Reversi

[pavol]

this is probably one of the most complex things i've ever done in turing. thought i'd post it and get some feedback. the font, if you don't have it, is included in the zip file. Enjoy.

[cool dude]

i'll give u a lot of credit for this one! thats the same game from the junior contest and i had some difficulty with it. how long did it take u to do this? good job!!!

[pavol]

Thanks. that's what inspired me to make this game, the last question in the contest. during the contest i got it to work partially and then i went home and made it into a game. it took me about 3-4 days (i wastn't programming 24 hours a day though )

[Delos]

Very nice. I like it.

- Error trap your input. Ctrl+Z crashes it. This is not too serious, but hey, might as well be complete.
- Presentability could have been improved. Setting it so that initial instructions are displayed at the top left-hand corner is practical, but just not very pretty. Again, a minor point aside from the engine.
- When selecting Starting Board, you may want to consider incorporating the mouse in addition to keyboard-selection.

- Gameplay was smooth, no errors with mouse control.
- Graphics were good, nothing too fancy and all within Turing's intrinsic limitations.
- AI was not that difficult to beat though. I would suggest providing several levels of AI, for instance:
+ Random - chooses a random move out of a list of possible moves. Unpredictability is more difficult to play against than most think.
+ Recursive search - similar to what you have, I'm guessing. Looks at all possible moves, determines best (most conversions). 'Recursive' part comes in, in that it starts considering moves further down the line (nesting itself a set number of times), and finally returning the most expediant move.
Read zylum's tut on Recursion if you're not familiar with it.

Overall good stuff.
+bits

[pavol]

thanks a lot for all the suggestions, i'll surely look into it all and post an update later on.

[pavol]

"Ctrl+Z crashes it"
i'm not sure how that happens or why it happens. does this mean ill have to do something like use getch() and get the user to type in 'c' for comp and 'h' for human? or is there another way to prevent this?

[Delos]

Ctrl+Z is an error based on ASCII input. Turing interprets it as the EOF marker. You could use a getch() sequence to filter it out (not too difficult), but you may end up with iffy input anyway. This would be the easiest way.
I might suggest looking into an Input.KeyDown() based approach, but this would likely end up being quite a bit more than you really need for this programme.

[batman]

Awesome game! When I was writing the junior contest I had some difficulty writing this program. I managed to finish it though, but mine is nothing compared to yours. Nice Game!

[[Gandalf]]

Great game, good AI, good playability.

-The AI was completely crushing me until I got a corner, after which it was an easy win for me. The second game was quite even. Either I suck or Delos is really good. Overall score: 2-1 for me. The AI should handle corners better.
-Text could be improved a bit, but as it is isn't bad.
-Didn't get any errors while playing.

Delos, I'm pretty sure Ctrl+Z is supposed to crash the program, like an Alt+F4 for Turing (it wasn't error proofed). At least, that's how it was for the DOS Turing.

Definately one of the more worthy non-Catalyst submissions!

[Booya]

Awesome game its even better then the one on my computer!

[pavol]

thanks to everyone for the replies. as for the crashing part i fixed it in the beginning where you choose to play human or computer just by simply using getch() but as for where you enter your name Delos, i think im gonna have to try your suggestion of Input.KeyDown. for now i just hope nobody wants their name to be ^Z, and for some reason Ctrl+D does the same thing and when i look at the input it says that i pressed ^Z

[jamonathin]

Good game. One thing you may want to change is the scale of your program. Seems a little big for a 800x600 monitor.

One problem/error aside from the others.

- If there's one space left and its the user's turn (black) and the user cant place his "circle" there, nothing happens. It just kinda sits there and waits for you to do something, whereas you cant.

Other than that, good work.

[Delos]

800x600?! What age are you living in! .
Though he has a point. As a challenge:
- determine the absolute dimensions of the monitor. Yes, Turing can do this, it's a hidden piece of code somewhere in F10.
- create an algorithm to resize your screen to fit any monitor.
- if the monitor is *really* small or *really* big, resize your pieces as well.

This will give you a taste of what its like to programme in dynamic environemtns, where you control absolutely everything and have next to no constant, hard-coded values. This can be quite useful in many cases, and is often a good habit to attain.

[pavol]

to address the problem you encountered jamonathin, all i can say is "that's weird", because i do have the game check if the user or computer has no more moves left. if you could describe as close as possible where you wanted to place the piece or what pieces were around it that would help a great deal.
and i'll look into the screen resolution thing.
thanks guys
im almost done the beginning where you select all the options, i think it's almost error proofed and looks a bit better

[MysticVegeta]

Good game, nice graphics. No bugs here visible right now to me.