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Project 9: Writing a Game in Visual Basic
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What This Assignment Is About

This assignment gives you the opportunity pull together most of the Visual Basic features we have studied through the first ten chapters of Norton’s text. This is the last assignment we will do in Visual Basic in this part of the course, so you may wish to read ahead in the text to discover other features to incorporate into your program.
 
 

What You Are To Do

For this assignment you are to implement a game. You may choose any game you like, but I recommend that you try creating a computerized version of non-computer game, rather than trying to implement a computer game that you have seen. Computer games are usually very complex, and far too ambitious to undertake within the time frame of this assignment.

Even non-computer games can get very complex, so for this assignment you should concentrate on the game’s user interface, not the intricacies of scoring and data handling. As in the first assignment, I am far more interested in seeing you experiment with Visual Basic’s event handling capabilities than seeing lots of Basic language code. In essence, your game doesn’t really have to “work,” although that would certainly be nice. It’s more important that the user interface be rich – that is, contain lots of Visual Basic features that conform to Windows standards – than that your game actually be playable. The best programs will use as many Visual Basic features as they can (without being silly!).

I strongly encourage you to talk to me either in person, by phone, or via e-mail about the games you plan to implement. One of the historical problems with this assignment is that students try to write a program that is too big. I can help you pare down your plan to a reasonable size so that you can be sure to finish this assignment on time.
 
 

What You Are To Hand In

Copy or zip to a diskette that you will hand in: Mark your name clearly on the diskette and label it “Assignment No. 2.”

Hand in your diskette at the beginning of class on the day it is due.
 
 

How You Will Be Graded

This assignment will be graded on a 20-point system with points awarded as follows:
 
Criteria Possible
Points		 Your
Score
Documentation and Formatting
     - all variables and procedures have adequate descriptions
     - code has adequate in-line comments, whitespace, and indentation
     - program appears that it can be maintained by another programmer		 5  
Input Processing and Error Handling
     - prompts for input are clear and unambiguous
     - flow of input focus is natural and follows standard conventions
     - error messages for incorrect input are appropriate		 6  
Screen Layout and Message Clarity
     - overall appearance is attractive
     - user has clear indicators for what s/he is supposed to do
     - graphics and color are used appropriately		 6  
Originality
     - interface is interesting
     - implementation has clever aspects
     - game is fun to interact with		 3  

 
Jesse Heines

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Last Updated: 12 March 2000