Reborn America, this is my time

Chapter 91 I Like Whoring For Free
When "Pac-Man" involves AI technology, what should this game do?
Ethan didn't know.

But when Evelyn pulled him into the garage of her new home, which is the girl's new base, the girl who spread out the design drawings on the production table already had an idea, "Ethan, levels, scores, models, rewards, these things we All of them can be produced slowly, but these four ghosts with wisdom must be considered first, because I think that without them, the whole game will have no soul."

Ethan agrees with this view.

As he nodded in agreement, Evelyn smiled again and said, "Then let's start with the production of ghosts first? The first question, I want to know, in your inspiration, how many things do these four ghosts have in common?" mode?"

"Because when the common pattern is determined, the code related to this section can be copied directly."

Ethan felt that he understood, but he didn't fully understand.

The so-called understand, refers to the copy.

No way, who told him that in his previous life, there were too many stalks about programmers copying code?

As for not understanding...

"Oh Evelyn, I was wondering what you mean by a common pattern?"

Ethan asked in disbelief.

"Common pattern? This actually refers to the behavior of ghosts in your design. Is there anything in common?"

Since Ethan didn't understand, Evelyn patiently explained, "For example, four ghosts chasing players, this is actually a common mode, but in our case, the term common mode is not applicable, because you give four ghosts Ghosts set different characteristics."

"The characteristic you set for the red ghost is direct pursuit, so when writing the code, its characteristic is to calculate the shortest distance between itself and the player in real time, and then move forward along this road."

"The characteristic you set for the pink ghost is to ambush the player, so when writing the code, its calculation method is to calculate the player's position in real time, and then determine some pixel points forward according to the player's orientation, and then put this void, the player The possible advancing target becomes the destination of the ghost, and the pink ghost goes to this position, and at the same time, every time the player changes, the advancing position of the pink ghost will also change."

"And the feature you set for the blue ghost is to cooperate with the red ghost to contain it. In this case, you must confirm the point where the player is located as the center point, and connect one end to the red ghost and the other end to the blue ghost. During the process, the route of the red ghost must be calculated first. If he is moving horizontally, it is the X axis. If he is moving vertically, it is the Y axis. In this case, the route of the blue ghost must be the same as his. Symmetry, to create a right-angle intersection, when the right-angle intersection appears, the containment effect you want can be reflected, and the blue ghost can hunt down the player in a double-team way in the game.”

"The last orange ghost, the feature you designed is garrison, so when writing code, its feature is to garrison near the birthplace, and set a detection radius around it, when the player enters the radius, this orange ghost The ghost will calculate the shortest distance and start chasing, and when the player leaves his judgment radius, the orange ghost will stop chasing until the player appears again."

"Because their chasing modes are different, we can't call ghosts' chasing a common mode. Conversely, as long as the ghosts' modes of action are exactly the same, then these codes are..."

Evelyn drew out her voice.

And Ethan nodded clearly, and added: "Common."

"Bingo!" Evelyn smiled and snapped her fingers, "So... In your opinion, what are the common patterns?"

Evelyn has already made her words so clear, so Ethan's description is much simpler.

Although he only played the game "Pac-Man" in his previous life and didn't try to make it, but even so, the common patterns of the four ghosts are still very easy to judge, such as escaping and being caught.

First, the so-called escape means that after the character played by the player eats the luminous beans at the four corners of the map, it will give a layer of DeBuff to the ghost.

When the player eats the luminous beans and is in an invincible state, the four ghosts will enter a state of fear and avoidance, because at this time, the role played by the player can kill them back. A common pattern only for ghosts.

Second, being caught, this refers to the death state of the ghost after the player is in the invincible state and eats the ghost.

Because in "Pac-Man", the ghost can be resurrected after death, but it must return to the old lair in the middle to rest.

Therefore, this process is also a common pattern of the four ghosts.

Tell the truth!Although Ethan had written a lot of content eloquently before, this kind of segmented analysis really didn't exist on the draft paper.

Therefore, when he recalled the common pattern of these four ghosts under Evelyn's inquiry, Evelyn quickly recorded it there.

At the same time, Evelyn's mouth didn't stop, and she kept saying: "If you take it apart, the escape mode is a kind of way in which the four ghosts detect the disappearance of any of the four luminous points on the map, and then enter the opposite direction to run away." Behavior……"

"To be caught is the overlapping feedback of the four ghosts and the player character at the same coordinates on the map during the escape. This needs to be distinguished from the capture of the player by the ghosts, because the detection of the coordinates is interlinked and cannot be wrong, so... ...Add a time detection? For example, if the ghost overlaps with the player for a period of time after the luminous point on the map disappears, it will be caught?"

Looking at the figure of his sister who was writing vigorously, Ethan felt a little emotional.

Because when he decided to make the game "Pac-Man", he never expected that this game could be so difficult.

Write the judgment separately?
It's too much work!
But at the same time, a touch of curiosity actually rose in his heart.

"Evelyn." He called the girl's name.

"Ang?" The girl replied subconsciously.

"Can I ask you a question?"

"Say."

"I want to know, why did you choose the method of time detection in the judgment of being caught?"

