Hackathon-Simulator-2018

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  walking sprites for main characters

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  background tiles

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  sprites for swag struggle mini game

Inspiration

Why do students go to hackathons? What experiences keep them coming back? What are universal experiences for any hackathon you go to? We try to answer these questions in a simple, 2D isometric game using the Godot Engine. Meander around the main room, talk to npc hackers, and participate in mini games, trying to earn enough points to impress the judges and win the hackathon! With mini games like Grub Grab, a strategic challenge to get the most snacks, Swag Struggle, a fight to see who can steal as much swag from each other, and the Troll Cave Challenge, a game that tests your skills in programming (or at least how well you can destroy code to move on to the next level), compete against npcs to secure your spot as the ultimate hacker!

What it does

Currently we have a main menu, a select your character screen, and the ability to walk around the main room as the camera follows your character. The Swag Struggle game is partially implemented, with a score system and a player with a bag that other players need to collide with to steal points (swag). There is also a system that allows text boxes to appear when interacting with npcs, but it is not demonstrable at this time.

How we built it

We came into this hackathon intent on learning the Godot engine. Nicholas handled the back end code and Amanda worked on the graphics and implementation of level design.

Challenges we ran into

The only challenges that were difficult for us was the lack of time and manpower. Having only one person creating one element of the game at a time while another works on creating sprites and implementing them meant we made slow progress. Any other challenges in code and design were able to be overcome with communication and research into the problem.

Accomplishments that we're proud of

We're proud of the amount of work we were about to get done while learning a new engine (and trying to stay awake). We're especially proud of the camera implementation and the start of our swag struggle game, which took some time to figure out because we needed the backpack object to always be behind the player when moving around the screen. It took a long time to do the vector math but eventually we were able to get a smooth template that just needs the implementation of other players and their AI pathing.

What we learned

We learned a lot about Godot, how it makes some elements of game design easier and other elements much harder. We also learned new fundamentals of game design and game design coding. Lastly, we learned that we need more teammates to create a polished game in 36 hours.

What's next for Hackathon-Simulator-2018

We will continue working on the mini games and transitions between the main room and said mini games, as well as create an ending scene and adding more random generation elements and interactions.

Built With

• gdscript