Alexey's other puzzle game: Hexic

Thread in 'Other games' started by Zaphod77, 16 Feb 2011.

  1. Zaphod77

    Zaphod77 Resident Misinformer

    It's called Hexic. You may have heard of it.

    It's free on xbpx360, and PC, though the full version playable offline costs a small amount of cash.

    Anyway, the PC version controls with the mouse, and misclicks can get annoying really fast, especially because sometimes the selection lags behind your mouse cursor.

    I think a better PC version can be made. :)

    The x-box version proves that you can use only a stick and 2 buttons to play the game well, and that option is not available on PC.

    Anyone who's played it on PC and rotated a cluster when they meant to rotate a star piece and had an unintended clear mess up their board will agree that there ought to be a better way.

    SO i've got a mind to make a clone for PC with keyboard/stick control.

    USe the arrow keys to move the 3 cluster selection. THe grid is placed such that hexagons are stacked vertically. So a cluster can either have two on the right or two on the left.

    When moving horizontally, if you move sideways, the selection is mirrored on a line drawn directly down through the center of the hexes on the side matching your direction. For vertical motion, the selection is moved vertically one step, but constrained to the two columns it is in.

    This is how the xbox version does it exactly.

    One button for clockwise, and one for counterclockwise rotation. Again, so far, so xbox360.

    However, you can also rotate star pieces. TO do this, the star must be selected. On PC, you do this by mousing over it. But this is somewhat imprecise. The xbox implements some logic to try to detect when you want to move it onto a star.

    My idea is to add a third button. one that toggles between cluster rotation and star rotation mode. In star rotation mode, the selection cursor would move differently, and only select stars. This would be very useful.

    Here's my idea for handling it.

    For vertical move, jump to the nearest star in that direction in the same column Wrap if you have to. Set tiebreaker direction to direction you moved (up or down). For horizontal movement, move as many columns over as you need to find one with a star in it, then select the closest one to your original position. Break ties by selecting the one in the tiebreaker direction. After each move, if the new star was higher, set tiebreaker direction to down. If the new star is lower, set tiebreaker direction to up. This stops it from heading to the top or bottom when you are trying to cross your master's grid.

    Now there's one issue I can see with this logic. If you do not have a master's grid, you may select a star that's very far away, and then it will take many more taps to get to where you want to be. For this case, an alternate logic might be more useful. With each consecutive sideways move, pick the closest one on the column to your original location, and break ties by the higher one.

    Which is the better system? :)
     

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