Flash – Case 10

Start menu and tweaks/bug-fixes/polishing.

Case 10 is the last case in this semester’s course of Animation and Interactivity – I’m at the point where I clearly see a game in front of me, fully functional (apart from a menu-system and a retry-function). It feels good to finally be done with the programming, and to finally have a game, even though I’ll need to dig through another semester of programming – but that’s fine, at least I have some ground to stand on when we start fresh over the winter.

Case 10: This is the last case, by now you should have a more or less functioning game and it’s time to add the last bits and bolts to your product. The start menu is vital to any game – in a way like a manual explaining a user how to use your game, how to play it.

Reflection: It’s been three very tough months. I had no idea what a jungle Flash and ActionScript actually is when I first started out with this course, but now I’ve gotten some experience – and it is a nice treat to see and experience all the possibilities that can be had with the usage of Flash and ActionScript in simultation.

I don’t feel anywhere near fully educated in either Flash or ActionScript, but I do at least feel that I by now have a general grasp of both the language and how to animate (be it vector-graphic or pixel-graphic). This is a good feeling in itself. What makes this feeling even better is that I, with some help from a good course and good friends, have developed a platform game! It even works, and it is quite fun if I can say so myself.

Difficulties:

• Introducing more classes, that needs to communicate with the main-class
• Figuring out how buttons work, and how this can be included in running a function
• Cleaning the game after the player has died
• Restarting the game when the player retry

Solution:

Result: Here’s a link to a quick mock-up (in my world – that is usually how things end up looking) of how I want the start-menu to look and feel.

Also, the game is finally done! Click here to give it a go.