Description
1. Introduction
The purpose of this assignment is to help you gain experience with interactive graphics
and animation techniques such as repainting, timer-driven animation, collision detection, and
object selection. Specifically, you are to make the following modifications to your game:
(1) the program is to make use of the proxy and factory method design patterns,
(2) the game world map is to display in the GUI, rather than in text form on the console,
(3) the movement (animation) of game objects is to be driven by a timer,
(4) the game is to support dynamic collision detection and response,
(5) the game is to support simple interactive editing of some of the objects in the world, and
(6) the game is to include sounds appropriate to collisions and other events.
2. Proxy Design Pattern
To prevent Views from being able to modify the GameWorld object received by their
update() methods, the model (GameWorld) should pass a GameWorld proxy to the views;
this proxy should allow each view to obtain all the required data from the model while
prohibiting any attempt by the view to change the model. The simplest way to do this is to
define an interface IGameWorld listing all the methods provided by a GameWorld, and to
provide a new class GameWorldProxy which implements this same interface. The
GameWorld model then constructs and passes to each observer’s update() method a
GameWorldProxy object instead of the actual GameWorld object. See the course notes and
the attachment at the end of Assignment #2 for additional details.
Recall that there are two approaches which could have been used to implement the
Observable pattern: defining your own Observable interface, or extending the Java
Observable class. If you chose to use Java’s “Observable” class (e.g. declaring that your
GameWorld class extends java.util.Observable instead of implementing your own
Observable interface as discussed in class), you may find it is more complicated to deal with
the proxy requirement: you will have to override not only the Java notifyObservers()
method so that you can pass a proxy, but also the addObserver() method so that you can
keep track of what observers to call back with a proxy. This means it may almost be less work
to change your program to use an Observable interface.
3. Factory Method Design Pattern
If you implemented A2 correctly, all game object creation takes place in a method named
initLayout(). Currently this method most likely makes direct calls to the constructors for
each type of object to be added to the game world, which as discussed in class and in the
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Lecture Notes tends to lead to code which is difficult to maintain and modify. For this
assignment you are to replace each direct call to a game object constructor with a call instead
to a factory method which returns an object of the corresponding type. For example, your
program should now contain methods such as makePylon(), makeCar(), etc.; these methods
should be invoked by initLayout() to obtain new game world objects.
4. Game World Map
If you did assignment #2 properly, your program included an instance of a MapView
class which is an observer that displayed the game elements on the console. MapView also
extended JPanel and that panel was placed in the middle of the game frame, although it was
empty.
For this assignment, you are to change MapView so that it displays the contents of the
game graphically in the JPanel in the middle of the game screen. When the MapView
update() is invoked, it should now call repaint() on itself. As described in the course
notes, MapView should also implement (override) paintComponent(), which will therefore
be invoked as a result of calling repaint(). It is then the duty of MapView’s
paintComponent() to iterate through the GameWorld objects (via an iterator, as before)
invoking draw(Graphics g) in each GameWorld object – thus redrawing all the objects in
the world in the panel.
Note that paintComponent() must have access to the GameWorld (or more
correctly, to a GameWorldProxy). This means that a reference to the GameWorldProxy
must be saved when MapView is constructed, or alternatively the update() method must
receive and save it prior to calling repaint(). Note that the modified MapView class
communicates with the rest of the program exactly as it did previously (e.g. it is an observer of
its observable; it gets invoked via a call to its update() method as before; etc.).
Each game object has its own different graphical representation (shape). Pylons are
filled circles; oil slicks are filled ovals; fuel cans are filled squares; the player’s car is a filled
rectangle while non-player cars are unfilled rectangles; and birds are unfilled circles. Note that
the attributes associated with each concrete game object can be used to specify the drawing
characteristics of the object (for example, cars have a length and a width which can be used to
draw the corresponding rectangle). Pylons should include a text String showing their number;
fuel cans should include text showing their fuel quantity (size). (You may choose to also use
the size attribute of a fuel can to determine the actual drawing size, but the game might look
better if fuel cans were all the same size and used the text String to show quantity.) Use the
Graphics method drawString() to draw the text on pylons and fuel cans.
