Notices

Today I would like to present (and ask for your feedback) a logical game for Maemo - MGraph (working title).

The application is in a quite early stage of development but is usable and can give some fun (I think )

The 'website' of the game: http://docs.google.com/View?id=dfbhdsnd_211cm58bgd8

and a short video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jBuM8Iswcn0

The game is available in extras-devel as mgraph (beware of the dragons! seriously!), uses Qt 4.6 and requires constant network connection.
It is not fully user-friendly (it may take some effort to get what is done where), be aware of that. I will help with that (of course), but don't get angry that you 'don't know what to do'.

There are two parts of this project I would like to highlight:

• the product (here the game) and
• the idea behind

The game itself is quite simple (ok, as simple as it gets probably) logical game with built-in editor and possibility to share created editors. Should be a nice thing after some polishing, but nothing really extraordinary.

The more important (for me) is the idea behind the game, namely the mechanism of levels sharing. The key points here are:

• easy to use, built-in editor
• single press levels sharing
• access to published levels directly from within the game, via various channels (newest, best, created in my neighborhood...)
• recording solution during level creation and
• automated validation if level if solvable on the server side, using recorded solution
• levels creation as a part of the game, with points earned for other players trying to solve created puzzle

To sum the above up:
Think about game like AngryBirds. Now imagine, that instead of just levelpacks, you can directly access new levels in the game, just like if you were browsing videos on youtube. For solving given level in X tries you get 1/X points (simplification ). But also imagine, that the editor is built directly into game. You move the blocks around, choose which birds are available, creating your own level. You then solve your own level, just like you do with other levels. At this point your solution is recorded (in this case number of the bird, force an angle of shooting for it, optionally the moment of finger press when the bird is airborne). The whole solution of the level can be written in 4*number of birds (so it's lightweight).
The server gets your level and your solution. It simply plays it, using regular game mechanics (not graphics) and checks if the solution leads to the success. No complicated math necessary, quick and cheap way to check if level can be solved. If yes it is published through the channels. This guarantees that every level you see in the game can be solved, without need for any kind of reputation to eliminate unsolvable ones.
And you get the points for every player that tries to solve your level (the more tries it takes, the more you get).

There are of course some extras to this (e.g. number of elements available for level building depends on your points) but the core idea is as above. It is applicable to most of the logical puzzle games available on the market, on every platform. And this is something we would like to present with this application.

Wow, that was long

[edit] Call for designers is here: http://talk.maemo.org/showthread.php?t=48450

Hey, if no one steps up within the next three weeks, I can help. Problem is, I've got a crazy contract I'm trying to finish right now.

Sounds like a cool project!

Tim