Activities/Blocku: Difference between revisions

==Game Suggestions==

  I think it's great.  Three points:

  1)  Users probably don't want to play many games of the same operation

  (e.g. x+y=10), and the teacher probably doesn't want to create a new game

  operations (e.g. numbers up to 12, + - and *) and have the game select a

  random operation from the set for each game.

  2)  There are some interesting possibilities for using network collab

  between users and teachers, but work on that last.  To start, users should

  launches.  Teachers can just tell the students what settings to use, and

  then look at the screens to verify.

  3)  The visual structure of the game seems almost identical to Gnome's

  Tetravex.  In the spirit of Open Source, you should consider reusing the

  Tetravex gameboard display code.

  --Ben

  Looks great Mark!  Feel free to get in touch with me if you need any

  help with implementation.

  I agree with Greg that this would be a good target for PyGame.

  Regarding the game design, you should consider adding some sense of

  progress, or else players will get tired quickly. Some ideas:

  - Start with two cards, gradually ramp up to 9.

  - There needs to be a good "snapping" mechanism when dropping, so

  users don't get frustrated by trying to line the cards up.

  - Adding the ability to rotate the cards in 90 degree increments would

  add to the challenge.

  - Your notion of customization seems limited to replacing the square

  with a graphic, which might obscure the number.  Is this really a good

  way to customize it?

  - I agree with Ben that when you start the game you should first

  select which types of puzzles (* + - / etc) you want, how many

  squares, whether rotation is allowed.  No need for the teacher to be

  involved.

  - Why limit it to numbers?  E.g. how about comparisons like "X is

  heaver than Y" and on the sides of the cards are things like

  that relationship.  This would be called a "set", and could be

  exported to the Journal.

  Good luck with your project!

  Very clever.  I just cut made a cut out of the game out of paper.  My

  1st grade niece played with it for over half an hour.  It will be a

  hit on her XO.

  david

  Mark, this looks like a brilliant little activity.  Simple, fun gameplay, extensible.  Really great.

  Some thoughts:

  1. I'd love to see this as primarily a PyGame activity, with just enough "Sugar" to run it on Sugar  

  easily, but also easily available as a Windows or Mac activity.  If done well, this is precisely  

  the sort of activity that could cross over.  (Which is, in fact, how I'd like to see most Sugar  

  games built.)

  2. Always think a little bit (but not too much) about assessment.  The student knows they're  

  getting better because they are "leveling up".  The teacher knows the kid is getting better  

  attention to this  question, but it would be great if there were a simple way to allow teachers to  

  aggregate "high score" data, which really doubles as assessment data in cases like this.

  A great start.  I look forward to seeing what it becomes.

  --g

==Comments==