Ethan asked suspiciously: "In my setting, when the player eats the luminous point, there will be a layer of negative status on the ghost, and at the same time, they will also change their appearance, so we can't set the detection as Is the appearance changed? When the player encounters a ghost with a changed appearance, the ghost will die, isn’t this logic okay?”

"Of course." Evelyn understood what Ethan wanted to say.

But at the same time, she also explained: "But if this is set up, there will be a problem with game detection. Suppose the negative state of the ghost just disappears when the player collides with the ghost with the negative state, how should the game judge at this time?" ?”

"The ghost will determine that there is no negative state on its body, and the overlapping codes that collide at the same time will determine that the ghost has a state."

"Because the two codes are calculated at the same time."

"In this case, did the player eat the ghost, or did the ghost kill the player?"

"The machine can't figure it out."

"This kind of rough judgment without prioritization may lead to judgment problems in the game, so detecting the best anchor point, I think, is the time with the highest priority. If this is set, the code only needs to judge one variable, and does not Error-prone."

Is that so?
Ethan understood.

"In this case, will the code be written less?"

"Of course." Evelyn nodded and said, "After all, our memory is limited, and if we can give 4K, we must not give 8K."

"Add a little more, and that's more than $30 more in cost."

Good guy!Does that count as a cost?
Ethan was startled.

But Evelyn's self-confidence reassured him a lot.

Under the communication between the two, they had already analyzed the AI ​​of the four ghosts that night.

The next day, Evelyn began to nest at home, trying to write code.

To be honest, if it were any other game company, when faced with a game like "Pac-Man" that needs to write code, the production progress would not be very fast, because the penetration rate of personal computers on the market is quite high. Low.

Even if those commercial companies want to do it, and want to jump from the field of circuit board arcade machines to CPU arcade machines, they have to purchase personal computers first, and then recruit engineers who know how to program and let them make games.

In the process, they may also face various problems such as Altair's joystick computer and CPU adaptation.

And Ethan and the others...

There is no such concern at all.

Because the personal computer Evelyn uses is the APPLE 1 that Steve Wozniak hand-wrought and gave to Ethan.

Not only that, MOS 6502 is their own product.

When the inventor of the most important CPU for making games and the inventor of the personal computer that provides production tools can be easily found, Ethan really can't think of anyone in the world who can stop him from making "Pac-Man" a thing. Make it out?
Especially when he called Chuck Padow and asked about the assembly language of MOS 6502, and the other party faxed the 151 opcodes and 56 instructions in less than an hour...

Even if Evelyn has never touched MOS 6502, she can quickly get started with the instruction set.

And when Ethan called Steve Wozniak and asked him to add a disk interface to that APPLE 1, the other party had already arranged the external devices for Ethan in less than three hours. ...

Evelyn doesn't have to worry, the data will be lost.

Of course, Ethan's call also made others a little curious.

Chuck Paido asked him on the phone if he had any new ideas.

Ethan smiled and said yes, and said that he would give him a copy after finishing.

Steve Wozniak was even rougher, wanting to see Ethan for inspiration.

Although this did not comply with the rules for the protection of commercial secrets, Ethan agreed.

And after Steve Wozniak finished reading it, the little fat man was very excited——

"Oh! Sxxt! Is this your inspiration?"

"Oh! My! God! Your design makes me want to play!"

"How about game production take me one?"

"I don't want money! I just want to make it!"

"You can ask me to be responsible for any project! Whether it is the path writing of the four ghosts, the design of the basic panel, or the creation of map levels, I can complete these projects!"

"real!"

"I'm pretty good at coding!"

This proposal made Ethan overjoyed, and Evelyn was also happy to have someone to share the work for her.

Ever since, on the first day of game production, the "Pac-Man" team changed from two people to three people.

Also, on this day, Steve Wozniak, a little fat man, discovered a problem as soon as he got started.

"Ethan, Evelyn, did you miss something?"

"Because in your design, the four ghosts, like the player, start from the small room in the middle of the map, but among the four ghosts, only red, pink and blue will keep chasing the player, and orange is the range surveillance."

"So, when the game starts and the player runs out of the middle, the three ghosts will chase after the gate opens, and the fourth orange will only stand by in the middle. In this case, wouldn't it be very easy for the player to avoid it?"

"My suggestion is, if possible, it will also come out of the haunted house, and then move forward along the walls of the maze at regular intervals, for example, 30 seconds when the difficulty is low? Go forward for ten seconds and then rest for 30 seconds? Change it to 20 seconds when the difficulty is high? Ten seconds?"

"We can make it an aimless wandering creature, and when the player enters its range, it will hunt it down fiercely. In this way, isn't it more vivid?"

This proposal made Ethan stunned on the spot.

Although he didn't know if the little orange ghost in the previous life "Pac-Man" was designed like this, but it doesn't matter, right?
Because Steve Wozniak's proposal is fun to hear!

"very good!"

"Very oppressive!"

"I'll leave this to you!"

Ethan patted Steve Wozniak on the shoulder, entrusting the little fat man with a heavy responsibility.

Anyway, it's all for nothing!

The technical leader is willing to do more, so how can he be polite to the other party?

Does it not exist?

(End of this chapter)