The appropriate place to put the responsibility for drawing each shape is within each
type of game object (that is, to use a polymorphic drawing capability). The program should
define a new interface named (for example) IDrawable specifying a method
draw(Graphics g). Each game object should then implement the IDrawable interface
with code that knows how to draw that particular object using the received “Graphics” object
(this then replaces the toString() polymorphic operation from the previous assignment.)
Each object’s draw() method draws the object in its current color, at its current
location. Recall that the location of each object is the location of the center of that object (this
is for compatibility with things we will do later). Each draw() method must take this definition
into account when drawing an object. For example, the drawRect() method of the
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Graphics class expects to be given the X,Y coordinates of the upper left corner of the
rectangle to be drawn, so a draw() method for a rectangular object would need to use the
location, width, and height attributes of the object to determine where to draw the rectangle so
its center coincides with its location. For example, the X coordinate of the upper left corner of a
rectangle is (center.x – width/2). Similar adjustments apply to drawing circles.
5. Animation Control
The program is to include a timer to drive the animation (movement of movable
objects). Each event generated by the timer should be caught by an actionPerformed()
method. actionPerformed()can then in turn invoke the “Tick” command from the previous
assignment, causing all moveable objects to move. This replaces the “Tick” button, which is no
longer needed and should be eliminated.
There are some changes in the way the Tick command works for this assignment. In
order for the animation to look smooth, the timer itself will have to tick (generate
ActionEvents) at a fairly fast rate (about every 20 milliseconds or so). In order for each
object to know how far it should move, each timer tick should pass an “elapsed msec” value to
the move() method of each movable object. The move() method should use this elapsed
time value when it computes a new location. For simplicity, you can simply pass the value of
the timer event rate (e.g., 20 msec), rather than computing a true elapsed time. However, it is
a requirement that each move() computes movement based on the value of the
elapsedTime parameter passed in, not by assuming a hard-coded time value within the
move() method itself. You should experiment to determine appropriate movement values.
Another change has to do with the way the time value in your ScoreView JPanel is
computed: it must take into account that it is being called at a much higher rate, so it must
keep track of how many calls have been made and only decrement the on-screen counter
when enough calls to equal one second of elapsed time have been made.
6. Collision Detection and Response
There is another important thing that needs to happen each time the timer ticks. In
addition to invoking move() for all movable objects, your code must tell the game world to
determine if there are any collisions between objects, and if so to perform the appropriate
“collision response”. The appropriate way to handle collision detection/response is to have
each kind of object which can be involved in collisions implement a new interface like
“ICollider” as discussed in class and described in the course notes. That way, colliding
objects can be treated polymorphically.
In the previous assignment, collisions were caused by pressing one of the “collision
buttons” (“Collide With NPC” for example), and the objects involved in the collision were
chosen arbitrarily. Now, the type of collision will be detected automatically during collision
detection, so those buttons are no longer needed and should be removed. Collision detection
will require objects to check to see if they have collided with other objects, so the actual
collisions will no longer be arbitrary, but will correspond to actual collisions in the game world.
Collision response (that is, the specific action taken by an object when it collides with
another object) will be similar in most cases to previous assignments (when the player’s car
collides with a fuel can, for example, the car’s fuel level is increased, the fuel can is removed
from the game, and another fuel can is added to the world). One additional constraint on
collisions is that when the player’s car collides with an NPC, there is a 20% probability that this
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will cause an engine leak and create a new oil slick. Your player/NPC collision code should
generate a random number and use it to determine whether a new oil slick is to be generated.
If so, position the new oil slick at the location of the player’s car at the time of the collision (as
opposed to a random location as in previous assignments). Some collisions also generate a
sound (see below). There are more hints regarding collision detection in the notes below.
