Detecting "Any Button Press"

Question

I'm trying to allow the player to press any button to continue from the main page. I was able to do this by making a List of Buttons and looping through these and checking for one of them being down; however, I feel like this code is kind of ugly and wonder if there's a simpler way to do it that I'm just not thinking of?

Here's my what my code looks like now:

            if (GamePad.GetState(PlayerIndex.One).IsConnected)
            {
                var buttonList = new List<Buttons>()
                {
                    {Buttons.A},
                    {Buttons.B},
                    {Buttons.Y},
                    {Buttons.X},
                    {Buttons.Start},
                    {Buttons.Back},
                    {Buttons.RightShoulder},
                    {Buttons.LeftShoulder},
                    {Buttons.RightTrigger},
                    {Buttons.LeftTrigger}
                };

                foreach (var button in buttonList)
                {
                    if (GamePad.GetState(PlayerIndex.One).IsButtonDown(button))
                        ExitMainMenu= true;
                }
            }

Answer 1

This should do the job. In the end of every update loop, save state of previousGamePadState. Then you can compare em. This is fast way to detect changes. No need to loop.

GamePadState.PacketNumber:

You can use PacketNumber to determine whether input state has changed. If the value of PacketNumber remains the same between two sequential calls to GetState, then there has been no change in input.

public bool HasInputChanged(GamePadState previousGamePadState, bool ignoreThumbsticks)
{ 
    GamePadState currentState = GamePad.GetState( PlayerIndex.One );
    if ((currentState.IsConnected) && (currentState.PacketNumber != previousGamePadState.PacketNumber))
    {
        //ignore thumbstick movement
        if ((ignoreThumbsticks == true) && ((currentState.ThumbSticks.Left.Length() != previousGamePadState.ThumbSticks.Left.Length() )&&(currentState.ThumbSticks.Right.Length() != previousGamePadState.ThumbSticks.Right.Length()) ))
            return false;
        return true
    }
    return false;
}

EDIT: Changed to method. It's not guaranteed to work right as is, but should work. Also, because this really detects changes in input, so if user releases button, it is seen with this also. I also added if to detect thumbstick movement, so you can ignore those at least.

Hope this helps you. Let me know, if it does not suit your needs, I'm sure we can work this out.

How to: Detect Whether a Controller Button Has Been Pressed This Frame GamePadState.PacketNumber Property

Answer 2

You could manually construct an empty GamePadState, and then check it for (in)equality with the current real one, which you fetch by calling GamePad.GetState.

playerInput = GamePad.GetState(PlayerIndex.One);  
emptyInput = new GamePadState(Vector2.Zero, Vector2.Zero, 0, 0);
if (playerInput != emptyInput){

    // yay!!!!, a button push!
    // 
    // P.S., remember to allow any PlayerIndex to take control of the the game 
    // from the main menu.  It sucks when you pick up controller2 and it doesn't work.

}

Answer 3

If you don't mind the use of Reflection, you can use something sort of like this (possibly even this exactly):

        var properties = typeof(GamePadButtons).GetProperties(BindingFlags.Public | BindingFlags.Instance);
        foreach (var property in properties)
        {
            var value = property.GetValue(GamePad.GetState(PlayerIndex.One).Buttons);
            if (value is ButtonState && (ButtonState)value == ButtonState.Pressed)
                ExitMainMenu = true;
        }

Answer 4

Since Buttons is an enumaration you can use the Enum.GetValues method like this:

var buttonList = (Buttons[])Enum.GetValues(typeof(Buttons));

foreach (var button in buttonList)
{
    if (GamePad.GetState(PlayerIndex.One).IsButtonDown(button))
        ExitMainMenu= true;
}

Answer 5

Riffing off @Katu's original answer, this seems fastest/cleanest. Just check for GamePad input. Done.

    bool GamePadInputChanged(GamePadState previousGamePadState)
    {
        var currentState = GamePad.GetState(PlayerIndex.One);
        return currentState.IsConnected && currentState.PacketNumber != previousGamePadState.PacketNumber;
    }