New SolarWolf, 1.5

[Pete Shinners]

There is a new version of SolarWolf available. SolarWolf is a frantic 2D
arcade game of collecting and dodging. It is written in Python and has
become a very good game.

This new version enhances the menu screens, more music, and adds user
preferences. Check out the downloads and screenshots from the main site. If
you haven't looked at this game in awhile now is the time to check it out.
It has become an entirely better game with recent releases.

http://www.pygame.org/shredwheat/solarwolf/

 

[Peter Strempel]

There is a new version of SolarWolf available.

First impression: "Wow"
Second impression: "This is all pure Python???"

I have been using Pygame for quite a while now for prototyping what would be
later done in C (excellent toolset, by the way), but didn't expect it's
possible to write a full blown game in pure Python with it. I have been
wrong. :*)

Keep up the good work!

Peter

 

[Pete Shinners]

First impression: "Wow"
Second impression: "This is all pure Python???"

Definitely all Python. Some of it "cleaner" than others. I've been working
on this for awhile now and I've learned a lot since I started. I've set it
up so the 'Binary Installers' still run from full source code.

When writing a game like this in Python, performance is always a concern.
SolarWolf ends up being very careful with the graphics with what is cleared,
drawn, and updated. When you get down to it, drawing all the graphics still
takes a large percentage of the runtime. It's still pretty easy to make a
Python game that runs too slow.

There's a few other great looking Python games that have gotten pretty mature.

Pydance, http://icculus.org/pyddr/
Pathological, http://pathological.sourceforge.net/

 

[Peter Strempel]

Definitely all Python.

I admit I already had looked at the sources to make sure.

I suppose a significant amount of the low-level graphics stuff happens
inside the SDL C libraries, which should help performance. But I guess I am
not the person to lecture you about Pygame architecture.

'Binary Installers'

I noticed the Linux binary installer bundles Python. This annoyed me two
days ago, but right yesterday I got complains from a user of one of my
projects which is linked to Python 2.3 (and expecting this on the endusers
box) who is running Fedora which still has Python 2.2. I think I see your
point. Deployment on Linux sucks...

When writing a game like this in Python, performance is always a concern.

SolarWolf runs okay on my old PII 333 MHz box with acceptable performance,
but it's pushing the limits. And I know this isn't what the average user has
at home. I guess with todays hardware even graphic intensive games using
scripting languages should become less of a problem, as SolarWolf
demonstrates. And there is still the option to do some stuff in C, I
personally am an adept fan of a Pyrex and a profiler.

There's a few other great looking Python games that have gotten pretty mature.

Pydance, http://icculus.org/pyddr/

Seen it, not my taste (that doesn't mean it's a bad game).

Pathological, http://pathological.sourceforge.net/

Addictive stuff, this lives on my harddisc since a couple of months already.

What I found interesting with SolarWolf is that it's the game written in a
scripting language which pushes graphics most among those programs I've seen
so far (including FrozenBubble, which is not Python but sort of the same
class). I'm not really a scripting zealot (right tool for the job, rather),
but it's pretty cool to see what actually is possible with Python, and
SolarWolf is a good demonstration concerning this point.

Another interesting Python & Games related project is Devils Whiskey, which
seems to make heavy use of Python as well. Vegastrike comes to my mind, too.


Peter

 

[Pete Shinners]

I suppose a significant amount of the low-level graphics stuff happens
inside the SDL C libraries, which should help performance. But I guess I am
not the person to lecture you about Pygame architecture.

You are correct here. All the graphics and sound routines happen inside SDL.
Pygame does offer the ability to map image pixel data inside Numeric arrays,
which does allow for more realtime graphics effects, like the classic
'flame', blurs, fades, etc.

Still, pygame itself is fairly low level when you get the game programming
parts. It is not a big framework or "canvas" type application. Your python
code must do all the work of managing and communicating game objects.

I noticed the Linux binary installer bundles Python. This annoyed me two
days ago, but right yesterday I got complains from a user of one of my
projects which is linked to Python 2.3 (and expecting this on the endusers
box) who is running Fedora which still has Python 2.2. I think I see your
point. Deployment on Linux sucks...

Hard to get around the Python in the packaging. If it's any consolation,
this is how all the .EXE versions of python programs work too. My main goal
of the linux binary was so it could run on computers at work, which are an
ancient Redhat release. Fortunately the included Python is very transparent,
so you only know it's there if you start digging in.