Release New (Beta) version of Reword

[purplepup]

I've updated my word-find letter-unjumbling game Reword to version 0.6.2


Improvements:


- Added eng_common_all (bigger more generic) and eng_small_6_letter (original reword) dictionaries


- Added (Y) button in menus for [back]


- In-game keyboard feedback on screen


- On screen help messages platform/keyboard specific


- Improvements to Rewordlist dictionary builder utility


- Added A-Z keyboard so player can type words if they want (or use Pandora controls)


- Updated dictionaries to support 6, 7 and 8 letter longest (re-word) words


- Ability to switch dictionaries within the options screen (UK and US included)


- New 'Arcade' game mode that allows progress without requiring a longest word


- Save game feature for returning to a part-played game


- Some animation and design improvements


Fixes:


- Word count display fixed


- Randomness bug in Win32 build


- Dictionary term scrolling


- Touch offset being thrown off should now be fixed


- Changed letter roundel colour to have more contrast


- Improved hi-score inits entry screen to allow A-Z kbd update and show prev inits


I still have some tweaking to do with new achievements, but I think the main game is solid.


Please try it out and give feedback.


Download from the repo: (New version 0.6.2 - 31/Jul/12) http://repo.openpand...eword.purplepup


Hope it's an improvement


Cheers


Al

 

[GiraffeeDreams]

Great game, playing right now, personally I'd make the colours a bit brighter (I don't know if this would affect the readability of the words but otherwise brilliant

 

[purplepup]

Great game, playing right now, personally I'd make the colours a bit brighter (I don't know if this would affect the readability of the words but otherwise brilliant

Do you mean the black letters on the purple roundels or the colour scheme in general?


I'm not much good with colour schemes really and even this took ages before I was comfortable with it.


I had thought the letters could be a bit brighter too, so back to Inkscape it is then...


Anyway glad you like it.

 

[GiraffeeDreams]

It's mostly the background colour, it's very pale, I think it'd look better brightened up.


I love being able to see the word meanings though, major kudos, when I see some words I didn't know exist it's nice to know what they are

 

[F_Slim]

I had this on my SD card for ages, but only tried it today for the first time. It's really nice, I like it.


You wrote this yourself for Pandora and GP2X, right? Great job!


Not sure if it makes sense, but on the Pandora using the keyboard might be nice, At least that's the first thing I tried to do


I am not really good at this game though, mainly because I am not a native english speaker I guess. So additional dictionaries (or a ready-to-run PND version of the editor/converter you mention in the documentation) would be very welcome!

 

[FelixNemis]

I second using the keyboard.


This is a very well made game btw.

 

[diligentcircle]

- have seen touch offset move though corrected with a game restart

You're using SDL, I take it? It's an easy fix (though a big hackish): rather than setting the cursor as not visible, show an invisible cursor (i.e. one that's completely blank). There's a page that shows exactly how to do it in C++, though I don't know where it is off the top of my head.

 

[purplepup]

- have seen touch offset move though corrected with a game restart

You're using SDL, I take it? It's an easy fix (though a big hackish): rather than setting the cursor as not visible, show an invisible cursor (i.e. one that's completely blank). There's a page that shows exactly how to do it in C++, though I don't know where it is off the top of my head.

Yes, I'm just calling SDL_ShowCursor (0);


Thanks for the info, I'll check it out.

 

[mcobit]

http://blogs.distant-earth.com/wp/?p=293

 

[_wb_]

Very nice game! I like anagram games a lot, and this one is very nicely done. Thanks for making this!


Yes, keyboard support would be great. Also custom dictionaries in appdata folder would be nice; perhaps make the word explanations optional since it is much easier to find simple wordlists in other languages than full dictionaries. Perhaps even check /usr/share/dict, some people may have wordlists in that directory (eg for their spellchecker).


Is there a way to see the meaning of the smaller words? I'm not a native English speaker but I tend to know the meaning of the long words while I often have no clue what some of those short ones could mean...


With keyboard support this would be a nice showcase game for the Pandora, since no other gaming handheld has a keyboard

 

[diligentcircle]

Oh my god, I can't believe I forgot this: please, please, please ditch that annoying letter selection thing it uses for typing your initials and use the keyboard instead (or at least make it possible)! This is the one thing I hate about ReWord, and it's especially annoying because the game doesn't remember the last initials typed.


Being able to use the keyboard to move letters down would be nice as well, come to think of it. Just make it so that typing a letter makes it bring one of that letter down if available. This is nowhere near as annoying as the high score list initials, by the way, but it would make the game a lot smoother if typing was possible.

 

[purplepup]

... please, please, please ditch that annoying letter selection thing it uses for typing your initials and use the keyboard instead (or at least make it possible)! This is the one thing I hate about ReWord, and it's especially annoying because the game doesn't remember the last initials typed....

Yea, I see your (fairly strongly made) point about the letter selection for initials. It took me a while to get that working and in doing so failed to re-implement showing the previous initials as it used to. I'll put that back in. The initials selection is touch enabled, like everything else, so it's quick to select. But I'll see if I can improve on it.


I'll also try and implement keyboard letter selection when playing.


Thanks for the feedback

 

[purplepup]

Ok, after an all day hacking session, I've updated Reword to v0.6.1 with the following changes:


- Added A-Z keyboard support so player can type words if they want (Pandora controls still work too)


- Touch offset being thrown off should now be fixed (thanks onpon4 & mcobit)


- Changed letter roundel colour to have more contrast


- Improved hi-score inits entry screen to allow A-Z kbd update and show prev inits


Hopefully this should keep a few people quiet!


I had to change the PXML file with a new <package> tag which has now created a new Reword alongside the old one. So I have disabled the old one for now. Unfortunately this means I lose my star rating and have to start again. Please feel free to vote for it.


Thanks

 

[mcobit]

If you choose the same package id and appid, like the previous one, it should update on the repo instead of creating a new one.

 

[_wb_]

Wow, that was fast! Good work, PurplePup!

 

[purplepup]

If you choose the same package id and appid, like the previous one, it should update on the repo instead of creating a new one.

Yes, but as the PXML didn't previously have a package tag, and I assumed I shouldn't have the same package name as the app name, I added 'package.' to the front of the appid and used that as the package name. If it's ok to duplicate then I may update it (but lose any new comments and votes etc - D'Oh! - can they be merged?)


Also, re. the PXML file I noticed I had to put in a description for the package and the app... so which one is displayed to the user in the repo?

 

[mcobit]

Both are displayed, but the one in the packagetag is more visible, as it is on the frontpage. the other can be viewed by clicking on the app.

 

[purplepup]

Thanks, I might fiddle with the description a bit then, but I think I'll leave the package name now so the old one will become obsolete.

 

[Mr_Loon]

Really enjoying this one, many thanks for the updates.


There is 1 problem I have with the (British) dictionary, it seems to include acronyms as valid words which can make things a little difficult.


Anyone got a suggestion for a better dictionary file?

 

[purplepup]

Really enjoying this one, many thanks for the updates.


There is 1 problem I have with the (British) dictionary, it seems to include acronyms as valid words which can make things a little difficult.


Anyone got a suggestion for a better dictionary file?

Yeah, sorry about that. When the game went up to 8 letters from 6, I couldn't afford the time to edit the dictionary manually again, so I just dumped the xdxf oxford english (and US) dictionaries into it. I may be able to remove some words if the description denotes it's a acronyn etc. Or we could crowd source a exclusion file I could run against it to eliminate words that we don't want.


I've got another update soon to make keyboard use in menus more consistent amongst a few other things.