"Creating Art & Music" is an introductory course designed to introduce creative activities in the context of art and music. Thus far the course has been taught at the middle school, high school, community college, and university level (with appropriate adaptations for each level). Each week this fall, students in the course are posting their projects in this strand of the Snap! forum. Here is s a link to the course materials:
In this week's module, we will begin exploring how to create games in Snap!. Since games tend to be more complex, this module will extend across multiple weeks, as we develop concepts, create first drafts, and then refine mechanics and features.
As a jumping off point, please review the documents on the course page for the module on Designing Games. This includes links to several games of varying complexity as well as text documents showing how they were built.
Feel free to review past versions of this module or other projects published in Snap for additional game ideas.
Once everyone has outlined a game they want to create and described the elements they want to include, we'll work on creating those elements and assembling them into a fully functioning game.
I plan on building a Halloween-themed game of "escaping the woods": player should manipulate the character by pressing buttons like "up-arrow" to jump or "down-arrow" to duck and glide; some obstacles are set so that they player should pass them, otherwise they loose one life and game over. There is no exactly "winning" state because the game continues as long as no mistakes have been made!
My plan is to create a game similar to whack a mole where the objective of the game is to hit (press) on as many "moles" as possible in a given time frame. The twist is that there will be fake moles that appear that take away a point instead of adding one.
To create the game, I will need to create a grid of neutral sprites that will randomly switch to a "mole" or a fake mole that will switch back to neutral if pressed or if too much time has passed. I will also need a way to keep track of the points, when the player either wins or loses a point. I will also need to include some time of timer to end the game.
I haven't started anything yet but any future developments will be made here: Link
For my game I plan on creating a game where the player is an object at the bottom of the screen and can only move left or right using the arrow keys. The obstacles in this game will appear from the top of the screen and move down the screen. The player's objective is to avoid these obstacles as they glide across the screen. I anticipate this will include creating clones of the obstacles coming across the screen and deleting them if they fall off the bottom of the screen to avoid slowing the program down. There will not necessarily be a win/loss condition, but instead how long a player can survive and I hope to create a way so the game becomes harder as time continues.
The plan for my game is to create a platformer that moves horizontally. It's going to be a game where a crab must platform its way to safety in the ocean while the environment is dangerous (spikes on the ground that will kill you) and there are enemies around (currently I only have a jellyfish enemy but I'll probably add more). I plan on having the crab be able to jump, move left and right, and dash. The game ends when the crab gets to its home. Currently, I have the background, some hand drawn sprites (the play button, the crab, and the jellyfish), and the music set up. I will continue to work on it throughout the week.
For my game, I plan to optimize the code more and fix some bugs. As is, it is a racing game where you play as a car and you are driving through the streets of a city. Use WASD or Arrow Keys to move around. The goal is to collect the 4 coins as fast as possible. I used clones to create a 3D effect and did some math to calculate directions for movement. I also want to add sound effects, music, a titlescreen, and improved text for showing points.
Update: I fixed a bug related to the coins not matching the movement of the world. The solution is not perfect, but it works for now. I also added a titlescreen, copyright free music I found online here, a coin pickup sound effect, and a small hud.
Update 2: I reworked the game into an infinite runner game, where you need to avoid crashing into buildings for as long as possible. I added a restart feature, a crash sound effect, and a car sprite for the player.
For my game I plan to create a game similar to "Flappy Bird". The player will be able to use the space bar to control the "jumps" of a bird/its y position. The goal of the game is to continuously adjust the height of the bird to fit through the opening of poles that occur at different heights. If it misses the opening and hits the pole then the game is over. The goal is to get through as many as possible. I will use clones to create the tubes and the screen will appear to be moving similar to the flower fame.
For this week I think I’ll work a game/interactive animation with original characters. I think as of now I’m going to try and create original images and then animate them using the costume blocks. Then I’ll add some interactivity between the user and the animation at large. The user will most likely either have their own sprite or will navigate user the point and click concept.
My plan for this project is to recreate a game like crossy road where a chicken tries to cross the road while cars/objects are going by. I think it might be difficult to animate cars and/or the background but shouldn't be impossible.
For my game, I'm planning to design a maze (randomly generated for each round) where the character has to find its way to the final destination. Along the way they can collect objects to earn points. I want to establish a time limit and if they don't reach the final destination before the game ends they lose.
I have made a lot of progress on my game, but need to figure out how to have the duck die if hit and also how to change the speed of the clones moving on the road. It is the same link as above!
Here is my project: Game Design - Spencer Lewis. I think I had decent structure as of now, however, certain aspects don't work as expected which I need to tune up. The goal is get that working and than add more and more sprites.
For my project, I am going to replicate the game Scoops. There will be ice cream and tomatoes falling from the sky and the point of the game is to stack as many scoops onto the cone. However, if you get a tomato or an onion, it's game over.
Here is the link to my project: Game. One issue I am running into is increasing the amount of objects that fall from the top of the screen gradually as it eventually drops a lot of objects at once.
This is looking really good! I like how the cars are spawning and I think that by just adding movement and the ability to lose by a car touching you, the game is nearly done!
I've started setting up the general game mechanics such as the overall movement, the heart system, changing of backgrounds and platforms, and an npc. I do have some glitches (one that I'm currently trying to fix is that my crab disappears after some time) and systems that aren't working atm but I hope to fix it.
I really like it! The mechanics of the game ran pretty smoothly and overall, I think you're pretty much done with the game. I would suggest, since this is a racing game, you could having the moving sprite be an actual car. Great job!