CGI IT Challenge 2014

A coding challenge for secondary school’s computer clubs

Club of sponsors

Ver 1.3

www.thecgi.net

Table of Contents

Contents

The Challenge ____________________________________________________________ 1

Timetables _______________________________________________________________ 2

How to enter _____________________________________________________________ 3

Judging and Prizes ________________________________________________________ 4

Getting Started ___________________________________________________________ 5

Contact Information ________________________________________________________ 9

Also included at end of this document

Planning Document

Programming Criteria Marks

Entry Form

This document also appears as a series of web pages at

http://www.thecgi.net/itchallenge

Club of Sponsors

Without the support of our sponsors this event would not be possible.

Pg. 01

The Challenge

The Challenge

A computer coding challenge for small teams of students to develop a 1980’s style 2D

arcade game to be coded, tested and demonstrated during the course of a ‘Code Fest’ day

as the culmination of the challenge. This is to be preceded by a period of time whilst

prototype game concepts and development methods are explored and digital resources

(sounds and graphics) are assembled. This will be conducted during computer club time

developing team working skills, programming skills and preparing documentation in

readiness for Code Fest day.

The game will be developed in Scratch v1.4 on Raspberry Pi.

On “Code Fest” day the teams will gather at a central venue with their Raspberry Pi’s.

Each team will ‘code out’ their game, utilising the skills, methods and resources that have

been developed in computer clubs to complete the game. The team will test the game,

complete documentation and then present their game for judging.

A short list of games will be selected for presentation on the stage and an overall winner

will be announced.

Further prizes will be awarded to teams in a number of categories including reflecting the

age of the team members.

Pizza will be eaten, ping-pong will be played and a pile of code will be written, tested and

new games will be played !

Alan Rowe

Confederation of Guernsey Industry

arowe@fusion-systems.com

Pg. 02

Timetables

Timetables

Competition Timetable

The competition will run over several phases

Early February : CGI IT Challenge launched

During February : Submit entries for validation

End of February : All entries validated

Feb – June : Design, develop proof of concepts, prototypes, build graphic objects and

sound clips, prepare documentation

JUNE 27 2014 – CODE FEST DAY

Venue : Lower Concourse Beau Sejour

Code Fest Day Timetable

Attend school as normal for registration, then join your teachers to gather IT equipment that

you will use.

9:30 Transport depart for Beau Sejour, followed by equipment set up

10:15 Briefing

10:30 Coding begins

12:15 : Lunch served – Pizza! (and other choices!)

1:00 – 2:45 Coding

2:45 – 3:45 Judging

4:00 - 4:30 Presentation of selected games

5:00 Presentation of prizes

Clear up and go home

Parents will be welcome to attend from 4:30 during presentation of games and prizes.

Pg. 03

How to enter

How to enter

Form a team

Teams should be comprised of 3 to 5 people which can be across year groups.

Develop a game concept

Decide on the concept of your team’s game, what genre of game, how it will play. See

Inspiration. Remember to include as many of the features that we will be looking for in the

judging – see Judging Criteria

Roles, responsibilities and tasks

Teams work best when every member has a clear idea of what they are expected to do for

their team. Roles and tasks can then be allocated to each team member. You need to

decide who will lead or act as spokesman for the team. Remember there are a number

jobs that need doing – the Planning Document provides some more illustration of this:

• Game Design

• Coding / Code snippets

• Digital Resource Pack - sounds and graphics

• Documentation

Submit the entry form to your Computer Club teachers

Complete an entry form for your team and submit it to your teacher for validation. The

Entry Form is the first part of the Planning Document and allows you to describe the

concept of your game and how you will set about developing it.

A teacher will review your entry to validate it against the guidelines to ensure that your

team has thought through your idea completely and that your goal can be achieved within

the constraints of the competition.

Pg. 04

Judging and Prizes

Judging and Prizes

Judging Criteria

Judging will be based on the following criteria

Technical Execution - 25%

Technical Difficulty – 25%

Refer to Appendix Programming Criteria Marks.

Game Play – 25%

Documentation – 15%

An assessment of completeness, accuracy and adequacy of documentation – Refer to the

Planning Guide.

