This is a clone of the bubble breaker game I found on an IPAQ running windows mobile (the most exact PC clone I've found is KDI's Jawbreaker). Initially, I couldn't find a version for windows (because I didn't remember what the game was called), so I wrote one myself. A search on google for "bubble breaker" turns up a bunch of results, but this version has the advantage of being completely free (not a trial, not shareware, but completely free as in open source). Personally, I think it looks and plays better too, but my opinion is obviously biased.
This version behaves slightly differently since I decided that if I was going to write it, I wanted to play it the way I liked. The biggest difference is the addition of new playing blocks dropping down in a row, instead of new playing blocks only coming from the left. This has the effect of making the game last a lot longer. Other differences are that the game is played on a 12 x 12 grid, and there's no sound.
There really isn't any point to the game. I keep track of the moves and averages, and it is possible for the game to end. What's important is that the gameplay is quite addictive.
The code isn't the greatest, and the drawing is all done using win32 GDI calls (no MFC, no frameworks, just pure win32 GDI). I did it this way because the windows compile is more a test harness for the game logic than anything else.
The bubbles used to be square blocks (because I was lazy) instead of actual round bubbles, but as of version 1.04, the bubbles are ray-traced phong-shaded super-sampled spheres (I.E. they look nice). The game logic looks like it's working properly. Screenshots are included below. If you want to waste some time playing, you can download the compiled version here. It's a plain zip file containing a single executable. Since the game is so simple, no installation needed - just run the executable directly.
Execution speed on an old PIII/733 was acceptable. There's a bit of flickering, and that's because of the quick and dirty GDI drawing code. However, I'm not going to do anything about it. Maybe I'll write a direct draw version one day.
As of version 1.05, an open source version, this program uses the zlib license. This means that you can pretty much do anything you want with it short of claiming the work as your own. You can see the license text here. Also, although it is not required, I'd appreciate a link back to this web site if you choose to distribute the program. The game is also known as Chain Shot!, SameGame, Bubblets and Jawbreaker
Because the code is so simple, it should compile under any compliant windows compiler. I use Visual Studio 2003 as my development environment.
If you want to contact me for any reason, my email address is embedded within the program and source code. However, it's very likely that I won't check my email.
The executable is known to work on windows XP and 2000. It may work on other versions of windows, but I haven't tested on any other platform.
- Samson
