Simon Thatham's Portable Puzzle Collection

[joyrider]

Hey,

while looking for a game i could recreate (since i can't port myself) i stumbled upon Simon thatham's portable puzzle collection. It's a collection of all sorts of puzzle games and it's aimed at portability. all that needs doing is writing a new frontend for it for the gp2x which i'm not capable of doing with my limited knowledge. but i was thinking that someone else could possibly do it and that it would be a nice addition for the gp2x. It even has information for developpers on how to use the back/middle/front end etc. so i do think this can be done with some sort of ease for a more experienced programmer.

you can check it out here :
http://www.chiark.greenend.org.uk/~sgtatham/puzzles/

if noone is up for it i'm thinking of recreating and thus not porting at least one of those games

 

[Alex.]

I encourage you to remake one of those games regardless of whether it gets ported or not. The more native GP2X games the better, especially since you could put your own unique spin on it, not being constrained by prewritten code

- Alex

 

[prairiefire]

That looks really cool. I'd love to see someone attempt to port/rewrite those games for the '2X!

 

[joyrider]

well after months of inactivity (mostly due to world of warcraft ) i'm giving one of the games a shot. I think i can pull it off already made the graphics which are very basic but they need to be cause i'm using a floodfill function to fill the pipes and will use a simple getpixel function to determine if the level / game has been won.
so little logic is needed because i only need to check each tile middle position to see if a certain color exists this makes my life and programming it much much easier only downside is can't really generate levels like in his games although i could use a bruteforce method but i have no idea how long generating a level would take, would be intresting to try it out doh

anyway here's a screenie guess which game i'm remaking i named my remake waternet It's not much and there are to many starting points on the map (there should be only one) but it was for testing out the floodfill function is randomly generated a level (one that most probably isn't solveable)

edit :

oh crap just saw pipes in the homebrew forum, it's basicly the exact same game and looks much better, doesn't seem to be using floodfills doh probably the reason why it looks much better
i'll probably abandon it now, no point in doing something that someone else did

 

[joyrider]

hmm it seems pipes is using java virtual machine to run the game i could create a normal gpe version of my game. what do u guys think should i continue or not ? or start on another of his puzzle games ?

 

[Parkydr]

A lot, if not all, of these would run on the X server unmodified.

Only problem is they use GTK, which needs quite a few other libraries

 

[gaterooze]

That whole package looks sublime. It would be *perfect* for GP2X...

 

[___]

I think you should create your own gpe.
And yes, this package does look amazing.

 

[Alex.]

hmm it seems pipes is using java virtual machine to run the game i could create a normal gpe version of my game. what do u guys think should i continue or not ? or start on another of his puzzle games ?

Definitely continue. It's not like Pipes is an original game and you're stealing some GP2X coder's idea. Besides, you can always do something to give it your own interpretation, like funky graphics, crazy game modes, etc. Good luck

Edit: think of it like another space shooter: there are hundreds of great ones out there, all revolving around the same idea and game play - just make sure you'll give it that boost of your own creativity to establish it as your own game, and not just a clone.

- Alex

 

[joyrider]

yeah but my skills are limited most of the time i'm happy if i can even succeed at creating just a clone. which is what i'm doing now with the game. Funky graphics is something i can't do either i'm doing graphics myself most of the time and i suck at it hehe. I'm using the net game to create the levels since that net game has an option to create (unique solveable) levels randomly, a thing i'm not able to comprehend how i can do that hehe but i have a (windows) level editor ready and i'll see if i can create some levels myself as well. I'm thinking of doing 3 difficulties easy : 5x5 & 6x6 grid, medium : 7x7 & 8x8 grid, hard : 9x9 & 10x10 grid and i'm making 10 levels for each grid specification so a total of 60 levels. once thats done i'll try to comprehend how i can generate levels myself but this might be difficult since i'm using a neat trick to see if a level is completed (floodfill & getpixel on each tile) and it could be that u end up with a level where the tubes don't connect with each other but that when floodfilled all tiles get filled up which gives weird levels but anyway thats for later on. Main thing is getting a game running with some levels then i can see where i go from there .

if someone likes to help with creating levels u can get the level editor here : http://www.willemssoft.be/misc/leveleditor.exe

What i do now is use the net game from to generate a unique solveable level of a certain grid size (max 10x10 for my game) then it solve the puzzle and recreate the solved puzzle in the level editor once u have done that u can press the shuffle button a few times to rotate the pieces around randomly and then save it.

the usuage is simple u click on a picture and it gets selected then u click on the bigger picture to drop the piece in the level. The pieces with red around the tubes are starting positions. It is possible to have multiple starting positions but i wouldn't make use of that unless u know what ure doing

update 2:
here's a little movie of what i got so far :
http://www.willemssoft.be/misc/waternet.avi

The Level selector is ready, levels can be loaded played and be completed.

 

[joyrider]

Hey guys, i'm still working on this but not so much anymore since i'm getting my time taken by other things (like preparing everything softwarewise for my mame cabinet). But i worked a bit on it the last couple of days and i even created a wip video. The game is basicly finished except that it's missing a lot of levels, i haven't created almost any of them since honestly it's just plain boring to do and takes a lot of time. (could get a hand in this). anyway here the wip video on youtube : http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kw19ZR63DdI

 

[Alex.]

