UPDATE: Added new link at the end of the post.

I found this little gem that can create fonts with outline for XNA games: Bitmap Font Maker Utility Plus. It is actually a variation of the Microsoft utility Bitmap Font Maker.

After you choose a font you want to use, set the size for the outline. Note that the font preview does not reflect any changes here and that the resulting font will be white.

The exported file will look something like the following image (depending on your font preference):

In Visual Studio make sure that you set content processor to Sprite Font Texture. I have also changed the extension to xnb since I have had trouble if bmp was left as the extension (but that might be me ).

Other blog posts you might read:

• http://dudesknight.wordpress.com/2011/03/25/xna-custom-sprite-fonts/
• http://blogs.msdn.com/b/shawnhar/archive/2007/04/26/bitmap-fonts-in-xna.aspx
• Adding ImageMagick to Star Ninja’s XNA content pipeline – Another way of handling fonts in your pipeline.