XNA loading/splash screen on game start - xna

Question

I'm trying to have a loading screen that pops up as soon as you run that executable that launches the game, whilst the game loads I want to display an image on the desktop much like how Gamemaker allows you to have a loading image.
I've had a brief look around and most people want an image to be shown whilst they load content which is not what I want, or perhaps it is... =P
My guess would be to set the game window borderless at the start, load the splash screen, draw it, then begin all the main loading (Specifically loading DirectInput through SlimDX takes a while). However would this support having a transparent/irregular shaped image? E.G if I wanted a borderless circle to be displayed whilst the game loads, would that be possible?
Thanks.

Answer 1

It's very simple. Just implement System.Threading and you're done.
Here's how it works, first add:
using System.Threading;
to the top of your class, then add the following things:
//the enum for state types
enum GameState
{
Loading,
StartMenu
}
//Init our gameState enum as variable
GameState gameState;
protected override void LoadContent()
{
gameState = GameState.Loading;
spriteBatch = new SpriteBatch(GraphicsDevice);
device = GraphicsDevice;
Window.Title = "Your Window";
//Other stuff that you had here before, now go in LoadGame()
loadingscreen = Content.Load<Texture2D>("loading");
Thread bgLoad = new Thread(new ThreadStart(LoadGame));
bgLoad.IsBackground = true;
bgLoad.Start();
}
public void LoadGame()
{
//Loading stuff here
gameState = GameState.StartMenu; //or GameState.Playing
}
and then put a loading texture in your Content Project

Answer 2

If I understand you correctly, you essentially want to have a window opened that is not full screen that also lacks the regular border and buttons that accompanies a window.
I can't test this but this should be a good start.
Here!
I would start by creating a bare bones Game1 class that can track an image and keep track of time for a timer.
Later you could add logic that actually tracks the loading of assets in the main program.
To start I'd just test it for a fixed time like 3 seconds.