Originality – 10%

Assessed from originality of concept and use of original resources including graphics /

sprites, sounds etc.

See Appendix detailing Programming Criteria Marks

Prizes

A further announcement will be made concerning prizes but they are likely to be awarded in

the following categories:

Best game in challenge

Runner Up

Best graphics

Best game play

Best young team

Best submitted code

Special Merit Awards – at the discretion of the judging panel

Pg. 05

Getting Started

Getting Started

Inspiration

The 1980s was the decade of the arcade game, all over the world teenagers could be

found in dark converted storerooms or old dance halls pumping ten pence after ten pence

into arcade machines. The first were fairly basic such as Pong and Pacman but soon came

the first playable incarnations of movies that we had seen such as Tron and Starwars. Boys

and girls all over the world were hooked. They became incredibly popular and spawned a

massive industry that today produces games for Xbox and Playstation such as FIFA and

Call of Duty.

These are a few of the biggest names from back then.

Star Wars - This game was released back in 1983 and was based around the original Star

Wars movie. You pilot Luke's X-wing fighter through several different levels. The game

featured some of the real character voices.

http://www.80stopgames.com/site/node/1820

Tron - This game was based on the Disney film by the same name and released back in

1982. In the film the developer gets sucked into the game. It featured 4 sub games

including: tanks, cycles, spiders and a "breakout" style wall. The cycles game is essentially

snakes where you need to avoid crossing the trail of another motorbike. In 2010, Tron

Legacy the sequel to the original movie was released.

http://www.classicgamesarcade.com/game/21670/tron-game.html

Donkey Kong – This is a platform game and a precursor to Mario and featured jumping

over gaps, obstacles or enemies whilst progressing up the structure accumulating points.

http://www.80stopgames.com/site/node/1285

Pac Man – a 2D maze game where the objective is to evade four enemies whilst eating all

the pellets and fruits (bonus scores) in the maze. Enemies could also be eaten briefly after

eating a power pellet.

http://web2.server7.devteam.dk/pacman/pacman_lang2.swf

Pg. 06

Getting Started

Frogger - A simple game where the frog is guided from the bottom of the screen to the top

across sections representing roads or rivers whilst avoiding hazards which move

horizontally across the screen in the river or road.

http://neave.com/games/frogger/frogger.swf

All these games and more are available to try and be inspired by at

http://www.80stopgames.com

http://www.liketotally80s.com/play-80s-arcade-games.html

Game Features

During the Code-fest day you will plan and design your game. It must include the following

features but this list is not exhaustive.

players can enter their name

a scoring system

multiple levels.

power ups

a score board

The game can be based on any theme but should be fun to play and easy to learn.

The evidence that you need to produce for this is:

an analysis of the problem with the inputs, processing and outputs required

an algorithm and success criteria for the program that meet the user requirements

This task is all about you showing your skill as a programmer. You may only use Scratch

1.4 to produce the solution and demonstrate your skills.

Code a solution to the game. Show the program code with comments to show your

understanding.

Evidence that you need to produce for this competition is:

a coded solution

the program code commented to show your understanding of the variables,

operators and program constructs used

a demonstration of the user interface showing how your program works

Pg. 07

Getting Started

Digital Resource Pack

It is expected that teams will create and assemble a pack of digital resources that they will

use in the final building of the game. This can include images for backgrounds, characters

or objects as well as sound effects that may be required.

It is imagined that teams will work on creating graphics or sounds themselves or collecting

them from freely available resources on the Internet.

Bring these along on Code Fest day to use when coding the game.

Code Fest Day

Remember this is a coding challenge and the teams that will perform well are those that

have practised and prepared for the event. They will have learned to cooperate well with

each other as a team, utilising each team member’s best skills. Think about this as the

coding Olympics, you wouldn’t enter the Olympic stadium for the final without training and

practice, so get practicing now!

Reflect on the Roles and Responsibilities so everyone knows what they are doing

on the day and what is expected of them.

Use your documentation and prepare a plan for the day – a process for how your

game will get written and assembled.

Think about allocating amounts of time for the various aspects of the process,

knowing who is doing what and when.

Have a strategy and contingencies E.g. Build a basic version of the game first that

functions and is demonstrable, then add successive extra features as time allows.

