Time for action – add SpriteFonts to Game1

1. Right-click on the Fonts folder in the Content project in Solution Explorer, and select Add | New Item.

2. From the Add New Item dialog, select SpriteFont.

3. Name the font as Pericles36.spritefont. After adding the font, the SpriteFont file will open in the editor window.

4. In the SpriteFont file, change <Fontname>Segoe UI Mono</Fontname> to <Fontname>Pericles</Fontname>.

5. Change <Size>14</Size> to <Size>36</Size>.

6. Add the following declaration to the Game1 class:

   Private pericles36Font as SpriteFont

7. Update the LoadContent() method of the Game1 class to load the SpriteFont, by adding the following:

   pericles36Font = Content.Load(Of SpriteFont)("Fonts\Pericles36")

What just happened?

Adding a SpriteFont to your game is very similar to adding a texture image. Since both are managed by the Content Pipeline, working with them is identical from a code standpoint. In fact, SpriteFonts are really just specialized sprite sheets...