Sort It Out by vanderZwan
As I was busy attending a wedding and seeing friends and family this weekend, this turned into a 12 hour compo for me. Still proud of the results :).
Offline version is best version (fastest and full-screen) - the "web" version is an oldschool Java Applet. You've been warned!
Be sure to read the instructions, because you immediately dive into the game as it starts up. Unless of course you like the challenge of figuring out what happen on your own ;).
Screencast of near-final version, with explanation:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L5kA2_LuUmU
(or click the screenshot for an animated gif of the game in action)
=== Sort It Out ===
A minimalist puzzle game.
Your mission: to unscramble the bits within ten seconds!
Divide the mixed up string into one string of black and one string of white bits. Yes, that implies these bits be racist and demand segregation. It is terrible, but who are we to judge?
You can't drag the bits directly, you must use mouse/touch gestures to move them.
Swipe Left/Right to move between the left end of the top string of bits, and the right side of the bottom string of bits. Swipe up/down to move between the left sides.
Try to sort as many bits as you can without lifting your finger (releasing your mouse button) - you only have a limited set of gestures and when you run out it's game over!
When you fail to sort within ten seconds, your scramble counter goes up by one, and is deducted from your spare gestures.
When you succeed to sort within ten seconds, you get (number of solved sets * spare gestures) added to your score, and three more spare gestures. So the fewer gestures you need to solve, the higher the score gets.
For every set of bits you (fail to) sort, one extra bit is added to the new set. It starts easy with just three, but it gets hard really fast!
Suggested personal challenges: high score, sorting as many bits as possible, longest non-stop gesture.
Made with Processing 2.08, the gesture code is a simplified version based on earlier non-game related work (but I announced I wanted to design a game around that input method).
Offline version is best version (fastest and full-screen) - the "web" version is an oldschool Java Applet. You've been warned!
Be sure to read the instructions, because you immediately dive into the game as it starts up. Unless of course you like the challenge of figuring out what happen on your own ;).
Screencast of near-final version, with explanation:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L5kA2_LuUmU
(or click the screenshot for an animated gif of the game in action)
=== Sort It Out ===
A minimalist puzzle game.
Your mission: to unscramble the bits within ten seconds!
Divide the mixed up string into one string of black and one string of white bits. Yes, that implies these bits be racist and demand segregation. It is terrible, but who are we to judge?
You can't drag the bits directly, you must use mouse/touch gestures to move them.
Swipe Left/Right to move between the left end of the top string of bits, and the right side of the bottom string of bits. Swipe up/down to move between the left sides.
Try to sort as many bits as you can without lifting your finger (releasing your mouse button) - you only have a limited set of gestures and when you run out it's game over!
When you fail to sort within ten seconds, your scramble counter goes up by one, and is deducted from your spare gestures.
When you succeed to sort within ten seconds, you get (number of solved sets * spare gestures) added to your score, and three more spare gestures. So the fewer gestures you need to solve, the higher the score gets.
For every set of bits you (fail to) sort, one extra bit is added to the new set. It starts easy with just three, but it gets hard really fast!
Suggested personal challenges: high score, sorting as many bits as possible, longest non-stop gesture.
Made with Processing 2.08, the gesture code is a simplified version based on earlier non-game related work (but I announced I wanted to design a game around that input method).
Ratings
| Coolness | 54% | 3 |
| Overall | 2.77 | 832 |
| Audio | 2.20 | 741 |
| Fun | 2.19 | 1055 |
| Graphics | 2.16 | 971 |
| Humor | 1.78 | 833 |
| Innovation | 3.69 | 120 |
| Mood | 2.65 | 612 |
| Theme | 2.58 | 997 |
Just watched the video, makes soooo much more sense now!
Quite a neat concept and love the graphic style.
@raincole: your avatar is oddly fitting for your comment :D
@Spotline: Thank you for the compliment! I admit that it takes a while to get into the "zen" of it. It helps if you ignore the scoring and how many spare gestures you have at first, and just focus on gestures and sorting.
@everyone who bothers to comment: the feedback is greatly appreciated! I'll be sure you give your games a try once I can listen to the audio (in the train right now, don't want to bother the other passengers).
My strategy is basically: go down if the leftmost bit is black, to the right if it's white; then when all bits are sorted, swipe up all the way and win. Got me to around 6000 points. But your video shows that more sophisticated approaches are possible. I wonder what it would be like without the time pressure, when you really have to minimize the number of moves.
The difficulty is a bit random, depending on how sorted the bits are to begin with. Perhaps worth considering some measure of "sortedness", e.g. number of transitions between black and white, and keep that roughly proportional to the number of bits somehow.
I like the simplicity of the graphics and sound, and the bits really seem to have a life of their own. Perhaps the screen layout could have been better, especially on fullscreen.
DesignerNap: Sorry it's not your kind of game, thanks for taking the time to try it! For some, like Zuige, panurge, Dew and me, mastering the frustrating interface is part of the fun, but I can easily see why it's not for everyone.