7. Sound
You may add as many sounds into your game as you wish. However, you must
implement particular, clearly different sounds for at least the following situations:
(1) when the player’s car collides with an NPC (such as a crunching sound),
(2) when the player’s car collides with a fuel can (such as a slurping sound),
(3) any collision which results in the player losing a life (such as an explosion or dying
sound),
(4) some sort of appropriate background sound that loops continuously during animation.
Sounds should only be played if the “SOUND” attribute is “ON”. Note that except for the
“background” sound, sounds are played as a result of executing a “collision command”. This
means that the collision command objects will need access to the “Sound attribute” contained
in the GameWorld. This in turn means that these command objects must be given the
GameWorld as a “target” (refer to the Course Notes section on the Command Design Pattern).
You may use any sounds you like in your program, as long as we can show the game to
the Dean and your mother (in other words, as long as the sounds are not disgusting or
obscene). Short, unique sounds tend to improve game playability by avoiding too much
confusing sound overlap. Do not use copyrighted sounds.
8. Object Selection and Game Modes
In order to gain experience with selection, we are going to add an additional capability to
the game. The game is to have two modes: “play” and “pause”. The normal game play with
animation as implemented above is “play” mode. In “pause” mode, animation stops – the game
objects don’t move, the clock stops, and the background looped sound also stops. Also, when
in pause mode, the user can use the mouse to select some of the game objects.
Ability to select the game mode should be implemented via a new GUI command button
that switches between “play” and “pause” modes. When the game first starts it should be in play
mode, with the mode control button displaying the label “Pause” (indicating that pushing the
button switches to pause mode). Pressing the Pause button switches the game to pause mode
and changes the label on the button to “Play”, indicating that pressing the button again resumes
play and puts the game back into play mode (also restarting the background sound if sound is
enabled).
– Object Selection
When in pause mode, the game must support the ability to interactively select objects.
The appropriate mechanism for identifying “selectable” objects is to have those objects
implement an interface such as ISelectable which specifies the methods required to
implement selection, as discussed in class and described in the Course Notes. Selecting an
object (or group of objects) allows the user to perform certain actions on the selected object(s).
Each selected object must be highlighted in some way (you may choose the form of
highlighting, as long as there is some visible change to the appearance of each selected
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object). Selection is only allowed in pause mode, and switching to play mode automatically
“unselects” all objects. For this assignment, only Fuel Cans and Pylons are selectable.
An individual object is selected by clicking on it with the mouse. Clicking on an object
normally selects that object and “unselects” all other objects. You must also implement one of
the following: either, (a) clicking on several objects in succession with the control (CTRL) key
down causes each of the clicked objects to become “selected” (as long as they are
“selectable”), or (b) rubber-band selection (all the objects in a rubber-band rectangle become
selected while all other objects become unselected). Regardless of which you choose, clicking
in a location where there are no objects should cause all objects to become unselected.
– New Commands
The game is to support three new commands in Pause mode. The first new command
is “Delete”, which removes all currently selected objects from the game world. The Delete
command should be bound to a new GUI button (see the picture at the end) and also to the
Delete (DEL) key using a Java KeyBinding. The Delete action should only be available while
in pause mode, and should have no effect on unselected items.
The additional two new commands are “Add Pylon” and “Add Fuel Can”. These
commands should be bound to new GUI buttons, and should add instances of the respective
object to the world. The location of the added object is determined by clicking the mouse on
the map view after having invoked the command. When the mouse is clicked the program
should prompt (using a JOptionPane) for an input number; for adding a Fuel Can the number
becomes the capacity (size) of the fuel can; for Pylons it becomes the sequence number of the
new pylon.
Note that the combination of the three new commands gives the user the ability to
create an arbitrary racetrack configuration; the game is no longer constrained to use the hardcoded initial layout. (The program could also be extended to support ability to add additional
Non-Player Cars, but this is not a requirement.) Note also that with the addition of the factory
method pattern for creating pylons and fuel cans, the program can easily be extended to
support dynamic creation of new, more complex types of track objects.
