Graphics with XNA Game Studio 4.0
Beginning Windows Phone 7 Application Development
Building Your First Mobile Game using XNA 4.0
Learning XNA 4.0
Microsoft XNA Framework Edition - Programming Windows Phone 7
Microsoft XNA 4.0 Game Development Cookbook
Microsoft XNA Game Studio 4.0: Learn Programming Now! - How to program for Windows Phone 7, Xbox 360, Zune devices, and more
Microsoft XNA Unleashed - This is a great book on XNA written by Chad Carter. Also, check out the updated source code of the book which works with MonoGame here
Profressional Windows Phone 7 Application Development
Programming Windows Phone 7 - A free e-Book for learning Windows Phone 7 coding
The Complete XNA Game Studio 4.0: An Exploration into the XNA Framework Library
Windows Phone 7 Game Programming in 24 Hours
Windows Phone 7 XNA Cookbook
XNA Game Studio 4.0 Programming: Developing for Windows Phone and Xbox 360 (Online version of the book here)
XNA 3D Primer
XNA 4 3D Game Development by Example
XNA 4.0 Game Development by Example: Beginner’s Guide
XNA Game Studio Unleashed - This is a link to the book's source code which has been updated to work with MonoGame and Windows 10. See more here
XNA 3.0 Game Programming Recipes

Are you trying to convert XNA 3.1 projects to XNA 4.0?

XNA 3.1 to XNA 4.0 Cheat Sheet – Loaded with example of how to convert projects
Breaking changes in XNA Game Studio 4.0 – things you should know before converting
3D XNA 3.1 game to XNA 4.0 – an example -pixel shaders ,xap files, DepthStencilBuffer (fixes)
XNA 3.1 to XNA 4.0 – RenderTarget2D, renderstate, effectpass, vertexdeclaration (fixes)
Coverting Between Texture2D and Image – Texture2D FromFile (fix)
SpriteBatch and custom renderstates – SpriteBatch, SpriteBlendMode, SaveStateMode (fixes)
Rendertarget changes – RenderTarget2D, GraphicsDevice.SetRenderTarget (fixes)
SpriteBatch and custom shaders – SpriteBatch Improvement (update details)
ResolveBackBuffer and ResolveTexture2D - Where are they?
Effect API Changes - effect.Begin(), passes.Begin() (fixes)
Effect Interfaces – BasicEffect updates, Built in Types (fixes)
SpriteBatch and renderStates – fix 3D graphics drawn incorrectly when 2D objects on Screen
Vertex Data – VertexDeclaration, VertexElements, SizeInBytes, VertexBuffer (fixes)
Point Sprites – Where are they?
State Objects – SaveStateMode, SaveStateBlock, RenderState, BlendFunction, (fixes)
ElapsedRealTime and TotalRealTime – understanding the time changes (update details)
DrawIntancedPrimitives – mesh instancing, state batching, shader instancing (update details)
Rendertarget formats – details on backbuffer formats and rendertarget formats
Reach vs HiDef – things you should know
New Effects built-in Content Pipeline – BasicEffect, SkinnedEffect, EnvironMapEffect and more
Viewport Tweaks – Updates to Viewport Objects and properties
Color constructors – updates to Color

*Most of the articles above are from Shawn Hargreaves Blog, posted here to make
them easier to find.

Sites that promote and review Xbox Indie Games

Indie Gamer Chick – If she likes your game obviously you did something right. Brutally Honest Indie Game Reviews.
Kobun’s Xbox Indies Page – Xbox Indie Games Recommendations and Reviews
Armless Octopus – Xbox Indie Game Reviews
Indie Nerds – Games worth playing
GameMarx – A site dedicated to Xbox Indie Games (news, reviews, podcasts and more)
XboxHornet – Loaded with Reviews and Xbox Indie Game Related Articles
Writings of Mass Deduction – Everyday A New Game Review (seeking the best games)
8 Bit Horse - Where 2D Lives
Indie Game Uprising – Look for High Quality Xbox Indie Games released every season
Kotaku XboxIndies – Lots of review and Indie game trailers
GameTrailers Xbox Indie Games – Lots of Xbox Indie Game Trailers
SFX-360 – Some Xbox Indie Games reviews (not many)

If there are any resources you would like to share or see added to the XNA Developer's Survival Kit, go to the Contact page to reach me. Also, if you have found this page helpful, please comment on my blog post.

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