Number Munchers

Number Munchers is a clone of the classic eductation game of the same name released by MECC for Apple II and Macintosh. For more information about the original game, check out the Wikipedia page or this emulator at Archive.org.

Number Munchers and its sibling Word Munchers are educational games intended to help students learn fundamental arithmetic concepts and vowel sounds, respectively.

This rendition brings Number Munchers 30 years into the future using Javascript, CSS, and HTML.

Players will play as a muncher hopping from space to space munching multiples, factors, prime numbers, equalities, and inequalities. They will need to avoid Troggles to succeed! Some Troggles will change the board and some might chase the Muncher!

MVP Features

• Basic Functionality
  • Users will be able to start and pause game. Game starts on menu
• Menu
  • will allow users to select game rules:
    • Multiples
    • Factors
    • Primes
    • Equality
    • Inequality
  • tutorial
  • audio options
  • starting difficulty level?
• Board
  • will be made of a grid of 5 x 6
  • will randomly seed according to rules
  • see wireframe
• Muncher
  • Users will navigate a 'Muncher' around the board to munch numbers that fit the rules
• Troggles will occasionally spawn
  • Troggles move once per second
  • Intitially, they will walk across board and change some numbers
  • Some Troggles will move towards the Muncher as difficulty increases

Technologies

• Canvas
• Web Audio API
• HTML
• CSS

Wireframes

Timeline

Monday 4/16

• JavaScript:
  • keep track of:
    • Score
    • Rule
      • use info here to tell tiles how to generate
    • generate Muncher on random space
    • generate tiles on every other space
    • Tiles
      • value
      • boolean: fits rule?
      • location
    • Null piece
    • Muncher
      • location
      • lives left
    • Troggle(s)
      • location
      • generate based on level/time
      • pathfinding
  • how to listen to Canvas and tell it to update
• Game skeleton needed by end of day
• figure out best way to store and access sprites in Canvas

Tuesday 4/17

• figure out best way to store and access sprites
  • speed run canvas tutorials
    • how to access and manipulate sprites
    • how to assign keyboard commands to actions
    • how to add sound on events
  • Canvas skeleton needed by end of day, with sprites and drawing instructions

Wednesday 4/18

• prettify everything
• keep working on game logic and make sure canvas renders on update of state

Thursday 4/19

• add sound effects for menu, background, muncher, troggle, etc.
• make sure page is pretty and inviting on load