Victory Through Superior Programming
Once upon a time in the dim mists of history, when geeks wore pocket protectors and shivered in over-cooled machine rooms filled with mainframe computers, running racks of punch cards through readers and poring over accordion-folded printouts, Silas Marner wrote a game for Xerox PARC's PLATO computer system called RobotWar. And it was good.
In RobotWar, you wrote a program to control a robot warrior, then pitted it in an area against the robots of others--the winner being the last bot standing. Marner did an Apple II version of the game--a less interesting game when played alone instead of on a networked system like PLATO--and since then, there have been occasional attempts to recreate the magic that Silas wrought.
Imagine, if you will, a RobotWar for the Internet era--with a community of avid players working to perfect their programs and defeat the current challenger, in a well-balanced game where, as in Magic, no program is perfect and some technique can best any bot. And tournaments and rankings and a progression system that opens new equipment and techniques to you as you progress.
You've just imagined Droid Arena 3.
This style of game is manifestly not for everyone; the actual game is in the coding, and players do little to nothing during actual battles, other than see how their droids perform and think about how to handle weaknesses they note before the next battle. Twitch gamers will merely find it frustrating. But those who like games that make you think--and actively enjoy programming--will discover why using the words "magic" and "RobotWar" in the same sentence is absolutely apt.
The Developer Says:
Ever wished to create your own robot, send it to battle and see it fight according to your program? This game features a simple yet powerful script language, true 3D fight movies generated each time you fight, experience levels, espionage, research, and more!
In DroidArena 3, you will take on the role of a decker with your own base and intelligence community. As a decker your main goal is to build a virtual robot and program it to do your bidding in combat.
What makes DroidArena 3 so cool?
1. You build your own virtual robot
2. You teach it what to do in battle
3. You watch it fight your enemies in 3D
4. You spy, research, construct & upgrade your virtual robot
Our Review
Psst... Looking for Some Droids?
Submitted by DrJ on Wed, 2006-07-19 18:47. The Word
One of the seminal games in Apple II history was RobotWar by Silas Warner, the same Silas Warner who designed Castle Wolfenstein-—the 8-bit shooter that inspired Wolfenstein 3D and essentially, DOOM. Published by Muse Software, the game required players to design their own scripts for the robots to follow using a special pseudo-code (very similar to Applesoft BASIC). The concept migrated to the PC and onto the earliest days of the World Wide Web as C ROBOTS. Naturally, this required one to code their robots in C. The advantage of the games was that they were always fresh, depending on the sophisticated (or non-sophisticated) level of coding that your competition could provide. It also taught some elementary lessons about coding, in general.
Voice of the Masses
Droid Arena 3No posts