NOV 12 2009
With Phase III now complete, there is only the final project submission remaining. In the Course section, I have provided the grading criteria for the final phase.
My intention was that by the end of Phase III your team should have all the tools and code needed to make a game. The final phase should be devoted to making more content, additional levels, polish, and working on parts of the game that you enjoy.
OCT 24 2009
As Phase III requires you to develop a two-dimensional vector class and provide unit testing for it, I'd like to give you a few pointers:
OCT 19 2009
Phase II submissions are due tomorrow by 11:59 p.m. as dictated by the syllabus. Do follow the submission requirements I have posted.
If your group is having difficulties completing Phase II, please feel free to contact me.
SEP 29 2009
After seeing the variety of Phase I submissions, I realize that a standard needed to be defined on how to properly submit a project. I have created a Submission Requirements section detailing the format of your remaining submissions.
SEP 23 2009
I would like to congratulate everyone on a successful Phase I. All submissions were received within the deadline, and I have had no troubles running your games. I am very pleased with what I have seen so far, excellent work everyone!
My intent of Phase I was to allow you to familiarize yourself with both Python and PyGame. Now that you have demonstrated this to me, you need to begin designing your game.
SEP 20 2009
I have compiled a list of utilities that I find helpful with game development. If you have a good suggestion for the list, please let me know and I will include it.
SEP 15 2009
Well mostly. For those of you who use Chrome or Firefox this is true. I am still working on making Internet Explorer play nice, which at times can be a task.
Please feel free to give me feedback about the site, as it is completely for your benefit.
SEP 14 2009
As the course project requires both Python and Pygame, it would be prudent to have both pieces of software installed on your development machine. If you are using the lab computers, this has already been taken care of for you.
The current production versions of Python are Python 2.6 and Python 3.1. Please note that you may find that some libraries you wish to use were written for Python 2.5.
The current version of Pygame is the newly released Pygame 1.9.1, though Pygame 1.8.1 is considered the more stable build.
The bundled examples are a good place to start learning PyGame. They can be found in the PyGame package examples directory:PythonXX/Lib/site-packages/pygame/examples
An additional resource for learning PyGame are the projects listed on the PyGame website. Many of them provide the full source, though be warned that most don't follow the best programming practices.