– Command Enabling/Disabling
Commands should be enabled only when their functionality is appropriate. For example,
the Delete command should be disabled while in play mode; likewise, commands that involve
playing the game (e.g. changing the player’s car direction) should be disabled while in pause
mode. Note that disabling a command should disable it for all invokers (buttons, keystrokes,
and menu items). Note also that a disabled button or menu item should still be visible; it just
cannot be active (enabled). This is indicated by changing the appearance of the button or menu
item.
The Command design pattern supports enabling/disabling of commands. That is,
enabling/disabling a command, if implemented correctly, enables/disables the GUI components
which invoke it. If you used the Java “Abstract Action” implementation of the Command
pattern, your commands already support this: calling setEnabled(false) on an Action
attached to a button and a menu item automatically “greys-out” both the button and menu item.
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9. Additional Notes
Requirements in previous assignments related to organization and style apply to this
assignment as well. Except for those functions that have been explicitly superseded by new
operations in this assignment, all functions must work as before.
Now that you have successfully implemented the Strategy pattern (in A2), you should
eliminate the “Switch Strategy” GUI button. Instead, you should add code to Non-Player
Cars to cause them to switch to a different strategy automatically every, say, 10 seconds.
This can be done by having the NPC’s move() method keep track of how many times it has
been called, executing the switch when 10 seconds have elapsed.
The draw() method in an object is responsible for checking whether the object is
currently “selected”. If unselected, the object is drawn normally; if selected, the object is
drawn in “highlighted” form. A simple method of doing “highlighting” is to draw the object in
“reverse video color” by fetching each of the RGB components of the object’s color,
subtracting each of those from 255, and using the resulting values as the highlighted RGB
drawing values. You are welcome to use a fancier highlighting scheme if you wish.
You may if you want use the Graphics method drawImage() to render your game
objects. This is not a requirement (but it will make your game look LOTS more interesting).
Note that if you do this, you still must have some way of distinguishing selected from
unselected objects. A common technique for this is to simply have TWO images for each
object – one the “unselected” version and a second which is the “selected” version. As with
sounds, you may use any images you want as long as we can show the game to the Dean
and your mother (except that you may not use copyrighted images).
As before, the origin of the “game world” is considered to be in the lower left. However,
since the Y coordinate of a JPanel grows downward, “up” (north) in your game will be
“down” on the screen (that is, a car that is moving north (heading = 0) moves down the
screen). The game will therefore be “upside down”. Leave it like this – we will fix it in A4.
The simple shape representations for game objects will produce some slightly weird visual
effects in the map view. For example, rectangles will always be aligned with the X/Y axes
even if the object being represented is moving at an angle relative to the axes. This is
acceptable for now; we will see how to fix it in a subsequent assignment.
You may adjust the size of game objects for playability if you wish; just don’t make them so
large (or small) that the game becomes unwieldy.
You may add additional features to your game as long as they do not conflict with the
specifications. For example, fuel cans could have an “expiration date” after which they start
to leak and eventually disappear. Another example would be to add more complex
strategies to NPCs (as long as they are implemented using the Strategy pattern). All such
enhancements are optional, and you shouldn’t spend time on them until you have the basic
program working – but such things can produce a more playable game if you have the time
to work on them.
MouseEvents contain a method isControlDown() which returns a boolean indicating
whether the CTRL key was down when the mouse event occurred. See the MouseEvent
class in the Java API JavaDoc for further information.
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You may “hard code” knowledge of frame and panel sizes into your program. Hard-coding
such sizes make determining things like location boundaries easier to accomplish, although
it makes the program a bit less flexible in the long run.
