Scratch For Kids For Dummies

CHAPTER 11

Design a Classic Videogame

Creating a classic Pong-style videogame is the game design equivalent to stick-figure animation. It’s not so much about creating an awesome game as it is about covering the basic game design elements that you will need to create your awesome game. Most ball sports videogames (think tennis and soccer) evolved from Pong, so this is the perfect project for those of you who eventually want to design your own football, volleyball, basketball, or hockey game. Even if you don’t want to create any kind of sports game, you will quickly learn how to move a character using keyboard keys, have stuff move around on its own, trigger sound effects, and keep track of score.

This Game Looks LAME!

Just because your friendly neighborhood author is starting off with simple graphics doesn’t mean you have to. If you are not into the “retro” look of this game, Scratch makes it easy to change the background and sprites at any time by changing the backdrop or sprite costumes. You can choose from the many graphics included in the Scratch libraries or paint your own.

Ask anybody over 40 years old what the first videogame he or she ever played was and most will answer “Pong.” Me, too! The original arcade game was produced by Atari, way back in 1972. It used a black-and-white television set from Walgreens, a coin mechanism designed for a laundromat, and a milk carton ...