Blogger spam

I have had some issues using blogger at home, hence why this has all been updated today, sorry about that.

Final

Ok So this is the game in its final state. Have done a number of things.

• Made the game scalable for different screen sizes.
• Added some colour and changed the design of the bucket.
• This also has animations for correctly collecting a shape.
• Animation for incorrectly catching a shape.
• Changed  the screen to Open GL for a massive performance increase.
• Edited the pattern shapes were expelled at to prevent objects going off te edge at te same time making it near impossible to play.
• Your now able to create a new game once a game has ended.
• Added a highscore function which saves the best score in a play session.
• Added a pause function.
• Turned the display cursor back on, as while it was off it looked better but made clicking off the screen to easy.
• Changed the life system. 
• you start gaining life back slowly after 10 points.
• you lose life for an incorrect collection.
• you lose life for missing a collection.

5 game screens

Ok have done quite a bit more. Added color and a bit of "texture" to the tunnel, makes it look a lot more 3rd, and simulates the players life(green though yellow to red). There is also a score system in place that counts the number of shapes correctly collects. These 5 images show the state of the game so far.

Decided to make the center of the rotation a bit higher on the screen as it creates more of a 3D enviroment by restricting what the user can see slightly. I have also created my bucket(the square at the bottom), this collects the objects. Have made it so if you miss 3 objects you get a game over screen.

its starting to work....

so far have made it rotate and and shoot out the 3 shapes, here is an image

Initial concept sketches

Going with the game idea...

Ok so I have decided to run with making a game.

I briefly looked into using blender for this however, due to time constraints I will use processing as my idea will be conveyed just as well.

So the goal is to create a tube like thing that objects or shapes fall through and the user has to catch. The idea being the shapes are the data and the user catches them in a bucket which is the data type.

Still intent to use more colour this project!

Text to support project

My project was looking at primitive data types within Java. In my game a type is represented by the shape the user has selected (left and right mouse buttons change this “type”), either a square, circle or a triangle. In Java we will call these respectively; a Character (a single key stoke), an Integer (a number) and a Boolean (true of false). The shapes moving through the “pipe” are described as values. These shapes must be matched with the correct shape which is controlled by the user, otherwise the program will fail (Game Over). For example, trying to squeeze a circle into a triangle would be like telling the computer to hold 4,587,361 in a space it has allotted for either “True” or “False”. Imagine asking the computer if 1+1=2 and it said “4,587,361". For the sake of simplicity I haven’t covered java machine casting at runtime type checking, so please be aware in some cases a circle should be able to fit into both a square and a triangle!

The game doesn’t end if you just miss one shape, as I wanted to show that software can run with bugs (errors) in it. As the game progresses so does the complexity, more shapes will appear at a greater frequency, just as they would in a larger program. Obviously a larger program can potentially hide more ‘bugs’, therefore the higher you score the more ‘life’ the pipe gets back. This ‘health’ is represented by the colour of the pipe.

Idea 1 - Game

Look at using java or blender, to make a simple game that would require the user to slot various shapes in various sockets

cost  - 1 - Nothing

time - 2 - Maybe 2-3 days.

Pros - costs nothing, no new skills need, would be one of the more interesting ideas for me to do

Cons - Time could get away from me, wouldn't be learning new skills just improving others

Idea 2 - Toy

Very similar to the game only will be much simpler and be a wooden frame that blocks of different shapes can slot in and out of.

cost - $50-100 + would need to borrow tools, and steal some wood stain(very expensive and need different colours but small amounts).

time - 1 - Could probably get this done in a day, other than waiting for glue and varnish to dry

Pros - Would be the most fun to make, having something physical is appealing.

Cons - Might be too simple, expensive(car still needs a front bumper!).

Idea 3 - Animation

essentially idea one but playing itself.

cost - Nothing

time - 3 - Mare time than I think I have -Would need to learn how to use blender or 3DSM :s

Pros - costs nothing, would learn a lot.

Cons - Would take a very long time, essentially the same as the game.