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MonoGame

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MonoGame
DeveloperMonoGame Foundation[1]
ReleaseDecember 2, 2009; 16 years ago (2009-12-02)[1]
Stable release
3.8.4[2] / June 2, 2025; 13 months ago (2025-06-02)
Written inC#
PlatformiOS, iPadOS, macOS, Android, Linux, Windows Phone 8, Windows Desktop, Windows 10, PlayStation 4, PlayStation 5, PlayStation Vita, Xbox One, Xbox Series X/S, Nintendo Switch
TypeApplication framework
LicenseMicrosoft Public License[3]
Websitewww.monogame.net
Repository

MonoGame is a free and open source software framework for developing video games in C#. It began as a way to bring existing XNA-based Windows and Windows Phone games to platforms Microsoft did not officially support, and is now also used to build new games from scratch. It supports iOS, iPadOS, Android, macOS, Linux, PlayStation 4, PlayStation 5, PlayStation Vita, Xbox One, Xbox Series X/S and Nintendo Switch, in addition to Windows.[4][5] It implements the Microsoft XNA 4 application programming interface (API).[6] Games built with MonoGame include Bastion, Celeste, Barotrauma, Fez, and Stardew Valley.

MonoGame originated in December 2009 as a port of XNA to the iPhone, and was renamed and moved to GitHub in 2011.[1] After Microsoft ended development of XNA in 2013, MonoGame continued as an independent open-source project, later adding 3D rendering and support for consoles including PlayStation 4, PlayStation 5, Xbox One, Xbox Series X/S, and Nintendo Switch.[1] Since September 2023, the project has been owned and stewarded by the MonoGame Foundation, a US-based non-profit organization that funds development through individual and corporate donations rather than subscription fees, royalties, or licensing costs.[1][7] The framework's source code is distributed under the Microsoft Public License.

MonoGame renders graphics differently depending on platform, using DirectX on Windows and OpenGL elsewhere; native support for the newer Vulkan and DirectX 12 graphics APIs entered public preview in late 2025.[8] Because MonoGame is an independent reimplementation of the XNA API rather than a copy of Microsoft's original source code, and because it has extended and modified that API over time rather than reproducing it exactly, developer Ethan Lee forked the project in 2013 into a stricter, accuracy-focused alternative called FNA.[9] MonoGame is also used in academic and hobbyist settings to teach fundamental game-programming concepts.[10]

History

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Origins in XNA (2004–2010)

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Microsoft announced XNA, a set of tools and a managed runtime for game development, at the Game Developers Conference in March 2004, with a public preview of the toolset following in 2006.[11] XNA became a popular platform for small and independent Windows and Xbox 360 developers and was used to create games such as Bastion and Terraria,[11] but Microsoft never extended official support to mobile devices. This gap led to independent porting efforts: in 2009, Bill Reiss released SilverSprite, an open-source 2D framework for Windows Phone inspired by XNA, and José Antonio Leal de Farias combined code from SilverSprite and the community project Mono.XNA to create XNA Touch, a port of XNA aimed at the iPhone, released in December 2009.[1] Several games built with XNA Touch reached the Apple App Store in 2010.[11]

Formation of MonoGame (2011–2013)

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In 2011, XNA Touch was renamed MonoGame and moved to GitHub, adding support for Android, Mac, Linux and OpenGL on Windows; Dominique Louis took over as the project's full-time lead.[1] MonoGame 2.0, the first official release, followed in October 2011 with a downloadable version 0.7 that had been available from CodePlex. These early versions supported only 2D sprite-based games; the last purely 2D release was version 2.5.1 in June 2012.[1] Support for DirectX 11, Windows 8 and Windows Phone 8 was added later in 2012, the same year the MonoGame team was invited to present at Microsoft's Build conference.[12]

In February 2013, Microsoft confirmed that it had no plans to release further versions of XNA, effectively ending official development of the toolkit that MonoGame reimplemented.[13] MonoGame's Dominique Louis said the decision left thousands of XNA developers without an official path forward, and the project pledged to continue supporting them.[13] Ouya console support was added to MonoGame in January 2013, and MonoGame 3.0 followed later that month, introducing 3D rendering support for the first time.[1] Over the following months, the team extended the framework further beyond a strict XNA 4 reimplementation, adding features such as RenderTarget3D,[14] support for multiple GameWindows,[15] and a new cross-platform command line content building tool.[16]

3D expansion and console support (2014–2022)

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The first MonoGame titles on PlayStation 4 — TowerFall Ascension, Transistor and Mercenary Kings — were released in 2014, the year Tom Spilman and Steve Williams took over stewardship of the project and official PlayStation 4 developer access opened to all Sony-registered studios.[1] Subsequent releases steadily broadened platform support: MonoGame 3.5.1 (2016) added PlayStation Vita support, MonoGame 3.6 (2017) added Nintendo Switch support, and MonoGame 3.8 (2020) introduced an early preview of Vulkan rendering.[1] PlayStation 5 support and MonoGame 3.8.1 followed in 2022.[1]

