Party sessions of short rounds (party.rounds) #

A party game made of short rounds played one after the other by 2 to 8 contestants, local players or bots. Each round is a data document; the kit runs the intro card, the round, the placement, the points and the final podium. Readable offline: gripforge docs party-rounds, or the MCP tool gripforge_docs (topic party-rounds).

What it is for #

A session goes through the phases lobby, intro (everybody held on their start, the rules shown), play, results (points by placement), the intro of the next round, and finally podium and done. A round says how it is won (goal), how long it lasts, what the arena looks like and what happens in it. The kit moves the bots, the local players 2 to 4 and the pushes, places the contestants and scores them. Player 1 is the character of the game. The look of the cards, clock, scores and podium is the presentation module (a fragment of the web UI); the models come from the asset slots party_bot, party_pickup, party_hazard, party_platform and party_finish.

Turn it on #

gripforge_gamekit_install   { project_id: "gkp_…", id: "party.rounds" }
gripforge_gamekit_configure { project_id: "gkp_…", id: "party.rounds",
                              config: { "contestants": 4, "humans": 1, "rounds": ["shrinking_ring", "gem_rush"] } }

It requires input.actions, world.ground and game.engine. Add the rounds to the party_rounds collection of the project; with rounds empty, all of them are played in collection order.

First example #

<!-- test: kits/game_engine/host/tests/party_rounds.rs::a_session_plays_its_rounds_to_the_podium --> Three bots and two rounds, with the intro, results and podium pauses at 0:

{ "id": "a", "name": "A", "goal": "most_points", "seconds": 5 }
{ "id": "b", "name": "B", "goal": "last_standing", "seconds": 5, "arena": { "size": 4 } }

In round a, party.session.award(id, 5) gives one contestant points and endRound() places everybody: 10 points for first, 6 shared by the two tied for second. In round b, two eliminate(id) calls leave one contestant standing, and the session reaches done with the standings kept in state().results and standings().

The round document #

A tie shares the better place and the next place is skipped.

Settings and defaults #

Services, events, variables, hooks #

• party.session (service): start(), state(), contestants(), standings(), round(), placements(), award(id, n), eliminate(id), finish(id), push(id), endRound(), skip(), arenaSize().
• party_start, party_award, party_end_round (actions) and party_finished, party_round_is (conditions) for scripts.
• party.started, party.round_intro, party.round_started, party.out, party.collected, party.finished_line, party.pushed, party.round_ended, party.podium, party.finished (events); party.out has a cause (edge, hazard or script); party.round_ended carries the placements.
• game.won, game.lost (events): sent at the end of the podium when endGame is on.
• party.phase, party.round, party.rounds, party.round_name, party.timer, party.leader (variables).
• party.push, party.p2_push, party.p3_push, party.p4_push (input actions) and the axes party.p2_x, party.p2_y (and the same for players 3 and 4).
• round.start (hook): the intro is over; seconds mutable; cancelled, the round is skipped without points.
• round.award (hook): before round points; amount mutable; cancellable.
• round.score (hook): per contestant at the end of a round; points mutable.
• match.end (hook): before the podium ends the game; won mutable; cancellable (the game does not end).

Hooks and modding #

A mod can change contestants, names, colors, rounds, points, the three durations and the two speeds, and add, patch or remove party_rounds documents. autoStart, center, humans and endGame stay the game's own choice. The four hooks above let a rule change the length of a round, double the points of a pickup or rewrite the final result.

Engines #

The web and the native Rust host run the same session. The cards, the clock, the scores and the touch push button are drawn by the presentation module of each host.

When it does not do what you expect #

• The session never starts: autoStart is off (call start()), or the collection party_rounds is empty.
• A round is missing: its id is not listed in rounds, or a round.start tap cancelled it.
• Nobody scores in a most_points round: the round has no pickups, or no one calls award.
• The game does not end after the podium: endGame is off, or a match.end tap cancelled it.

Limits #

Local players share one screen and one keyboard (player 1 on the usual keys, players 2 to 4 on the numeric keypad). The rounds are built from the fields above; a rule beyond them is written as onStart and onEnd actions or hooks.

Versions #

Kit 1.1.0, service party.session 1.0.0. 1.1.0 added the hooks and the script verbs.