This week was spent finishing the game I started last week, Cheese Chase. I ran into so many problems this week when trying to make my game better. Last week I had the cheese moving in the fourth level so I tried having the cats move in level 5, but I realized once I had them move, the sprites would not return to their original positions when the game restarted. I had to move all the sprites back to their original spots, which, in turn, moved the other costumes of the same sprite and I couldn't figure out how to fix it. After working for about 30 minutes, I had to revert back to the game before I had made any changes because I couldn't figure out how to fix it. That was a 30 minutes completely wasted except for the fact that I realized having the cheese and cat move is going to be too complicated for my game, so I took that aspect out.
After giving up on having the cat and cheese move, I decided to just make each level harder by placing more cats closer together so getting to the cheese is more difficult. I know the game is not too easy because I played it over and over to make sure all the scripts were working correctly and it would normally take me 2 - 3 tries to make it to the end of the game. The game is not too difficult either, but it's difficult enough to keep players interested. Remember, I've only been coding for 5 weeks and I am by no means an expert.
Once I had the game finished, I wanted to make a "Congratulations" page that appeared at the end. I decided to make it so the user can write his/her name on the last page as evidence that they finished. The mouse sprite follows the user's mouse and I enabled the pen feature to follow the mouse so they can write their name and take a screenshot of it as evidence that they passed. I had wanted users to be able to post this screenshot in the comments section, but the comments section doesn't allow picture posts. I ran into another hurdle on the congratulations page because I wanted the soundtrack playing in the background to stop and to play the voice over I recorded to congratulate the user. I worked on fixing this one script for over an hour. The problem was I couldn't make the soundtrack end and have my voiceover play. The coding blocks cover almost all the options you need to make a game, but sometimes I feel like they are missing some blocks. I ended up coming up with a hack to solve the problem. I had the script for the soundtrack on the mouse sprite and couldn't get it to stop and play my voiceover as a second sound. So, I moved the script to play the soundtrack onto the cheese sprite and on the congratulations page I had all the scripts for the cheese stop and then played the voiceover on the mouse's script. It worked!! (I apologize if that is all gibberish - but I'm using the vocabulary I learned from Scratch).
Lastly, I wanted my game to record how many plays it receives. I found a forum where other scratch users were discussing how to record usernames of the players who played their game. Most of the discussion was way over my head. They were discussing how to use blocks that I've never even seen before and didn't apply to my game. However, one user gave a comment (comment #8) that explained how to record the number of plays and I used it. I gave this user credit in my "Notes and Credit" section of my game, so I'm being a good user.
Even though this game was a lot of work and had me really frustrated, I am proud of what I have learned throughout this process. The biggest thing I learned about coding is that it really puts your problem solving skills to the ultimate test. Do you know what to do when you get stuck on something? Do you give up or get frustrated really easily? Then coding isn't for you. Or, maybe it is because it will force you to improve your problem solving skills.
After giving up on having the cat and cheese move, I decided to just make each level harder by placing more cats closer together so getting to the cheese is more difficult. I know the game is not too easy because I played it over and over to make sure all the scripts were working correctly and it would normally take me 2 - 3 tries to make it to the end of the game. The game is not too difficult either, but it's difficult enough to keep players interested. Remember, I've only been coding for 5 weeks and I am by no means an expert.
Once I had the game finished, I wanted to make a "Congratulations" page that appeared at the end. I decided to make it so the user can write his/her name on the last page as evidence that they finished. The mouse sprite follows the user's mouse and I enabled the pen feature to follow the mouse so they can write their name and take a screenshot of it as evidence that they passed. I had wanted users to be able to post this screenshot in the comments section, but the comments section doesn't allow picture posts. I ran into another hurdle on the congratulations page because I wanted the soundtrack playing in the background to stop and to play the voice over I recorded to congratulate the user. I worked on fixing this one script for over an hour. The problem was I couldn't make the soundtrack end and have my voiceover play. The coding blocks cover almost all the options you need to make a game, but sometimes I feel like they are missing some blocks. I ended up coming up with a hack to solve the problem. I had the script for the soundtrack on the mouse sprite and couldn't get it to stop and play my voiceover as a second sound. So, I moved the script to play the soundtrack onto the cheese sprite and on the congratulations page I had all the scripts for the cheese stop and then played the voiceover on the mouse's script. It worked!! (I apologize if that is all gibberish - but I'm using the vocabulary I learned from Scratch).
Lastly, I wanted my game to record how many plays it receives. I found a forum where other scratch users were discussing how to record usernames of the players who played their game. Most of the discussion was way over my head. They were discussing how to use blocks that I've never even seen before and didn't apply to my game. However, one user gave a comment (comment #8) that explained how to record the number of plays and I used it. I gave this user credit in my "Notes and Credit" section of my game, so I'm being a good user.
Even though this game was a lot of work and had me really frustrated, I am proud of what I have learned throughout this process. The biggest thing I learned about coding is that it really puts your problem solving skills to the ultimate test. Do you know what to do when you get stuck on something? Do you give up or get frustrated really easily? Then coding isn't for you. Or, maybe it is because it will force you to improve your problem solving skills.
Scripts for each sprite in Cheese Chase
(When compared to the scripts I was writing on week 1, you can see I've come a long way)
(When compared to the scripts I was writing on week 1, you can see I've come a long way)
After five weeks of coding and creating games using Scratch, I have learned a tremendous amount about coding and the skills that are required. I started out with ten inquiry questions and after five weeks, these are the answers I've come up with.
10 Inquiry Questions
- What is code, at its most basic level?
- Why would coding be beneficial for someone to learn?
- What life skills can be practiced when coding?
- What are the different aspects of a game that combine to make it entertaining?
- How can interacting with other users improve my coding skills?
- If my game does not get many players or comments, how do I find out how to make it better?
- What can I learn from playing other games that will improve my games?
- Is Scratch the best coding web-based software? What else is out there?
- How advanced are the games that can be created using Scratch?
- Are there communities outside Scratch that can help with making more advanced games?