XNA Game Studio is a finicky bugger, and it’s even more finicky now that it is no longer being maintained. One of the biggest issues is that it doesn’t work properly with the latest version of Visual Studio, 2012. However, you can cajole it and reassure it that things will be OK.

One way to do so is to essentially “translate” an existing, working install, and “hack” it’s configuration so that it works in Visual Studio 2012. In order to get the appropriate file setup, you will have to install XNA Game Studio 4 into Visual Studio 2010.

With Visual Studio 2010 Installed and XNA Game Studio happily installed, you can force the XNA 4 installation to get along with Visual Studio 2012. XNA Game Studio installs by default in

%ProgramFiles(x86)%\Microsoft Visual Studio 10.0\Common7\IDE\Extensions\Microsoft\XNA Game Studio 4.0

the first step in whipping it into shape is to simply copy that folder to the appropriate target location in the Visual Studio 2012 installation. This is located, by default:

%ProgramFiles(x86)%\Microsoft Visual Studio 11.0\Common7\IDE\Extensions\Microsoft\XNA Game Studio 4.0

Not done yet, though- it’s copied over, and VS2012 will try to run it, but it will look inside the plugin manifest, see that it doesn’t say it works with VS2012, and then explode (well, it doesn’t explode, it just doesn’t load the extension, but that’s hardly very exciting.) In order to do so, you will need to open and edit the extension.vsixmanifest file within the XNA Game Studio folder you copied (the new one, that is). You’ll notice this:

What you can do should be pretty clear now; just flooble¹ the “Version=”10.0” entry to point to version 11. Save the file, Open Visual Studio 2012, and BAM! Game Studio projects should now be available via the New Project Dialog Templates.

It still doesn’t work

Sometimes- perhaps You’ve been badmouthing Visual Studio behind it’s back; Maybe you complained under your breath about how slow Visual Studio 2012 is when you went to deal with Intellisense. Maybe you told Visual Studio 2012 where it can shove it when it provided you with a helpful popup tip. Visual Studio 2012 has feelings and, like a Cat, never forgets it’s enemies.

On the other hand, you might just need to delete the extensions cache file. The extensions cache file can be found at “%LocalAppData%\Microsoft\VisualStudio\11.0\Extensions”; specifically, the “extensionSdks.en-US.cache” and “extensions.en-US.cache” files in that folder. Delete them with impunity and regret nothing. Visual Studio 2012 has forced your hand. Innocent Files must die so that Game Studio 4.0 may live.

¹flooble is a word I just invented now. Patent Pending!