Manage your time, review progress against your plan at set times during the day

and make decisions accordingly.

Rules

All competitions must have rules and our rules are simple :

Games can be inspired by examples of existing games but should not be a direct

copy

Coding must be original work created by the team – no downloading existing

games!

Code snippets cannot be brought to Code Fest, all coding must be done on the

day. The challenge is to test coding skills. Coding may be prototyped during

computer clubs.

Pg. 08

Getting Started

Digital Resource Pack may be brought to Code Fest featuring graphic images and

sounds that will be used in the game.

Game must conform to 12 age rating.

Judges decisions are final.

Pg. 09

Contact Information

Contact Information

Computer Clubs & Teachers

Les Beaucamps High

Mr D Costen

Mr A Perkins

La Mare de Carteret

Mr J Cleal

St Sampson’s High

Mr P Beasley

Mr M Chesters

The Ladies College

Mr A Wade

Mr D Turner

Non participating schools

Send your entries or queries directly to Alan Rowe using the contact details below and we

will be in touch about progressing your entry.

CGI

Alan Rowe

arowe@fusion-systems.com

01481 721031

The Confederation of Guernsey Industry

www.thecgi.net

Tel 721555

Fax 701155

Email enquiry@thecgi.net

Website : www.thecgi.net

CGI IT Challenge 2014 : Coding Challenge – Planning Document

Team Name :

School :

Team Members:

Project Outline Give a brief idea of the game including a title

Project description

Give details of the type of game, levels, single, multi-player. You might include screen shots of games of a similar type.

Design Specification

Detail the inputs (etc keys used) and outputs (screen layouts, characters, music etc) This section is one of the most important and should contain details of every component of the game. It would be good to divide each part of project into parts detailing the components, inputs and outputs. You must give enough detail so that a third party could implement your design. It is at this stage that team members could be assigned individual tasks.

Implementation/Design

In this section break your design down into component parts, this will include the screen layouts, character designs, flow charts detail the game play. This last section will determine the routines and functions that will need to be programmed. These flow charts and diagrams should detail the logic. There is no need to do any scratch programming at this point.

Implementation

In this section you will need to start the scratch programming. Give listings of the routines and functions detailed above.

Testing

Each routine programmed must be tested. This includes giving example inputs and checking for expected outputs. For example you might use data that is “normal” at the top and bottom of an expected range as well as out of range data to make sure your programs work as specified.

CGI IT Challenge 2014 : Coding Challenge – Planning Document

Evaluation

In this section you must match the game as specified with the game as you produced. It is possible that during implementation you came up with ideas to improve the game. These should be detailed and re-specified as necessary. It is the purpose of the evaluation to check that for every part of the program it meets the design specification. Improvements should be detailed so that these can be implemented, tested and evaluated.

Documentation

The game must be fully documented using the guidance given here but also any user documentation that might be needed.

CGI IT Challenge 2014 – Programming Criteria Marks

The following are a list of instructions that could be present within a Scratch based program and how

they stand within a ladder of difficulty. Higher weighting should be given to those aspects in the harder

difficulty bands and how well those options are used in conjunction with lesser levels. Absolute basics

such as Hat blocks and Cap blocks have been ignored due to their necessity in running a script.

LEVEL 1 - EASY

Use of linear ‘do one thing’ blocks in a chain of events.

LEVEL 2

Broadcasting blocks to communicate between sprites when a condition is met in a linear fashion. Use

of simple ‘C’ blocks to repeat a function.

LEVEL 3 - MEDIUM

Basic use of variables, Boolean and reporter blocks

LEVEL 4

Use of IF functions, and options that require reporting between variables, lists, Boolean functions and

reporters

CGI IT Challenge 2014 – Programming Criteria Marks

LEVEL 5 - HARD

Use of random events in addition to variables, lists, Boolean function and reporters over several

sprites and within single script blocks.

CGI IT Challenge 2014 – Entry Form

Team Name

School

Team Members & School Year Student Name Year

Project Outline

Give a brief idea of the game including a title

Official Use

Validation by

Date

Validation Feedback

Planning Document Received Date

Planning Document Feedback