Pac-Ball (Released)

Java on Mobile Devices Android
#1

Finally finished my side project Pac-Ball. A tilt device game styled off of pacman. Collect all the white dots as fast as you can while avoiding the android bots.

Right now there are 28 stages in the Lite version 26 of which you have to unlock by earning Android Points. Destroy any of the android enemies to receive an Android Point.

The Full version right now has 28 stages unlocked and is Ad Free.

There are Global and Local high scores, three game modes Classic, Survival, and Gate. In Classic there are three difficulties. In Survival you try to stay alive for 45 seconds with the game on the Hard difficulty. Gate mode has you going through the map lighting up all the gates to win.

http://corvstudios.com/includes/Images/GBall_01.png

http://corvstudios.com/includes/Images/GBall_02.png

I just bought a G1 from one of my friends, and the game is playable on that phone. So it should work on any phone, runs the best on the higher end phones. If you see any issues tell me on here :slight_smile:

#2

Runs on the Samsung Galaxy but judging from the logs, it’s using the software renderer which explains the quite bad performance. If you want hardware acceleration on the Galaxy, you have to explicitly request a 16bit video mode like so:


                mGLView = new GLSurfaceView(getApplication());

		mGLView.setEGLConfigChooser(new GLSurfaceView.EGLConfigChooser() {
			public EGLConfig chooseConfig(EGL10 egl, EGLDisplay display) {
				// Ensure that we get a 16bit framebuffer. Otherwise, we'll fall
				// back to Pixelflinger on some device (read: Samsung I7500)
				int[] attributes = new int[] { EGL10.EGL_DEPTH_SIZE, 16, EGL10.EGL_NONE };
				EGLConfig[] configs = new EGLConfig[1];
				int[] result = new int[1];
				egl.eglChooseConfig(display, attributes, configs, 1, result);
				return configs[0];
			}
		});
#3

Okay, I added the code. Does this affect other phones, so should I check for which type so as not to affect others? I tested it on the G1 and Droid and it runs the same so I’m assuming not.

Thanks for testing, I guess I’ll update the game as soon as I add in at least one more noticeable change to the game. Most likely a level for full version.

#4

It should do no harm. I’m using it in my jPCT-AE demo too and it runs fine on G1, Galaxy, Droid, Nexus One, Spica…

#5

Can anyone confirm a Nexus One issue with the game, “a black band in the middle of the screen”?

#6

Looks and runs great on my Droid. I’m not a big fan of tilt controls, but this is a very nice implementation.

The free version has a 4-star rating as of this writing, so people must like it. Good luck with it and keep us updated on its performance.

#7

Hey Corv, I gave it a shot on my HTC Hero , 1.5 .
It runs fine, but definetly not on the speed it should, I compared the in game clock with a real clock, it runs 83% slower .
One thing you could make to speed things up is to either join adjacent bricks in one single image, or even to draw all fixed bricks in one transparent image, and then just draw this single image every frame, instead of drawing all single bricks every frame (Assuming that’s the way you are doing it) .
I also think the maximum velocity is a bit high, it would be easier to control if you set a lower maximum speep .
And I don’t quit understand why I start on level 2, finish it then go to level 1 … ?
You said there’s an online highscore, but I couldn’t see it, at least not on the lite version .

Well, other than that, Congratulations for the release !
It’s a fun game, though a little difficult to me :slight_smile:

#8

Issue: I just got an e-mail from someone with a HTC Desire, which is a 480x800 WVGA screen. Its the same as the Nexus One, and has the same black band issue. If anyone has those phones, I would love to hear how it looks on your phone. I have no idea what the problem is, EgonOlsen do yo think it has to do with the 16 bit request not happening?

@Polyclef - Thanks, I’m glad you liked it. It definitely works nice on the Droid. I’ll put my numbers up once I put out the next update.

@teletubo - I’ll look into those methods for speeding it up. On the smaller resolution phones it definitely seems a bit fast. I tried scaling the map at run time so it can look the same as the screenshots, but it would just run slower due to the scaling of all the images. I was thinking of putting in all raw images resized which would make a bigger file size, but that would still mean it would have to draw even more images if I don’t use one of your methods. I’ll keep trying different things.

Oh, it picks a random stage every time you play, so since the Lite version only has 2 levels (3 if you get gold on first 2) it appears to go backwards. To view the highscores you have to submit a score then you can see the highscores for that game type. I have a stage select and a highscore viewer on my todo list next.

Thanks for all the testing guys.

Edit: For added difficulty the only 480x800 WVGA screens in the US are the Nexus One, and the Droid Incredible which is unreleased. And Nexus Ones aren’t at carrier stores to try out…

#9

No problems on my phone (HTC Magic OS 1.5). Had a little bit of lag (almost unnoticeable), but maybe I haven’t played it enough yet.

Neat little game. Congrats.

What do you use for the online high scores?

#10

Good to hear, and thank you. I just send it to my website, and it handles the storing. I haven’t set anything up yet to view the scores on a website yet.

Everyone be sure to rate it. Not many people rate it out of the thousands that have downloaded it.

#11

Ok, the Post-It route. I’ve been wanting to do the same, but I’m put off by the problem of dealing with Internet F******s (and one just have to look into the comments for any application realize that the Android platform has a lot of those around). I wouldn’t trust an auto-censor function to keep those kind of idiots in check, and I don’t much feel like having to moderate that stuff manually.

I recently got access to the Scoreloop Android SDK (its in beta), and started experimenting with it. I’m hoping that it will prove satisfactory to adopt as a service for this kind of stuff.