I am excited to present to you all the final video game I made for this class utilizing p5 js and Arduino which is called The Boy Who Fell:
The Boy Who Fell is a survival game where you must control a boy and keep him above by utilizing the platforms from floating in below. But be careful as some of the platforms are spikes which will decrease the number of lives, but you can replenish those by jumping onto the wooden platforms. Also be wary of the row of spikes on the top so don’t stick onto one platform for too long!
User Testing
Sanjana helped me in the user testing. She was able to figure out how to play the game using just the on-screen instructions. What she did needed help in explaining was the lives system and how it worked which was the spikes take away life points while wood restores them until a maximum of 10. I decided to make wood give life for balancing sake.
Implementation
I started out in p5 js by creating the game with different classes such as Game, Player, and Platforms. The p5 js handles different functions such as the gravity of the player, randomizing which platform will appear and the overall design of the game.
For the Arduino, I added buttons onto the solderless board as to emulate the feeling of holding a controller. The controller is used in order to move the boy left or right. I set it so pressing a specific button sends either 1 or 2, depending on the button, to p5 js through which it detects which input is being pushed the and the boy moves in that direction.
In the end, only the Arduino is sending data to p5 js which is the value of what button is being pressed which is then stored in a variable and then compared to in an IF statement in order to determine which direction the boy moves.
I’m particularly proud of how I implemented the different platforms and they come from the bottom and the interaction between the player and the platform. I had even more platforms ready with different interactions but it proved to be too difficult and too much according to some feedback, so I eased the game down.
For improvements, I can improve the controller used in order to play the game but making a controller out of boxes and using bigger and better buttons. The game graphics can be improved as well as the instructions describing the game.