ACCELERATOR v0.1.1
(c) 2005 Philip Allison
http://sourceforge.net/projects/accelerator3d http://mangobrain.co.uk/
Released under the Artistic License - please read LICENSE
Originally created as an entry for the first PyWeek game programming contest. This package includes publically available font graphics, believed to have been placed in the public domain.
Requirements
Python, PyGame, PyOpenGL, and PyODE.
The Backstory
You take on the role of a test pilot in a top-secret research facility. Your mission: to be placed inside a prototype craft, miniaturised, and inserted directly into the ring of a gigantic cyclotron.
Why? To investigate first-hand the mysteries of Quantum Bogodynamics.
Sadly, a large number of men in black suits descended upon the facility on the day of the mission, with observation orders from "higher up". In a cruel twist of fate, the resulting surge in bogons caused things to go very badly awry. You made it inside the cyclotron physically intact, but with no radio contact to the outside world, your craft's engines leaking power, and just to top things off, you're now the size of an atom.
Your only hope is to steer a true course in your battered little craft for as long as possible, in the vain hope that eventually you will be rescued.
The Craft
During the game, a small amount of information about your craft's current status is available via a HUD.
Top left: your score.
Bottom left, blue and purple bars: power and shield meters, respectively.
Bottom left, small number: remaining lives.
Centre: crosshair (for.. umm.. aiming).
You fly the craft using the mouse. Simply point in the direction you want to go, in the style of any number of first-person games, and the craft will go there. Note that you do NOT have control over the craft's speed, or the ability to turn all the way around; this is intentional, the craft WILL get faster and faster until you die (or the game starts to malfunction, whichever comes first).
Left click to shoot; hold down the right button to recharge your shields (thereby reducing your power meter).
The craft has a certain amount of inertia to it, it won't just go where you want it to go. It's reminiscent of the ship from Asteroids, only in 3D; this is intentional.
The Particles
Bogons:
Known and feared as the elemetary particle of bogosity, these things
are conjectured to be the cause of all cockups in the known and unknown
Universe. Common bogon emitters include politicians, salesmen, bosses and the
like; common bogon absorbers include all highly delicate pieces of electronic
equipment.
Bogons are small and red, orbited by currently unidentified purple sub-particles, and to be avoided at all costs. Shooting a bogon decreases your score; colliding with a bogon decreases your craft's shield and power levels.
- Cluons
- The elementary particle of cluefulness; and the antiparticle to the bogon. Shooting a cluon increases your score, and replenishes your craft's power; colliding with a cluon also boosts power, but still damages shields. They are the same size and shape as bogons, but green.
Fat Electrons:
These things collect in the dusty recesses of all large electronic equipment,
and are best left there, because all they do is get in the way. Big and yellow,
indestructible, and collided with at your (instantaneous) peril.
- Phlogiston
- The "mythical" substance of which fire was, centuries ago, believed to have been composed. Strangely enough, the research facility at which you work has been an outspoken supporter of phlogiston theory since its death. Bullets - and your craft - will pass straight through this stuff, but it'll replenish some power on the way. Small, yellow, semi-transparent and sparkly.
Miscellaneous
You may also want to watch out for the walls of the cyclotron, which won't do your shields any good should you scrape them, and the countless short circuits brought on by the equipment malfunction that left you stranded here in the first place.