Avatar Pinball - Sock Puppet PC Demo

I took a break from development this morning to package up a PC version of my current Avatar Pinball build. It contains the Sock Puppet Pinball mode - one of 5 different modes in the game.

To run it, you will need to have .NET Framework 3.5 and the XNA 3.1 redistributable package. Both are small, easy installs.

You can get .NET 3.5 here (note that if you are running Windows 7, you already have it):

.NET 3.5

The XNA 3.1 redistributable package can be downloaded here:

XNA 3.1

My pinball demo can be downloaded here:

Avatar Pinball Sock Puppet PC Demo

Please do not redistribute the demo.

Use an Xbox controller if you have one connected to your PC.

Keyboard Controls:

• Menu navigation with arrow keys, enter and escape or back
• Launch ball with enter
• Shift keys control flippers
• Space nudges table
• Escape pauses game

You will need a decently beefy system to run the demo.  My PC (Core 2 Quad / GeForce 8800 GT) runs it fine. My laptop not so much. The game is hard-coded to run windowed at  1280x720. I figure if your screen size isn't at least that big, your system probably can't handle it anyway... :-)

Avatar Pinball

Current cover art for the game I'm working on. It still needs work, but it is the first version I've produced that didn't outright suck :-)

The Sock Puppet Pinball video I posted last week is one of the modes in the game, but on the Xbox the focus is on Avatars.



The project is coming together nicely, and I am (I hope!) in the final stages of development.

If I get time, I may release a windows build of the Sock Puppet gameplay (Avatars don't work outside of the Xbox).

Spritefont Effects (Ouline, Dropshadow, etc.) in XNA

In the course of trying to jazz up the text in my current game, I came across a great little tool for generating XNA Spritefonts with various effects added. Effects include outlining, beveling, dropshadows, and texturing.

It generates a .png file that you add as content to your project using "Sprite Font Texture" as the content processor rather than "Sprite Font Description". In code, you load it just like any other SpriteFont.

You can find it here.

Something Completely Different...

A video of my current project: