PyWeek: March/April 2010

[Alan]

Who wants to make a game for PyWeek with me? No Python experience required.

http://www.pyweek.org/10/

The shortlisted themes are:
* Eleventh
* Canine
* Wibbly-wobbly
* Rose
* Screwdriver

Voting is open now and the winning theme will be announced next Sunday. Then we have a week to make the game before Sunday 4th April.

[Sarah Marshall]

No Python experience required.

Do you really think you can make a game in a language you don't have any experience in in a week? I'm not so sure. Also, I was going to do Mini Ludum Dare but I got back home on Saturday at 8am and slept until 4. I am working on a new game though ^^

[Ali]

I am working on a new game though ^^

Yay!

As for myself, I would really love to but looming finals means I probably shouldn't . I'm sure I could make some graphics if you like though

[Alan]

No Python experience required.

Do you really think you can make a game in a language you don't have any experience in in a week? I'm not so sure.

Totally! Python looks like a pretty user-friendly language; it'll be much easier than learning C++ in a 48 hour competition.

I'm sure I could make some graphics if you like though

Thanks for the offer!

[philh]

I can't guarantee I'll actually spend much time on it, but I'll give it a go.

[Sarah Marshall]

I'll give it a go if I find the learning not too hard but I'd rather concentrate on my new game because it is in C++ and it's editor based etc. which is new to me.

[Alan]

The theme will be announced tonight at midnight.

If anyone is on MSN then and potentially interested in doing this, I'll probably start up a group chat for game ideas.

[Alan]

The theme is "wibbly-wobbly".

Game idea that me and Phil like: one part this game, one part platformer. Infinite level of balancing platforms going up. Goal: get as high as possible. Use mouse to balance platform, click to jump. Jump height is proportional to how long you held button down before releasing. Have to time clicking with horizontal momentum.

We have a repository called "balance" and nothing else. We will need to split the work up somehow.

[philh]

In the spirit of unilateralism, I've got a window up and a platform drawing.

It uses Pyglet, and shouldn't need any other (python-based) depedencies.

[Alan]

Good job. Feel free to continue unilaterally developing it until I get round to doing something.

[Alan]

I'm working on the player physics at the moment.

Things that need doing that I'm not going to do:

* Menu screen
* Score manager
* Graphics: circular player, capsule-shaped platforms, background, menu
* Particles

[Alan]

The other thing we definitely need is a name. Currently can't think of anything: any suggestions?

[Ali]

I can do up some graphics today if you want. Any ideas on what you want the player to look like? What actions does he need to have? I'm guessing jumping should be one, and you'll animate rolling yourselves in the code. So I'm guessing jumping and rolling is what you're after?

Also, regarding capsule-like platforms, do you mean they should look like pills or something?

I have an idea for a setting. We could call it "Roly Poly Samurai". The main guy is a really fat samurai, or maybe a big fat samurai head with a tiny body (like the trampoline assassins). The tilting platforms could be sticks of bamboo.

Also, that French game is awesome, and being able to read the instructions makes me feel sooooooo cooooooooooool

[Alan]

Thanks, that would be great.

We'll animate rolling in-code, and any jumping animation needs to take into account that he can jump from any orientation. Just changing his eyes/face a bit when he's in the air would do.

I think the most important thing will be the background. It would be great if it somehow changed the higher you get. I.e. you start on the ground with maybe a field or something, then as you get higher you see more hills in the background, then you get higher again and are in the clouds, then you eventually get into space. But obviously that's a lot more work for you so don't feel you have to.

The current game window is 360x480, because Phil's laptop has a tiny screen and we want it to be higher than it is wide. Depending on the player/platform graphics I don't know if we'll want to make that bigger though: maybe 420x560?

A capsule in geometry is a long rectangle capped with semicircles, or a rounded rectangle, or a rounded line. Depending on how you want to think of it.

"Roly Poly Samurai" works for me. What is the samurai's motivation here? Something I'd quite like to try is an in-game story with no text.

If it was an abstract setting, I was thinking of just having a football bouncing higher and higher. When you get close, it bounces off to a higher platform.

Something like a bouncing ninja with a bloodied sword would do the same job in this context.

[philh]

I've got the code for drawing the player, so all you need to do is replace player.png to see how it looks in action.

For pyglet implementation reasons, you should probably make the file at least 128x128. As I've just discovered, if it's smaller than that, it gets packed in a larger texture with a black background. Which shouldn't be a problem, but at least on my video card it samples some of the black when I draw the image, so you get unpleasant visual artefacts on the edges. There's an explanation of something similar here: http://markmail.org/message/c23x2agy7iq ... te:results

I know you like large images, so that shouldn't too much of an inconvenience.