LIVE

(Project Status: Work in Progress)

The-Coolony-Game

[Initial Proposal] JavaScript Project (JSP) for App Academy by Kira Porter

The Coolony Game: Overview

In this ant-themed, idle clicker-esque game, the player assigns tasks for ants to do. Tasks include gathering resources, excavating tunnels, creating new ants, and sleeping to restore energy (which depletes over time as ants do tasks). Ants do tasks in cycles, adding to the player’s resource deposits at the end of each cycle. The player must assign a new task to each ant when its previous task has been completed, or it will sit idle.

Visually speaking, players can view the available resource deposits on the game board (grid). Clicking on a resource deposit allows the player to view which ants are currently making use of that resource deposit. To view which ants are idle (not currently on any resource deposit), the player can click a button to view a list of their idle ants. By viewing the resource desposits or idle list, players can (re)assign a task for each ant to work on.

Functionality & MVPs

In The Coolony Game, users will be able to:

• Designate resource-collection tasks for their ants to carry out
• Use gathered resources to upgrade resource deposits
• View a how-to page (modal, or section on the same page as game window)
• View how many resources have already been accumulated (fixed-position, toggleable overlay at top of game window)

In addition, this project might include:

• An option for the user to display their game stats in a simplified modal or page
• Achievements and/or 'special loot’ (which isn’t usable in the game in any way, but would essentially be a form of game achievement (acquired through random drop events during gameplay))

Mockup

A mockup I assembled while trying out Figma (screenshot below):

Link to Figma Project

Technologies, Libraries, APIs

This project will incorporate JavaScript unit testing (Jasmine), and CSS animations/parallax (in the 'how-to' section). The board may have a background graphic (SVG). Sass (SCSS) will be used for styling.

Ideally, I will also enable users to click and drag around the game board (JavaScript event listeners / HTML’s drag-and-drop API), and to drag and drop ants onto resource deposits.

Implementation Timeline

• FRI 8/13 Landing page, how-to, & game container (HTML div), override ‘onscroll’ event in game container, networking/social media links; Game (grid array)
• SAT 8/14 Game (ant instances, resource deposits, resource deposit modals)
• SUN 8/15 Game (task cycles / time-based accumulation of resources, toggleable collected resources overlay)
• MON 8/16 Game (Ant energy/appetite decay, new ant creation, display idle ants list, display stats modal)
• TUE 8/17 Game (drag-and-drop functionality to assign ants to tasks, stats modal)
• WED 8/18 Better graphics, write ‘how-to’, CSS animations/parallax (custom scrollbar); Game (new tunnel excavation / resource deposit discovery)
• THU 8/19 Deploy (GitHub Pages)

Summary

Now that the project is finished (although I intend to continue doing some work on it), I've written a summary about it, available at the project's Wiki, which also has a copy of my actual implementation timeline for the project.