Ideas and obstacles

To relate to a youth audience, it is important to make the game fun and interactive. This can happen by thinkign outside of the box and brainstorming new ideas.

Using a large bitmap is inefficient because of the high use of memory compared to using tiles; though we want the roads to stay the same so it is useless to use tiles. Instead of using a huge bitmap, we will use a fair size, and zoom in to provide a scrolling effect.

One huge obstacle would be forming an efficient collision detection algorithm. My first thought was to program every road with x and y limitations, but this is highly inefficient. Then I thought I could make every single coordinate into a list with the map being the linked list. This would be inefficient because of the high use of memory.

Another collision detection technique would be to use a colour that seperates every object and sides of the road. This would make it easy to determine when objects collide. This may be efficient, but it would not look that great. Another option is to have a bitmap for every other car on the road and possibly for every side of the road. Then we could check if two bitmaps are overlapping. The problem with this is that it is also very inefficient because of the time and memory it uses.

My best idea so far is to create a list of roads with limitations, and areas where they switch off to different roads. They will all be given a number such as route 101. The roads they switch to will be provided in the information in a file, so when the object enters a different road, you only need to search the other roads given in the selection. Cars may also need to be incorporated into what is on each road, along with streetlights and train tracks.

Another obstacle will be planning the map to work properly with lights, cars, and trains working as though the environment was a real life situation; This is one way to engage the gamers. This also provides a sense that the game is never the same when it is played.

Flash programming

Looking at games that others have made, I am starting to contemplate whether to use flash actionscript or allegro. Flash is easier to use and possesses the ability to animate objects and manipulate frames instantaneously. On the other hand, Allegro has more potential, but it forces the programmer to control every aspect of drawing, animating, colouring, and designing a program. Actionscript is more inefficient when it comes to the structure of interfacing the animation, mouse clicks, key presses, and frames; athough being able to interface these aspects of a program with only small bits of code is astonishing.

Signs on the road cont..

Having a scenario that shows cars following the rules of the road except for one exception; this could include a car going through a red light. The point would be for the viewer to find out the flaw in the situation that could put others at risk in the environment provided.

Allegro Graphics Program

Allegro is a language I think is pretty good. It lets you create buffers, blit sprites, draw lines and shapes, play movies and sounds, output text, and link frames together. The language to program the actual program accepts C++ syntax which is also a pro. The only downside is that every detail must be covered; in other words, you must program every aspect of what you are trying to accomplish.

Other ideas

Some other ideas:
-A chemistry program to solve redox questions, or create polyatomic ions
-A program involving musical notes of an instrument ( to help teach or test skills )
-A program to help young children to differentiate colours or learn basic logic
-A 3-D engine that lets you create 3-D objects with a specific size and depth. Then allows you to add shapes together to build anything( such as an airplane or robot structure ) -> could also calculate area and volume
-A model of the laws of centripetal force or gravity of objects around another
-A fun way to inform how to convert decimals
-A program that informs students of turning points in history ( factors and effects from WW1 ) -> could be a game that follows through a timeline
-A program that either teaches, tests, or implements cryptography ( using hints to solve encrypted notes to solve the game )
-A program that simulates snowboarding
-A game to trade within a city and other cities to teach people how to get a feel for how to market.
-A game to help high school students and first year university students in learning the unit circle( being able to find cosine and sin values during critical angles ) -> we could implement this by having enemy objects enter the screen and having to enter the correct angle in radians to shoot missiles in order to save your vessel.

Signs on the Road

Learning the signs of the road, as well as relearning them, is beneficial for the safety of all drivers. Some ideas to inform people of the rules of the road in a fun and direct way could be by creating a 2-dimensional real life scenario. This could involve a car driving on the road as a combination of signs, turns, and lights. This could either be done by using graphics or pre-drawn or painted tiles randomized in the program. Another approach could be to do the same thing using 3-dimensions to make it more life like.