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Downhill Skiing exercises Logo’s list handling capabilities and leverages turtleSpaces 3D functionality to create an engaging yet simple game.

Once loaded, click the flag icon to start.

Click here to open this project in the web IDE.

Herein lies a wonderful introduction to game development in turtleSpaces. The game mechanic behind downhill is simple: the player travels down the ski slope, avoiding randomly-positioned trees while shifting left and right to end in the target zone.

turtleSpaces new terrain functionality provides some great opportunities for simple coding examples with few lines of Logo code, in this case less than 30.

First, we need to introduce the setterrain primitive. setterrain creates ‘terrain’ or a contiguous object of varying elevation.

The above is an example of the object created by setterrain. The setterrain primitive takes a number of parameters, and is a good opportunity to explain the different types of parameters used in turtleSpaces to students.

Wordle, a cross between Mastermind and Hangman, seems to be the rage these days. Also, implementing it in as few lines as possible. In Logo we get to cheat a little about the second bit, as we can stack multiple commands on the same line. But we still need to keep things within a reasonable line length.

We’re happy to say we succeeded in our efforts, and even expanded on the model somewhat, adding progressively longer words and hints, among other things. This is a pretty good example of string and list management in Logo, which is what it was initially created for, even before the turtle!

Floaty Turtle is a simple clone of Flappy Bird written in the Logo programming language that turtleSpaces uses.

Open in the integrated development environment (IDE)

NEWTURTLE "myrtle

TO floaty
  ;here is yet another example of a relatively complex
  ;game that can be rather simply implemented in Logo:
  ;a flappy bird clone!

  ;to make it work we use two turtles, one is the player
  ;and the other creates, moves and erases the pipes
  ;these are two seperate 'workers' or threads

  ;this procedure kicks off the game, displays a title
  ;screen, and then manages the player, processing
  ;input and moving the player appropriately

  ;the pipemaker turtle and its pipes procedure
  ;manages the pipes and checks for collisions

  ;the turtle does not move horizontally,
  ;instead the pipes do!

  reset
  cleartext
  setbackgroundcolor pick [6 7 14 5 10 11 14 15]
  ;select a random background color from the given list

  noaudiowait
  ;don't wait for audio to finish playing

  setmodel [penup back 7 stamp "myrtle]
  ;we need to offset Myrtle's actual position more
  ;toward her center for the purposes of this game

  setmodelscale 5
  ;make myrtle big!

  playsound "doodoo
  ;startup sound

  pipemaker:newworker [pipes]
  ;'kicks off' the pipemaker turtle, who
  ;creates and moves the pipes

  ;create the title screen:

  penup
  randomfillcolor
  slideleft 180 forward 5
  settypesize 60
  pushturtle
  ;'push' the turtle's state (position etc) on
  ;to a stack, from which it can be 'popped'
  ;off later

  typeset "Floaty
  popturtle
  ;restore the previously pushed state

  back 100
  randfc
  ;short for randomfillcolor

  pushturtle
  typeset "Turtle
  popturtle
  bk 10 sr 70
  ;back and slideright

  settypesize 10
  randfc
  typeset |Press any key to float!|
  ;title screen complete!

  home
  dn 90 rt 90
  ;down and right

  make "raise 0
  ;the :raise container holds the current
  ;value remaining to float Myrtle upwards

  forever [

    if loopcount = 1 [say "Ready!]
    if loopcount = 16 [say "Set!]
    if loopcount = 31 [say "Go!]
    ;the loopcount is the number of times the forever
    ;loop has executed. Based on that count, say the
    ;appropriate ready set go component

    if divisorp 100 loopcount [
      ;every 100 loops pick a random background
      setbg pick [6 7 14 5 10 11 14 15]
      ;from the given list
    ]
    ;setbg short for setbackground

    dosleep [50] [
      ;try to maintain an average of 50ms to do
      ;the following:

      if loopcount > 30 [
        ;if the loopcount is greater than 30:

        if :raise = 0 [
          ;if the value inside the :raise container
          ;is 0, then lower the turtle 2.5 turtle-units:

          lower 2.5
        ]
        [
          ;otherwise raise the turtle 2.5 turtle-units
          ;and decrease the value inside the :raise
          ;container by 2.5
          raise 2.5
          make "raise :raise - 2.5
        ]

        if keyp [
          ;if a key is pressed, play a sound,
          ;remove the key from the keyboard buffer
          ;and increase the value of the :raise
          ;container by 20:

          playsound "air
          clearchar
          make "raise :raise + 20
        ]

        clean
        ;remove the turtle's 'track' -- it's not
        ;drawing or creating anything so we don't
        ;need to have it piling up

      ]
    ]
  ]
END

NEWTURTLE "pipemaker

TO pipes
  ;the pipemaker turtle's job is to
  ;create the pipes, shift them to the left
  ;and check if they've hit the turtle

  clearscreen
  noaudiowait
  penup
  home
  slideright 250
  back 120
  up 90
  ;position the turtle appropriately for
  ;creating the pipes offscreen to the right

  begintag "move
  endtag
  ;this tag is used to shift the pipes,
  ;by replacing its contents with an ever-
  ;increasing slideleft directive

  make "height 100
  ;this is the starting height of the pipes

  make "heights [0 0 0 0 0]
  ;initialize an 'zeroes' list of pipe heights

  make "score 0
  make "count 0
  ;initialize the score and the pipe count

  settypesize 20
  ;set the type size. Type is the text you
  ;create inside the 3D world

  forever [
    ;do this forever:

    sleep [50]
    ;try to do this stuff in an average of
    ;50ms -- less or more as needed to keep
    ;that average:

    if divisorp 20 loopcount [
      ;every 20 loops:

      inc "count
      ;increase the contents of the :count container
      ;by one

      if loopcount > 60 [
        ;if the loopcount is greater than 60:
        playsound "clang
        inc "score
        say :score
        ;make a sound, increment :score and say it
      ]

      slideright 100

      begintag loopcount
      ;create a new 'tag' for the pipe
      ;so we can remove it after it passes the
      ;left side of the screen

      randomfillshade
      ;select a random fill shade

      make "col 1 + random 5
      ;select a random number and put it in :col

      setfillcolor item :col [12 9 7 6 11 14 10 13]
      ;set that color based on :col's index in the
      ;provided list

      make "height :height + (-60 + random 120)
      ;increase or decrease :height based on a
      ;random number

      if :height < 20 [make "height 30 + random 20] if :height > 120 [make "height 110 - random 20]
      ;if too high or low, pick a new value higher
      ;or lower as needed

      queue :height "heights
      ;add the new height to the list of heights

      ;create the lower pipe:
      cylinder 20 :height 50
      lower :height
      setfillcolor item :col [4 8 6 2 1 12 5 3]
      ;select the complementary color for the pipe

      cylinder 25 20 50
      lower 50

      ;type the pipe number:
      down 90 right 90 back 10
      if :count > 9 [bk 10]
      inscribe :count
      if :count > 9 [fd 10]
      forward 10 left 90 up 90
      ;if gameplay is too slow, comment out
      ;the above five lines

      ;create the upper pipe:
      lower 50
      ;remember, the turtle is upside down!
      cylinder 25 20 50
      lower 20
      setfillcolor item :col [12 9 7 6 11 14 10 13]
      cylinder 20 120 - ypos 50
      raise :height + 120

      endtag
      ;close the pipe 'tag'

      if loopcount > 119 [erasetag loopcount - 100]
      ;erase the pipe that has left the screen

      ignore pop "heights
      ;remove its height from the :heights container
      ;and just throw it away (ignore it)
    ]

    if loopcount > 60 [
      ;check for crash:
      if (or
        myrtle:ypos > (-120 + (90 + item 3 :heights))
        myrtle:ypos < (-120 + (20 + item 3 :heights))
        ;the third item in the :heights list is the
        ;height of the pipe around where the turtle
        ;is, so we can use that to see if we've hit
        ;anything
      ) [
        (print |Crash! Final Score: | :score)
        print |Press flag icon to play again!|

        calm "myrtle
        myrtle:run [setfillcolor 1 icosphere 30]
        ;red ball

        audiowait
        playsound "crack
        playsound "aw

        myrtle:clean
        ;gets rid of the red ball

        noaudiowait
        playsound "fall
        say |too bad|

        myrtle:repeat 90 [
          forward 3 lower 3 wait 1
        ]
        ;fall to the ground

        audiowait
        playsound "crash
        finish
        ;that's all folks

      ]
    ]

    replacetag "move [slideleft loopcount * 5]
    ;increase the value of the slideleft
    ;command in the move tag, shifting the
    ;pipes to the left

  ]

  ;and that's it! Not really much code, is it?

END

Consider the below game of ‘pub darts’:

You can open it in our Javascript-based IDE by clicking here

If you hover over the various primitives in the editor, a popup will tell you what they do.

The game consists of three main parts: the dartboard, the darts and the game itself.

The dartboard is constructed primarily using the ringarc primitive and a number of repeat loops. It uses the oddp boolean to decide which color each segment of each ring should be, allowing us to match the colors of a standard dartboard.

Dodgeball is a very simple game using a bale wherein the player moves the turtle from the left to right sides of the screen using the keyboard.

This is similar to a popular example used to teach Scratch, and the basic concept should be familiar to most Scratch learners.

In the case of this example, there are multiple balls that are controlled by a ‘bale’, a group of turtles who all execute the same code, first the code in the bale’s init procedure, and then the code in the ‘main’ procedure repeatedly. Each member of the bale executes consecutively, and once all members of a bale have executed (a cycle), the bale’s graphical output (its ‘turtle tracks’) is updated.

turtleSpaces is great for creating 3D models and animations, but we also want it to be great for games. Unfortunately, the interpreter is not the fastest thing around — but that’s okay! We can compensate by creating new commands that work ‘under the hood’ to take care of certain game elements.

Bales are groups of turtles that all execute the same code, for example alien attackers in a space battle game. They are declared similarly to turtles, using a NEWBALE declaration.

turtleSpaces isn’t just about games or 3D models, it’s also about art. Although generated by a Logo computer program, some of the visuals created by turtleSpaces can be quite striking! Combined with a digital art program such as Filter Forge, the results can be very artistic indeed.

Check out this gallery of turtle art:

Build this cool island scene using turtleSpaces Logo and a few basic shapes!

First we begin with a tree. We can build a trunk using a repeat loop of cylinders that get narrower in diameter and longer as we go. We can introduce a slight curve as well by tilting the turtle up a bit each cylinder we create:

Next we need to create the leaves, which we can do using the fiso (filled triangle) primitive. We can use a repeat loop to create a series of triangles growing in size, and then a second repeat loop to create a further series of triangles shrinking in size. In both cases, we tilt the turtle down a bit each triangle we create:

Environments are a cool new way to get started with Logo. turtleSpaces now provides a variety of environments in different settings to inspire Logo creation:

Starry Night and Star Platform – Myrtle builds in space!

Winter Ice Pond – Myrtle goes skating!

Pyramid Desert – Build a monument to the Gods!

Under the Sea – Shelly swims with the fishes!

Forest Cabin – Myrtle’s hideaway in the woods.