There's a new demo on the site! A simple clone of Breakout. When I say simple I really mean simple. This is another programming test and the instructions specifically said not to go above and beyond the requirements since they just wanted to see how I approached the problem so I kept the bells and whistles to a bare minimum. This was pretty handy because I was doing this at the same time as trying to sell all my worldly belongings and get my flat sparkling clean before the landlord's final inspection so I didn't really have time to do much more than the requirements anyway.
Functionally it's pretty much the same as the original Breakout (according to Wikipedia). There's 8 rows of bricks in 4 different colours, one projectile, and one paddle. The projectile's speed increases after the 4th and 12th brick is destroyed and also when the first orange and red bricks are destroyed. The paddle also shrinks to about half it's size when the projectile hits the top edge of the play area. My version is a bit shorter than the original version and only has one level. Since it's just a demo project I want the player to be able to reach the win state fairly quickly. You only get one life in version (as opposed to three in the original) since my version is shorter and multiple lives would make it too easy.
I finished the game in about a day or so and, while the instructions said not to add anything over and above the specification, I wanted to add something to make mine stand out a bit. I remembered playing a version of Breakout years ago on the TV Boy where instead of a ball it was a little man and instead of a paddle it was a see-saw. When the man collided with the paddle it flipped so it looked like the man had catapulted his companion instead of just bouncing. I decided I would skin my game to look like this. It doesn't show anything extra code wise but it will hopefully make it a bit more memorable. Also the only art is stick men which is, thankfully, within my artistic ability. I made a stick man who flailed his arms and replaced the projectile square with him. I also added a fail animation to him where he was upside down with his head all flattened out and arms still flailing since this was always the funniest part of the TV Boy game. I tested it and it looked pretty good and the man colliding with the paddle made the paddle look like a trampoline. I decided that, rather than having a see-saw, I would have 2 men holding a blanket which would bounce the projectile man. This was easy to make and I added some extra animation for the bounce and used a tween for the paddle shrinking to make things a bit smoother.
Overall, I think it turned out really well. It's a little basic but I guess that was the point. I didn't know when I added it to the site that the background would show up transparent. I could have fixed that but I decided to leave it the way it is. I thought the white background looked a bit rubbish anyway and it looks better with the transparent one.
Functionally it's pretty much the same as the original Breakout (according to Wikipedia). There's 8 rows of bricks in 4 different colours, one projectile, and one paddle. The projectile's speed increases after the 4th and 12th brick is destroyed and also when the first orange and red bricks are destroyed. The paddle also shrinks to about half it's size when the projectile hits the top edge of the play area. My version is a bit shorter than the original version and only has one level. Since it's just a demo project I want the player to be able to reach the win state fairly quickly. You only get one life in version (as opposed to three in the original) since my version is shorter and multiple lives would make it too easy.
I finished the game in about a day or so and, while the instructions said not to add anything over and above the specification, I wanted to add something to make mine stand out a bit. I remembered playing a version of Breakout years ago on the TV Boy where instead of a ball it was a little man and instead of a paddle it was a see-saw. When the man collided with the paddle it flipped so it looked like the man had catapulted his companion instead of just bouncing. I decided I would skin my game to look like this. It doesn't show anything extra code wise but it will hopefully make it a bit more memorable. Also the only art is stick men which is, thankfully, within my artistic ability. I made a stick man who flailed his arms and replaced the projectile square with him. I also added a fail animation to him where he was upside down with his head all flattened out and arms still flailing since this was always the funniest part of the TV Boy game. I tested it and it looked pretty good and the man colliding with the paddle made the paddle look like a trampoline. I decided that, rather than having a see-saw, I would have 2 men holding a blanket which would bounce the projectile man. This was easy to make and I added some extra animation for the bounce and used a tween for the paddle shrinking to make things a bit smoother.
Overall, I think it turned out really well. It's a little basic but I guess that was the point. I didn't know when I added it to the site that the background would show up transparent. I could have fixed that but I decided to leave it the way it is. I thought the white background looked a bit rubbish anyway and it looks better with the transparent one.
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