Your sound files must be included in your SacCT submission. File names in programs
should always be referenced in relative-path and platform-independent form. DO NOT hard
code some path like “C:\MyFiles\A3\sounds” in your program; this path will not exist on
the machine used for grading. A good way to organize your sounds is to put them all in a
single directory named “sounds” in the same directory as your a3 package folder (not
inside the “a3” folder; at the same level as the “a3” folder), and reference them using
“relative path” notation, starting with “.” Also, each “slash” in the file name path should be
independent of whether the program is running under Windows, Linux, or MacOS (so don’t
put a hard-coded “\” or “/” in your file names; instead, use the Java constant
“File.separator”). Thus, to specify a file “crash.wav” in a directory “sounds”
immediately below the current directory, use:
String slash = File.separator ; // predefined Java constant
String crashFileName = “.” + slash + “sounds” + slash + “crash.wav” ;
Because the sound can be turned on and off by the user (using the menu), and also turns
on/off automatically with the pause/play button, you will need to test the various
combinations. For example, pressing pause, then turning off sound, then pressing play,
should result in the sound not coming back on. There are several sequences to test.
Another problem you will need to solve is that when two objects collide, the collision may
be detected repeatedly as one object passes through the other. This is complicated by the
fact that more than two objects can collide simultaneously. One straight-forward way of
solving this is to have each collidable object keep a list of the objects that it is colliding with.
An object can then skip the collision handling for objects it is already colliding with. Of
course, you’ll have to remove objects from that list when they are no longer colliding.
Another problem that can occur with collision handling is that nested iterators will throw
exceptions if you attempt to remove an object from the collection while the iterator is active
(this generates a “concurrent modification exception” error). To solve this, *mark* each
object which needs removal (or add it to a list), and then after all collisions have been
handled, then go back and remove them.
You should tweak the parameters of your program for playability after you get the animation
working. Things that impact playability include the screen size, object sizes and speeds,
moving speed of objects, collision distance, etc. Your game is expected to operate in a
reasonably-playable manner.
As before, you may not use a “GUI Builder” for this assignment.
As before, your code must be contained in a package (folder) named (in this case) “a3”,
and it must be runnable with the command “java a3.Starter”.
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Deliverables
Submitting your program requires similar steps as for A1/A2:
(1) create a single ZIP file containing your source code (.java) files, your compiled code
(.class) files in package (folder) “a3”, and your sound files contained in a folder named
“sounds” which in turn is contained in the same folder as the one containing the “a3”
package folder;
(2) verify your submission by unzipping your ZIP file to an empty folder and executing the
program using the command java a3.Starter ; and then
(3) upload your ZIP file to SacCT. It is not a requirement to submit a UML diagram this
time.
Note that it is important to include your sound files in the proper folder in your zip file, and
that step (2) – verifying your submission – is especially critical for this assignment since it will
verify that you have your sound files properly placed. Failure to test (verify) your zip file will
incur a substantial penalty.
Also include in your ZIP a text file called “readme” in which you describe any changes or
additions you made to the assignment specifications (for instance, if you bind any additional
keys or add extra buttons, explain those in your readme file). Also include a description of any
additional strategies or other enhancements in your readme file.
Be sure to keep a backup copy of all submitted work. All submitted work must be strictly
your own.
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Appendix 1: Sample GUI
The following shows an example of how a completed A3 game might look. It has a control
panel on the left with the required command buttons (including several disabled buttons since
the game here is in “Play” mode as indicated by the fact that the Pause/Play button shows
“Pause”). It also has “File” and “Commands” menus, a score view panel showing the current
game state (as in A2), and a new map view panel in the middle containing four orange labeled
pylons (filled circles), three blue labeled fuel cans (filled squares), one player car (filled red
rectangle) and three non-player cars (unfilled red rectangles), two oil slicks (black ovals), and
two birds (unfilled circles).
Although you can’t tell from the static image, the left bird is moving south (toward the top
of the screen and the player’s car), while the right bird is moving north-west (toward the lower
left of the upside-down view). The cars are moving in various directions, but again with
respect to north being at the bottom of the screen. We will fix the upside-down orientation in
Assignment 4.
JC/PM:jc
3/21/15