You are the only employee who hasn't quit yet and need to program robots to replace your colleagues!
While the robots were cheap, they'll also not work for more than 10 seconds and easily blow up...
Please refrain from bumping the walls too much, the collision reaction code is a bit flaky (this is the last time I'm writing my own collision code, I swear!). Keep in mind, it was either this way or simply letting robots blow up immediately on collision detection...
The post compo version contains ~4-5 additional hours of work done a few days after the compo. It does not alter gameplay or add content, but instead aims at fixing the most glaring usability problem and improving the tutorials. The changes are:
- Replaced my collision code with Box2D. Physics of movement are exactly the same, but collisions are now crisp and reliable.
- Now fast forwards the time you'd otherwise have to wait idly at 5x speed when you click a robot.
- Made the tutorial text clearer and added a hint for when you can press a button or pick something up.
I love the idea of programming robots just by driving them in stead of let them make the calculations, i cant pass the first level, it's a bit difficult for me but it is cool, it reminds me of RoboCode, the maker was in my college teaching us about robots AI. Cool. Thanks for the code!
I'm very sad the collision mechanics turned out as terrible as they did. They worked pretty well when I first wrote them (you certainly couldn't just go through walls at a 90° angle...), but then I had to tweak some acceleration values to balance a level and it all crumbled. I'll probably look into integrating a proper engine like Box2D into this game as an exercise.
@Kyle Mac: I chose 3D over 2D because I'm a terrible artist and I prefer the look I'm getting from defining some shapes in 3D space and putting on some simple textures. It also works quite nicely during recording, better than I'd imagine it being in 2D, although it's true that the gameplay ended up taking place in a plane only. I'm not sure why you found the game confusing, but I can see what aspect could be tedious: something I definitely would have wanted to add in retrospect is an option to fast forward the simulation so one could begin recording immediately, without waiting for the cycle to end.
I found it incredibly confusing to start with, as the instructions are not particularly clear. I spent a few cycles at first just clicking the robot and nothing happened so I clicked it again etc and so your tutorial/instruction screen didn't show up. Then once it did I spent a few cycles moving the robot round with no idea what I was trying to do. I took quite a while to work out that I needed to press space when the robot is somewhere near, but not too near the teapot to pick it up without exploding it. Once all these realisations had happened it all seemed more obvious, but it certainly wasn't clear from the in game instructions how to proceed (or perhaps I just missed something).
this game is awesome. Once you get the hang of it. It's hard to figure out the order of things sometimes, but that's the game. What I really would like is a reset button, now I have to replay bots to do nothing, so it doesn't mess up the setup of other bots.
One of the most complete game I ever played on this contest. Interesting concept, nicely executed. Bugs and approximative gameplay make it difficult to feel all the fun it could give. Also we miss sound! Good job anyway.
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I'm very sad the collision mechanics turned out as terrible as they did. They worked pretty well when I first wrote them (you certainly couldn't just go through walls at a 90° angle...), but then I had to tweak some acceleration values to balance a level and it all crumbled.
I'll probably look into integrating a proper engine like Box2D into this game as an exercise.
@Kyle Mac:
I chose 3D over 2D because I'm a terrible artist and I prefer the look I'm getting from defining some shapes in 3D space and putting on some simple textures. It also works quite nicely during recording, better than I'd imagine it being in 2D, although it's true that the gameplay ended up taking place in a plane only.
I'm not sure why you found the game confusing, but I can see what aspect could be tedious: something I definitely would have wanted to add in retrospect is an option to fast forward the simulation so one could begin recording immediately, without waiting for the cycle to end.
I found it incredibly confusing to start with, as the instructions are not particularly clear. I spent a few cycles at first just clicking the robot and nothing happened so I clicked it again etc and so your tutorial/instruction screen didn't show up. Then once it did I spent a few cycles moving the robot round with no idea what I was trying to do. I took quite a while to work out that I needed to press space when the robot is somewhere near, but not too near the teapot to pick it up without exploding it. Once all these realisations had happened it all seemed more obvious, but it certainly wasn't clear from the in game instructions how to proceed (or perhaps I just missed something).