Notes from Thinktank IV

The two papers that were available are use as basis with added comments.

• Be sure to define small goals in the Thinktank ans to be able to approach them iteratively. While this is a good approach for an existing framework, a lot of base coding need to be done. See below
• Try to define the most important elements needed for a minimalistic running game. Some of them you already achieved. My opinion: Focus on interactivity. Depends on:
  • simple AI (spaceship follows pilot and shoots on it, probability of

hitting it is for example ~1/d (d is distance to craft))

o simple collision detection (bounding box is sufficient for a first

approach, _don't_ code your own collision detection alg.)

o simple mission goals (kill all pirates, kill 5 aliens, etc. just

simple counters)

o simple weapon (one is sufficient): sound and vision o simple interactive menu: (1) describing the mission goals (2)

informing the pilot if mission goals reached (3) informing the pilot he was killed, restart/quit. sound and vision.

o very good controls for the spacecraft (this is most important for

the quality of the game). Give this task only to very skilled and very motivated programmers that know the game genre. Define one and only one game to be used as a prototype, install it on his/her computer let him play it in front of you and discuss it. This is so important…

o simple HUD (showing health and ammo _only_) in a second iteration

you may show more..

o explosion effect for killed spacecrafts: sound and vision