Nonprofit foundation and recent development (2023–present)

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In September 2023, the MonoGame team announced plans to move the project's assets into a new non-profit foundation in order to secure its long-term governance and funding, following a period of upheaval elsewhere in the game-engine industry.[17] The resulting MonoGame Foundation was formed later that month and was recognized as a 501(c)(3) tax-exempt organization, retroactive to its founding, in October 2024.[18] Later releases include MonoGame 3.8.2 (2024), which targeted .NET 8, and MonoGame 3.8.3 and 3.8.4 (2025).[1] As of early 2026, MonoGame 3.8.5 was in public preview, adding native Vulkan and DirectX 12 graphics backends and a new content-building tool ahead of a planned 3.9 release.[19][8] MonoGame continues to be used by indie developers for cross-platform 2D and 3D games, including recent releases on Steam and modern consoles.[20]

Architecture

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MonoGame implements the XNA 4 API across each platform it supports.[21] On Windows, it renders graphics through DirectX using SharpDX, a .NET wrapper library for DirectX.[12] On non-Microsoft platforms it instead uses OpenGL, accessed through the OpenTK library; mobile builds that once relied on the Xamarin runtime have moved onto its successor, .NET MAUI, after Microsoft ended support for Xamarin on May 1, 2024.[22]

MonoGame's graphics capabilities come from OpenGL, OpenGL ES, or DirectX depending on platform. Since MonoGame version 3, the framework has targeted OpenGL 2, which added support for shaders and more advanced rendering; earlier releases such as version 2.5 used the more limited OpenGL 1.x. A native Vulkan backend and a DirectX 12 backend have been in public preview since late 2025, alongside a new cross-platform content-building tool intended to replace the existing MGCB Editor.[8]

Content management and distribution follow the ContentManager model inherited from XNA 4, letting developers use Microsoft Visual Studio to build and package game assets, such as textures, models, and audio, for their target platforms.

Governance and funding

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MonoGame is owned by the MonoGame Foundation, a non-profit corporation formed in Texas in September 2023 to direct the framework's future and promote game-development education.[1] Under the Foundation's bylaws, the project is overseen by a volunteer board of between three and eleven directors, who are elected by the sitting board itself rather than by a wider membership.[23] As of 2026, the board's president is Dean Ellis, while Dominique Louis — MonoGame's original project lead — serves as board chairman.[1] The Foundation is funded through individual and corporate donations, including via GitHub, Patreon and PayPal, which support framework development, documentation, community events and general project infrastructure.[1] MonoGame remains free to use, with no subscription model, royalty payments, or licensing fees, a model the project contrasts with commercial engines such as Unity and Unreal Engine.[7]

Usage

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Video games

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MonoGame was originally created to bring XNA-style development to platforms Microsoft did not officially support, and it has since been used as the underlying framework for numerous independently developed games, first in 2D and later in 3D.[1] Notable titles built with MonoGame include Bastion, Fez, Celeste, Stardew Valley, Terraria and Streets of Rage 4.[24] A more complete, community-maintained list of games known to use the framework follows:

This is a dynamic list and may never be able to satisfy particular standards for completeness. You can help by editing the page to add missing items, with references to reliable sources.
Game Year Developer Publisher
Apotheon[25] 2015 Alientrap
Axiom Verge[26][27]2015 Thomas Happ Games LLC
Barotrauma2023Undertow GamesDaedalic Entertainment
Bastion[28]2011 Supergiant GamesWarner Bros. Interactive Entertainment
Bury Me, My Love 2017 The Pixel Hunt Arte France
Capsized 2013 Alientrap
Carrion 2020 Phobia Game Studio Devolver Digital
Celeste[29] 2018 Maddy Thorson
Chasm 2018 Bit Kid, Inc.
Cobalt Core[30]2023 Rocket Rat Games Brace Yourself Games
Duck Game[31] 2014 Landon Podbielski Adult Swim Games
Dust: An Elysian Tail[32] 2014 Humble Hearts
Escape Goat[33]2011 MagicalTimeBean
Fez[34]2013 Polytron Corporation Trapdoor
Microsoft Studios
Flinthook[citation needed] 2017 Tribute Games
Infinite Flight[35]2011 Flying Development Studio
Jump King[36]2019 Nexile Nexile
Ukiyo Publishing
Kynseed[37] 2022 PixelCount Studios
Mercenary Kings[1] 2013 Tribute Games
Owlboy 2016 D-Pad Studio
Pyre[38]2017 Supergiant Games
Retro Bowl [citation needed] 2020 New Star Games
Salt and Sanctuary[39] 2016 Ska Studios
Score Rush Extended[40] 2016 Xona Games Reverb Communications
Skulls of the Shogun[41]2013 17-BIT Microsoft Studios
Solar 2[42] 2011 Jay Watts Murudai
Stardew Valley[43] 2016 ConcernedApe
Super Blood Hockey 2017 Loren Lemcke
Terraria[44] 2011 Re-Logic 505 Games
Tiny Life[45] 2023 Ellpeck Games Top Hat Studios, Inc.
TowerFall[46] 2013 Maddy Thorson
Transistor[47]2014 Supergiant Games
Unrailed! 2020 Indoor Astronaut Daedalic Entertainment
Wizorb[48]2011 Tribute Games
Woon[49][50] TBA Tour De Pizza Tour De Pizza