Looking very good joyrider, the graphics and menu look polished. Keep up the good work!

 

[joyrider]

thanks for the nice comments alex today i've been playing with sinus funcition to get a cool level finished "scene" it looks simple doh but i like it, never actually understood how u could get "wavy text" but i got it working by trial and error will have to figure out something else for when u completed every level in a certain difficulty now i wonder what hehe

update:
woot Found another cool thing and by accident ! Screen transitions (fading). I had forgotton to clear my buffer surface, and guess what it still had image data from a previous scene, (buffer is a global variabele) so in each new scene (/state) i still have the image in the buffer from the previosu scene. this looks very cool ! lol i'm jumping on my chair from happyness

update 2:

today i worked some more on it. Everything is finished except perhaps the tutorial. Now comes the stupid task of creating levels Really noone intrested to help me with that ? u'll get ure name in the credits (inside the game)

 

[hitbyambulance]

i played a game exactly like this on Palm (with a graphical difference of having a network of computers you to hook up to each other.) i can see how the level design would be tedious.

 

[Nagelfar]

Just found this thread

i played a game exactly like this on Palm (with a graphical difference of having a network of computers you to hook up to each other.) i can see how the level design would be tedious.

Yeah, well, this is why you don't do it yourself but let the computer do it It's actually easier than you would think, just look for labyrinth creation algorithms, there's plenty

 

[joyrider]

Just found this thread

i played a game exactly like this on Palm (with a graphical difference of having a network of computers you to hook up to each other.) i can see how the level design would be tedious.

Yeah, well, this is why you don't do it yourself but let the computer do it It's actually easier than you would think, just look for labyrinth creation algorithms, there's plenty

problem is i don't see how i can apply the algorithm for creating mazes on the game. well i can see what u mean doh the solved puzzle is basicly some kind of maze. but i can't figure out how i should addopt it all for use in this game. I did however create some small logical crap in the level editor that can generate some levels however it doesn't think about connecting a whole grid, it could be the generator generates a level with 2 seperate net's which are not connected to each other (fixed this by using a bruteforce method). Another thing that can happen is that the solved puzzle generates loops which is bad as well (no clue how how i can prevent this). I have no clue how i can deal with those things but it's easy now to generate a partially complete level and adopt it a bit for the small faults that are in it. I'm also not sure if the levels generated are uniquely solveable but then again i don't think that's needed as well. goana play a bit with it and see what it comes up with


oh yeah my signature has a new movie in it that shows the screen transitions (fading) and the level finished / completed levels scene as well as the credits and intro


update:
hehe damn it should have known the bruteforce method just takes ages to find a suiteable 10x10 level it's been running for 5 minutes and still hasn't found one lol ah well i can use it for smaller levels then :=), hehe it can't even find a level for a 7x7 grid :/

 

[Nagelfar]

problem is i don't see how i can apply the algorithm for creating mazes on the game.

Well this is actually pretty easy to understand, lets say you have a maze like this:
http://666kb.com/i/an1imv4g9z9wdrh4a.png]http://666kb.com/i/an1imv4g9z9wdrh4a.png

Just put a grid over it and the pathways become exits to differnt rooms. So lets say you create a maze. A room with 1 exit would be an endpipe, a room with 2 exits opposite to each other would be a straight one, 2 exits on 90 degrees is a bent pipe, 3 exits is the 3 ended pipe and 4 is the crossing

Creation of a 9x9 maze if done right can be measured in milliseconds

 

[joyrider]

ah ok, well i will start another program now to see if i can generate a maze the code is still a bit unclear to me and i haven't been able to find an example yet only some text references on how to do it. guess i'll know what i'll be doing this evening (besides poker at friend's place )

 

[joyrider]

cool it works
i managed to create a maze generator thanks to this page : http://www.mazeworks.com/mazegen/mazetut/index.htm

it worked from the first time and i can see now how i can apply it to the game, a level generator is in the working !!! thanks a million for the tip on the mazes i had no clue it's just a maze actually the solution. now i can generate levels and add another mode to the game to play a random level. I still have to convert my code from delphi to C++ doh but that shouldn't be a problem (i'm more familiar with delphi/object pascal then with c++).

I can now make a second game out of this maze generator as well and can even create a program to print out the mazes & stuff pretty cool 3 fly's in one clap : random levels, maze generator / printing tool and a new game !!!

i wish the rest of the (poker) evening went as good hehe

 

[Nagelfar]

cool it works
i managed to create a maze generator thanks to this page : http://www.mazeworks.com/mazegen/mazetut/index.htm

it worked from the first time and i can see now how i can apply it to the game, a level generator is in the working !!! thanks a million for the tip on the mazes i had no clue it's just a maze actually the solution. now i can generate levels and add another mode to the game to play a random level. I still have to convert my code from delphi to C++ doh but that shouldn't be a problem (i'm more familiar with delphi/object pascal then with c++).

I can now make a second game out of this maze generator as well and can even create a program to print out the mazes & stuff pretty cool 3 fly's in one clap : random levels, maze generator / printing tool and a new game !!!

i wish the rest of the (poker) evening went as good hehe

Glad I could help
To be honest I wouldn't make ANY levels manually, it is just tedious work and nobody cares if the levels are handmade or not. The cool thing about this game is the almost endless amout of levels you can produce manually