Space Rocks / Rock Dodger

4th place in NoStarch game contest!

Introduction

Dodge the rocks for as long as possible until you die. Kill greeblies to make the universe safe for non-greeblie life once again.

Controls

Up = go up
Down = go down
Left = go left
Right = go right
D = fire laser!
S = Shields [VERY useful!]
P = Pause

Command line

Run the program with "rockdodger"
rockdodger -s = silent (no sound)
rockdodger -w = run in windowed mode (Full screen mode is now the default because it looks way cooler)
rockdodger -h = list all allowed command line options

Screenshots

Download

You can't get a binary yet. I may soon be in Debian, so all you apt-getters can grab it from there.

Download a tarball of the source : rockdodger-0.6.tar.gz .

CVS

If the source release isn't fast enough for you, you can get the raw bleeding edge version of rockdodger via CVS. From your command-line enter

cvs -d:pserver:anonymous@cvs.spacerocks.sourceforge.net:/cvsroot/spacerocks login

..and enter the password anonymous. Then run the next command line to get yourself a fresh steaming hot pile of rockdodger:

cvs -z3 -d:pserver:anonymous@cvs.spacerocks.sourceforge.net:/cvsroot/spacerocks co spacerocks

Keep up to date

Keep abreast of latest developments and make suggestions for further development using the mailing list. Join the mailing list .

History

28/07/02
An update! Enough people told me they liked the game, and I got some notice from a Debian maintainer, so I took an interest this weekend in polishing up a few of the changes made over the last few months... and now they're here! Easier starting level!
04/03/02
Found some more pictures of the old Challenger here
16/02/02
Version 0.4.2
The laser is working and dangerous! You don't get any points for shooting rocks, but it does get them out of the way. There's an unlimited supply of laser power, but that will have to change (I don't want this game getting too easy)
15/01/02
Oh! So close but so far! I come fourth in the NoStarch game developer's contest! Missed it by ONE point! Oh the humanity... there was a prize for first, second and third.

See the results and the winners here

21/10/01
version 0.3.0
The front screen and the 'game over' are the most obvious changes here. The high score entry is a little more like a normal video game. Anyway, I recommend you download this one, especialy if your last download was earlier than 0.2.0.
7/10/01
version 0.2.0
Music working! Would you believe it. I've thrown away my own sound mixer and use SDL_mixer instead. I'm using the music from 'tumult' by Bill Kendrick. Bill got it from various sources.
30/9/01
version 0.1.8b
Slight ackaging error means the last version just didn't work. This is the last woking version before I add some music and a high score table in the next version.
18/9/01
version 0.1.8
Made a nice web page for the project (you're looking at it) and basicaly put everything ready for publication.
8/9/01
version 0.1.6
First release that's completely playable. I've had to rename the game Rock Dodgers because there's already a commercial asteroids-clone called space rocks. Oh well.
2/9/01
version vapour
Bought a copy of Programming Linux Games and rewrote the game in C and SDL for Linux. I make the game available under the GPL.
*/*/84
version primitive
Wrote the initial version for the Challenger C4P in blocky character graphics. The game is the hit of the compuer science class

Required Libraries

You MUST have SDL installed.
Any version later than 1.1 should be fine. Mandrake 8.0 comes with it already installed.

Be aware that there are problems with SDL before about version 1.1.6 or so, especially with the font support, so you might want to download the latest SDL version 1.2. I'm developing using version 1.2, so sometime in the future you might find that this game runs a bit funny if you don't have the latest version.

You also need the SDL_image library to load the png images.

You need the SDL_mixer library to load play the music.

Install

Unzip the file into a directory, type make, and type ./rockdodger to run it. To run in full-screen mode, type ./rockdodger -f

Like it?

Send me an email: pad at pcholt.com.

Developers

You can join the project at the spacerocks project at sourceforge.net.

SourceForge Logo