MODERATOR NOTE: All support for the quickstart engine should be asked in the codeplex forum for the project.

This is the thread for any information pertaining to the XNA QuickStart Engine. It is a free, open-source, engine designed to help XNA users get started on a 3D game with a lot less time and hassle. It is currently in the prototype phase, and as such it isn't a full-fledged engine yet. It is an XNA community project, and the speed as which it advances depends on participation from the community. New members are joining in already, and will all be participating part-time on it to bring new versions whenever possible, but I encourage anyone that wants to contribute to the community with their fair bit of knowledge to feel free to join in the project. Shoot me an email request, with your contribution info (what you've accomplished on the template), and I can add you to the project. If you don't feel like participating you do not need to be a member to download the free template. Have fun, and please feel free to leave ask any questions, and leave comments and/or criticisms, as it can only help us improve the engine.

If you'd like to use the engine, visit the QuickStart Engine project at CodePlex where you can download the newest build.

Video preview, v0.16 (Low Quality 320x240, 3m37s, 3.1mb)
Video preview, v0.16a (High Quality, 3m22s, YouTube Video)


Note: Version 0.195 of the Engine was released on August 2nd, '08, and it is quite a bit more flexible and powerful that v0.182, but not as pretty (less graphical features at the moment). If you are looking for something more powerful for games, and compatible with the Xbox360, you should download v0.195 rather than the older v0.182.

Rundown of main features (v0.182, Nov. 26 '07):

• Terrain system: Smoothing supported, self-shadowing, and automatically implements as a quad-tree. LOD system setup for terrain and in correlation with water component to increase framerate from 2-6 times in any scene with terrain. Terrain scaling also supported to achieve large scale scenes with little performance cost.
• Water (reflective and refractive), still in beta, CREDIT: Riemer's tutorials
• 3D physics (not full rigid body, still in alpha), now including water-based physics. Full rigid body coming in future versions.
• Weather (rain and snow) (using 3D particle system, CREDIT: XNA particle sample)
• Camera component, fixed and arc-ball cameras attach to entities. All cameras have ability to collide with terrain. Free camera system can lock to terrain as well.
• Entity heirarchy loads models, positions, rotations, and takes care of physics.
• Custom easy-to-use timer system built on top of XNA timers.
• 2D HUD component allows for message display.
• Sound manager ready-to-use.
• Component system lets user remove or add any components they need or do not need. If you don't want terrain, then just don't add the terrain component. If you don't want water, or weather, just remove them. And if I make a new component in the future, simply add it and turn it on and you're good to go.
• Post process effects: Bloom effect (more to come, like Depth of Field, Distorion, etc...), and support for Multisampling (coming in v0.183).
• Simple A.I.: Player and Bot classes included (since v0.182). A.I. has just been added, but will get better.
• Controllable entities allow you to use input to move around your entities. Current version lets you move the blue player around with the Xbox360 controller. You can switch between camera and player control using the start button.
• EventLogging and HUD Messaging system. Log any information you wish, or display it on screen during game with ease.
• There are too many features to list in a forum post, if you click the link you can read a feature list.

Features coming as soon as possible:

• Better Artificial intelligence (spawn points, triggers, wandering, chasing/evading, fuzzy logic/desire system, finite state machine, pathfinding algorithms)
• Geomipmapping to increase framerate on large maps
• Oct-tree implementation
• Skinned animation
• Bug fixes (always a new bug to fix)
• GUI editor and in-game GUI (buttons, images, etc...)

For anyone (seriously) interested in joining the project:

• Read through the current issues and features to get an idea of the things we will be working on.
• Read through the coding standards document and engine documentation for more info.
• Sign-up for a CodePlex account (completely free), Email me a request and what you plan to contribute and I will add you to the project.
• I've got versioned builds in the source code section at codeplex.
• If you've never used CodePlex Client source control, it took me about 5 minutes to learn, here's the link to download it (only 400kb or so). You can simply download the source, make any changes you'd, and upload a patch which can then be merged with the newest version.
• I've begun adding issues and feature requests if anyone feels like starting on them. Of course, you can always work on mods that aren't on the list, I would recommend issuing a feature request first however.
• I uploaded older versions of the code as well, not sure if I can think of a use for them, but maybe someone else will.

Sounds great! This will be helpful for newbies ...

Thanks for taking the time to do this! Awesome resource for the commuinty. I'm  going to go download and give it a look over to see what kinds of goodies I can learn from it. Thanks again!

It was throw together in only a few hours so it isn't anything spactacular, any feedback would be great.

It isn't a gui or anything, in fact, I'm glad it isn't, it is meant to help programmers get started, if I had made it a gui it would've been more like a level editor / engine than a tutorial / framework.

I'm curious to see if it will really be useful for any new programmers.

I am also updating the physics in my simple physics demo as well. Any changes I make can easily be integrated in to the template. I will update the template as well from time to time as required.

I did release a physics update (v0.11) tonight.
http://www.nfostergames.com/samples.htm (Second sample on the page)

The forums have been the slowest I've seen them lately (labor day weekend probably), so I don't even know if this is something that beginners will be using, or able to use. I'll need some feedback on that end.

I am looking into it.  It has been a LONG time since I did 3D, so I have forgotten a lot.  Anything to help get back into it quicker will be a big help.

I'm not afraid of any criticism either, feel free to tell me if it sucks. I'm looking at this as a learning experience, so even criticism is a good thing if I learn from it.

I've downloaded it but haven't had much time to take a look at it. :( Hopefully tonight.

Just a couple bits of info.

The original direct link I posted was to a physics sample, not the template sample, sorry about that, I was really tired I guess. I did fix the original post to reflect the true link.

Also, I've updated the template to include my latest physics sample. Also I've integrated code for the gamepad and mouse so the user can simply fill in or reference it. Also added comments, and optimized memory usage to use 30% less ram. Decent update if anyone is using this. My code for the quad-trees was highly unoptimized. Using a large terrain 1024x1024 now uses around 100mb less ram. If I'm going to use this template as a sample for beginners, I'd hate to get you guys started off with inefficient, wasteful code.

I'm still in the process of optimizing, as soon as I find out what is taking up so much RAM.

I'm not sure if it's my connection or your site, but neither of those links work. The page doesn't display and the file download just hangs.

I've tested the connection from 3 computers, and 2 ISPs. I'd bet it is your connection. If anyone else is having trouble let me know, if the problem isn't limited to just one person then I will do some investigating.

Tried it again and the download worked. :)