In this lesson, we’ve seen how to apply Phong lighting using the BasicEffect, and how to set up cameras. Armed with this knowledge, you’re ready to start building explorable game environments.

A good next step is to think about what other kinds of cameras you can create. What about an over-the-shoulder camera that follows the player? Or a first-person camera that uses GamePad input? As you now know, a game camera is nothing more than code to determine where the camera is in a scene, and where it is pointed. From that, you can create a View matrix. You might also try expanding the options for the Perspective matrix from the default implementation we’ve been using.