| Submitted by , posted on 26 June 2001 |

Image Description, by "Jadlings," as I egotistically call it, is insipred by the cross-platform game concept of Lemmings(TM), by Psygnosis, DMA, et al. The gameplay is similar; the player guides the creatures from entrances to exits by utilizing attributions such as climber, floater, and exploder. By minimizing fatality rates, the player achieves high scores and recognition by his or her peers. Eventually, the player becomes the god (through his own eyes) that Jadlings allows him to be. On a psychological level, this scheme appeals mainly to Populous enthusiasts; those who revel in the brief two seconds when Neo flexes his muscles and bends the walls and world around him.
Anyway, allow me to explain the photons above: The screener in the middle is what the main menu looks like. "Configure" just takes you to the level editor, where you can use the arrow keys to change tiles and the mouse buttons to place them. Invert your eyes to the upper-right and view an in-game screenshot. If things just aren't going your way, click on that mushroom cloud and watch as all the Jadlings get a five second counter hanging over their heads. Five seconds later and their innards bounce across the map.
Features:

> - Windows AND Linux
> - Slow Motion
> - Fast Forward
> - Pause
> - Level editor
> - 24bit color
> - Gravity
> - Scaled solidity minimap
> - Quake-style console with commands, command listing, environment variables, EV listing
> - Particle System with gravity, bouncing, fading
> - Visually pleasing interface (soft colors)
> - Nostalgic gameplay

As for the actual programming, I chose an interesting path. Just about everything that is calculated is based on dt, the change in time in milliseconds since the last time the world was updated. There is a big advantage to this - the game time matches real time so it runs at the same speed on every computer, regardless of processor. There is a big disadvantage to this - if dt gets too high, collision detection accuracy is pretty much out the window. So there is a rudimentary check in there already to split up dt to the point of reasonability, but of course bugs still exist. When using fast forward, Jadlings are often stuck inside rocks, etc.
The game is about 80% complete and will stay that way unless someone is interested in helping me finish it. This was more portfolio work to keep me busy while I seek employment. Speaking of which, my resume is available upon request ;)
A playable demo will be up at my website as soon as I upload it:
www.Jadware.com, Software section. Anyone interested in seeing the source code needs just pledge a few hundred lines of code towards the ultimate completion of the game. Thank you for the time.
Thanks,
Jad Meouchy
Jadware.com

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