Submission to SwampHacks VII (2021).
Created by Gabriel Sotelo and Luigi Cabrera.
Check out our Demo Video here
Visit our DevPost Submission here
The quarantine decreed due to COVID-19 these last months has shown that entertainment is a vital component part of the human being. That includes, of course, virtual entertainment; however, its potential is sometimes underestimated and even disparaged. When our team committed to attending to SwampHacks, we knew we wanted to create and provide entertainment, making use of our fresh and rather novice knowledge with the use of PyGame. Defend the Swamp was inspired by a classic video game you would find in a Home Arcade Room, a game that brings up many joyful memories to my team, and likely you too! However, Defend the Swamp has its unique and original touch, it is heavily influenced by the culture of the University of Florida, featuring Albert Gator and his swamp!
Defend the Swamp is a single-player fighting 2D video game. Help Albert Gator defend his swamp by defeating the evil skeletal invaders. The game will progressively increase its difficulty as larger waves of enemies are summoned over time, so you will have to keep the rhythm. An integrated database is included in the program which allows the user to keep track of the global records, as well as setting own records too. This is performed through a highest-scores mechanism connected with the local database, which will allow the user to input their name after making a new high score, and visualize it on a leaderboard thereafter (yes! Just like an arcade machine!).
Defend the Swamp_ was built making use of the Python programming language and the cross-platform set of module PyGame. Additionally, digital designs and animations were elaborated using PhotoShop and other web-available tools and sources.
Coding is always a challenge itself, with its own problems and dilemmas along the way. However, we enjoy those challenges. However, it is worth mentioning that we felt particularly annoying the process of making the digital drawings in order to elaborate visual animations in our game. We are not graphic designers, but that didn't stop us from doing our best to create smooth and appealing animations. Nonetheless, we reckon that part was a time-demanding and tedious process.
We are proud of having just written the biggest project in our short experience as Computer Science students. We feel incredibly happy because we realized that what we have done is a game that can be actually played and enjoyed by everyone, just like popular arcade games were back then and impacted this and the past generation.
In the technical sack, we have gained more confidence and fluency in working with Python and PyGame; furthermore, we have learned a lot about graphic design and visual animations. On the other hand, we have strengthened our teamwork and time-management skills, along with our perseverance and ability to work under a time-pressure.
There is a lot of room for improvement for Defend the Swamp, and there is a solid base over which we can build an even more complex and engaging game. Stay tuned! ;D