Education and other uses

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Because MonoGame provides low-level building blocks rather than a visual editor or built-in scripting language, it has also been adopted in academic and hobbyist settings to teach fundamental game-programming concepts such as the game loop, sprite batching, and content pipelines.[10] Instructional books such as Game Development with MonoGame (Apress, 2022) and long-running tutorial series from independent game-development sites have used the framework to teach 2D and 3D game programming in C#.[51][52]

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MonoGame is an independent reimplementation of Microsoft's XNA 4 API rather than a fork of Microsoft's own source code, having grown out of the community projects Mono.XNA and SilverSprite.[1] Because MonoGame could not initially reuse Microsoft's copyrighted XNA reference documentation, contributors had to write original documentation from scratch; in 2022, Microsoft authorized the MonoGame project to reuse the former official XNA documentation, provided a copyright notice crediting Microsoft is included.[53] MonoGame's willingness to extend and reinterpret the XNA API, rather than reproduce it with strict fidelity, later led developer Ethan Lee to fork the project around 2013 into a separate, accuracy-focused reimplementation named FNA.[9]

See also

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References

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  1. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 "About". MonoGame. Retrieved July 5, 2026.
  2. ↑ "MonoGame release 3.8.4". Retrieved June 2, 2025.
  3. ↑ "FAQ: Licensing – MonoGame". GitHub. Retrieved September 2, 2025.
  4. ↑ "Documentation". MonoGame.net. Retrieved August 25, 2017.
  5. ↑ "Main Page". MonoGame.net. Retrieved November 25, 2023.
  6. ↑ "Windows 8, XNA and MonoGame". MSDN. Microsoft. August 1, 2012. Archived from the original on August 4, 2012. MonoGame is an Open Source implementation of the Microsoft XNA 4 Framework. The goal is to allow XNA developers on Windows & Windows Phone to port their games to the iOS, Android, Mac OS X, Linux with both PlayStation Suite and Windows 8 support currently under development.
  7. 1 2 "MonoGame". MonoGame. Retrieved July 5, 2026.
  8. 1 2 3 "MonoGame 3.8.5-preview.2". MonoGame. January 2, 2026. Retrieved July 5, 2026.
  9. 1 2 "FNA". FNA-XNA. Retrieved July 5, 2026.
  10. 1 2 "Chapter 01: What is MonoGame". MonoGame Documentation. Retrieved July 5, 2026.
  11. 1 2 3 Lock, Andrew (June 3, 2025). "Creating your first sample game with MonoGame". andrewlock.net. Retrieved July 5, 2026.
  12. 1 2 Torre, Charles; Spilman, Tom (November 2, 2012). "Monogame at Build 2012". MSDN Channel 9. Microsoft. Archived from the original on July 7, 2013. Retrieved May 11, 2013.
  13. 1 2 "It's official: XNA is dead". Game Developer. Retrieved July 5, 2026.
  14. ↑ tomspilman (March 15, 2013). "RenderTarget3D for DirectX". GitHub.
  15. ↑ jamesford42 (February 26, 2013). "Multiple GameWindow support for Windows/DirectX". GitHub.{{cite web}}: CS1 maint: numeric names: authors list (link)
  16. ↑ "MonoGame Content Builder". Github. Archived from the original on April 29, 2015. Retrieved June 7, 2013.
  17. ↑ Dawe, Liam (September 21, 2023). "MonoGame plan to create a non-profit foundation to support development". GamingOnLinux. Retrieved July 5, 2026.
  18. ↑ "Non Profit Status". MonoGame. October 22, 2024. Retrieved July 5, 2026.
  19. ↑ "MonoGame Roadmap". MonoGame Documentation. Retrieved July 5, 2026.
  20. ↑ "Releases · MonoGame/MonoGame". GitHub. Retrieved April 14, 2025.
  21. ↑ Vermeir, Nico (April 1, 2013). Windows 8 App Projects - XAML and C# Edition. Apress. ISBN 9781430250661 – via Google Books.
