Big Task Help!

[Fredy1025]

I have been given the task of creating a frog leap game that starts at 1 and finishes at 12. The layout is as follows. The '@' symbols are just included to show blank white space.

1-----2 @@ 3---4
|@@ |@@@ |
|@@ |@@@ |
5@@ 6------7-----8
|@@ @@@ |@@ |
|@@ @@@ |@@ |
9----10 @ 11 @12

Each number within the game will represent an object, the user will have to reach the 12th leaf start from leaf 1. the frog can only move in the directions of forwards backwards, left and right. Does anyone have any starting points? eg using and array or list? i have a feeling this is going to be a big task. is inheritance possible?

[Z e r e o]

The best advice I could give is don't do this on the console if that is what you're planning on doing (Which from what you provided seems to be the case). To put in plainly the console is an absolutely horrible medium for games, which by this I don't mean to "knock" console programs or anything. It is just that since the console was never meant to be a platform for games you're going to spend a hell of a lot of time trying to "hack" your way though things by trying to make the console do stuff it just isn't meant to do.

So what should you do instead? Well my advice would be pick up a simple 2D graphics library and start working with that. I do admit they can look quite complicated at first but trust me if you put some time into learning how to link libraries (If you don't know how already) and learn the basics of simple 2D game development (Which in all honesty isn't all that hard) you will find it a much more pleasurable experience then working with the console.

Plus to top it off you can do a lot more neat things! Want your leaves to move back and forth to add some more difficulty to the game? Well that would be absolute hell to implement on the console, but with a 2D library it quite easy! All you need to do is add in the notion of time (Plenty of tutorials out there like http://gafferongames.com/game-physics/fix-your-timestep/ ) and implement some simple sprite movement and you are done!

Then there is also obvious things like if you want fancy looking graphics? Well you can't get those on the console sadly. Or heck even if you do like the console look and feel for the game, you can still implement it in a 2D graphics library to make it emulate the console much easier then the console itself plus with some added features you might want. Not to mention that learning a graphics library will help you a lot more later on then learning how to hack together a game on the console (Which is only used for debug output in the development process if at all in game development).

So in my mind there is many pros to using a 2D graphics library and just a bunch of hurdles in using the console. But then again this is just my advice and isn't something that is set in stone ;p

If you're looking for a good 2D library to use I would highly recommend either SFML or SDL, whichever suits your style more. You don't need anything robust like Cocos2d-x when you are just starting out. The simpler the better since it still gives you all the tools you will need with less clutter to distract you.

Anyways best of luck to your with you game. If you have any more question I am sure others or myself would be glad to help answer your questions.