  22. ↑ "Xamarin support policy". .NET. Microsoft. Retrieved July 8, 2026.
  23. ↑ "Foundation Bylaws". MonoGame Documentation. Retrieved July 5, 2026.
  24. ↑ "MonoGame". GitHub. Retrieved July 5, 2026.
  25. ↑ @MonoGameTeam (October 1, 2014). "The official Monogame twitter announces that Apotheon will launch on PS4 using the Monogame engine" (Tweet) – via Twitter.
  26. ↑ Happ, Thomas (September 14, 2016). "Achievement Unlocked!". Axiom Verge Blog.
  27. ↑ Culafi, Alex (March 11, 2015). "Dan Adelman Explains Why Axiom Verge is Not Coming to Wii U - News". Nintendo World Report.
  28. ↑ Greg (August 24, 2012). "Bastion's Open Source Branch for MonoGame". Super Giant Games. Archived from the original on June 2, 2013.
  29. ↑ "Celeste — Tools". Celeste (official developer blog). Maddy Makes Games. Retrieved July 8, 2026.
  30. ↑ Driscoll, Ben (May 7, 2023). "Setting up FMOD for a C# game". Medium.
  31. ↑ "An Interview with Duck Game Developer Landon Podbielski – GameCritics.com". gamecritics.com. Retrieved March 26, 2021.
  32. ↑ @NoogyTweet (March 25, 2017). "According to a twitter response by creator Dean Dodrill, Elysian Tail was originally created in XNA and later ported using MonoGame" (Tweet) – via Twitter.
  33. ↑ "Steam Community :: Group Announcements :: Escape Goat". October 18, 2013.
  34. ↑ Euden, Ben (May 5, 2013). "Ben Euden on Twitter". Twitter.
  35. ↑ Hanselman, Scott (April 26, 2013). "MonoGame and Xamarin make shipping Infinite Flight a reality". Hansel Minutes.
  36. ↑ "Jump King tactics platformer and Linux". Linux Game News.
  37. ↑ "Kynseed FAQ – PixelCount Studios". March 24, 2019. Archived from the original on March 24, 2019. Retrieved February 26, 2023.
  38. ↑ Linneman, John (July 28, 2017). "Pyre on PS4/ PS4 Pro! Beautiful Graphics But What's Up With The Bugs?". YouTube. Digital Foundry. Retrieved July 28, 2017.
  39. ↑ "Salt and Sanctuary Presskit". Ska Studios. Retrieved July 8, 2026. Ska Studios uses the Monogame framework to develop for PlayStation4
  40. ↑ "GDC 2017 WRAP UP". Xona Games. March 26, 2017.
  41. ↑ "Skulls of the Shogun - Developer Interview - MSPoweruser". May 22, 2012. Archived from the original on December 22, 2015. Retrieved May 19, 2013.
  42. ↑ Watts. "Solar 2 | Murudai".
  43. ↑ Chalk, Andy (December 1, 2021). "Stardew Valley update 'futureproofs the game' with improved modding support". PC Gamer. Retrieved February 12, 2022.
  44. ↑ "Terraria dev pledges $200,000 to Unity rivals after "destruction of trust"". PCGamesN. Archived from the original on July 15, 2024. Retrieved September 10, 2025.
  45. ↑ Ellpeck (August 16, 2024). "Tiny Life by Ellpeck". Itch.io. Retrieved August 16, 2024.
  46. ↑ Kollar, Phillip (March 20, 2014). "Sony gives indie devs the stage to praise PlayStation 4's developer support". Polygon. Vox Media. Retrieved September 12, 2023.
  47. ↑ "Transistor FAQ". Supergiant Games. Retrieved July 8, 2026. Now it uses our fork of MonoGame
  48. ↑ JF (December 15, 2011). "Wizorb coming to Mac and Linux December 19th!". Tribute Games. Archived from the original on September 3, 2012.
  49. ↑ "Pizza Tower dev teases gameplay from its next game". Shacknews. November 25, 2024. Retrieved January 24, 2025.
  50. ↑ Game, Mono (November 25, 2024). "#BuiltWithMonoGame :)". Twitter. Retrieved January 25, 2025.
  51. ↑ Salin, Louis; Morrar, Rami (2022). Game Development with MonoGame: Build a 2D Game Using Your Own Reusable and Performant Game Engine. Apress.
  52. ↑ "MonoGame Tutorial: An Introduction and Brief History". GameFromScratch.com. Retrieved July 5, 2026.
  53. ↑ "Call to improve the documentation using XNA documentation". GitHub. May 21, 2022. Retrieved July 5, 2026.

Further reading

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