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• null values vs "empty" singleton for optional fields

  - by Uko

  First of all I'm developing a parser for an XML-based format for 3D graphics called XGL. But this question can be applied to any situation when you have fields in your class that are optional i.e. the value of this field can be missing. As I was taking a Scala course on coursera there was an interesting pattern when you create an abstract class with all the methods you need and then create a normal fully functional subclass and an "empty" singleton subclass that always returns false for isEmpty method and throws exceptions for the other ones. So my question is: is it better to just assign null if the optional field's value is missing or make a hierarchy described above and assign it an empty singleton implementation?

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• How to keep balance / Unlock items / achievement rules

  - by Mark Knol

  I'm working on an engine for a game, too learn javascript and just because its fun. I'm a flashdeveloper, I know how to build websites. Now making games is a different challenge, javascript is a challenge, but I'd love to learn how to structure code and what patterns are common. I dont mind if the game ever finish, I'm mostly interested in the programming part of it. I dont have a particular endresult in mind, so I'll see where it takes me. I currently have a system where you can buy items. The items cost a specified amount of gold, silver, diamonds etc. When you have selected and bought the item, it takes time before getting rewarded. When time is over, you are getting rewarded with other properties (gold, energy, diamonds). For example, you can buy an apple for 50gold, It takes a minute, you get rewarded with 75energy. Or if you take a run, it cost 50energy, it takes 5minutes, reward is 25gold and 25silver. These definitions is what i call actions. Currently I already have a system where this already works and I can define as much actions with as much properties as I want. The definitions I have kinda looks like this: {id:101, category:544, onInit:{gold:-75}, onComplete:{energy:75}, time:2000, name:"Apple", locked: false} {id:102, category:544, onInit:{gold:-135}, onComplete:{energy:145}, time:2000, name:"Banana", locked: false} {id:106, category:302, onInit:{energy:-50, power: -25}, onComplete:{gold:100, diamonds:2}, time:10000, name:"Run", locked: false} {id:107, category:302, onInit:{energy:-70, silver: -55}, onComplete:{gold:100}, time:10000, name:"Dance", locked: false} {id:108, category:302, onInit:{energy:-230, power: -355}, onComplete:{gold:70, silver:70}, time:10000, name:"Fitness", locked: false} Now, I would love to add a system where I can lock/unlock the actions using achievement rules. Lets say, if you buy 10 apples, you unlock a new action, like bananas which cost more, and reward more. In the future I maybe want to restrict achievements and actions to levels. I am kinda stuck how to structure this. I have 2 questions: Which patterns are used to define achievements? How/where are they defined? Should it be part of the action, or should it be a separate controller? Is it a good idea to register all completed actions to it? I think I want multiple types of achievement rules, Id love to hear some ideas how to develop it. How do you create/find a good balance, so the user does not get stuck or can cheat by repeat a pattern of actions to get too much rewards. I know there is not a simple answer and i'm lacking of a good game-concept, but I wonder if anyone created such a game and how you dealed and played with it.

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• Algorithm for dynamically calculating a level based on experience points?

  - by George

  One of the struggles I've always had in game development is deciding how to implement experience points attributed to gaining a level. There doesn't seem to be a pattern to gaining a level in many of the games I've played, so I assume they have a static dictionary table which contains experience points vs. the level. e.g. Experience Level 0 1 100 2 175 3 280 4 800 5 ...There isn't a rhyme or reason why 280 points is equal to level 4, it just is. I'm not sure how those levels are decided, but it certainly wouldn't be dynamic. I've also thought about the possibility of exponential levels, as not to have to keep a separate lookup table, e.g. Experience Level 0 1 100 2 200 3 400 4 800 5 1600 6 3200 7 6400 8 ...but that seems like it would grow out of control rather quickly, as towards the upper levels, the enemies in the game would have to provide a whopping amount of experience to level -- and that would be to difficult to control. Leveling would become an impossible task. Does anyone have any pointers, or methods they use to decide how to level a character based on experience? I want to be fair in leveling and I want to stay ahead of the players as not to worry about constantly adding new experience/level lookups.

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• Identifying the best pattern

  - by Daniel Grillo

  I'm developing a software to program a device. I have some commands like Reset, Read_Version, Read_memory, Write_memory, Erase_memory. Reset and Read_Version are fixed. They don't need parameters. Read_memory and Erase_memory need the same parameters that are Length and Address. Write_memory needs Lenght, Address and Data. For each command, I have the same steps in sequence, that are something like this sendCommand, waitForResponse, treatResponse. I'm having difficulty to identify which pattern should I use. Factory, Template Method, Strategy or other pattern.

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• Frames per Second and Updates per Second [on hold]

  - by matt murray

  So this is more a general resources question, as I am seeking knowledge on how best to conserve resources in a game (I am writing in Java, and please this is not a thread on what language I should write it in, I have already chosen Java) so that the updates and frames per second could be the highest they could be. In general I am just searching for any articles you may have, any personal experience, anything what so ever that could be of use to a pretty new Java game developer on the subject! Thanks in advance!

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• When do domain concepts become application constructs?

  - by Noren

  I recently posted a question regarding recovering a DDD architecture that became an anemic domain model into a multitier architecture and this question is a follow-on of sorts. My question is when do domain concepts become application constructs. My application is a local client C# 4/WPF with the following architecture: Presentation Layer Views ViewModels Business Layer ??? Domain Layer Classes that take the POCOs with primitive types and create domain concepts (e.g. image, layer, etc) Sanity checks values (e.g. image width 0) Interfaces for DTOs Interface for a repository that abstracts the filesystem Data Access Layer Classes that parse the proprietary binary files into POCOs with primitive types by explicit knowledge of the file format Implementation of domain DTOs Implementation of domain repository class Local Filesystem Proprietary binary files When does the MyImageType domain class with Int32 width, height, and Int32[] pixels become a System.Windows.Media.ImageDrawing? If I put it in the domain layer, it seems like implemenation details are being leaked (what if I didn't want to use WPF?). If I put it in the presentation layer, it seems like it's doing too much. If I create a business layer, it seems like it would be doing too little since there are few "rules" given the CRUD nature of the application. I think all of my reading has lead to analysis paralysis, so I thought fresh eyes might lend some perspective.

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• Which screen resolution should I target for modern mobile phones? [closed]

  - by tugberk

  Possible Duplicate: Building for different screen sizes I am developing a site which needs to work on mobiles as well. I avoid specifying width and height by pixel. Mostly I am using percent for that but sometimes I need a specific area. for example, 300px div element. Which screen resolution should I target for modern mobile phones in general? I know it varies but what is the higher number. Most of my concerns are iPhone, Windows Phone and Android.

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• What is the best way to generate income from mobile games?

  - by Thomas

  As the title states, what is the best way to get income from mobile games? (taking into consideration that creating the games only costs a lot of time and the games are relatively simple) As I see it, there are multiple ways of getting money from mobile games, Selling them for a fixed price (seems like a high threshold for potential buyers) In-game purchases (I can imagine this only works for several types of games, I don't see this working well for monopoly unless you like really fancy hotels ;) Ingame advertisements / sponsorships Which way will most likely bring the most profit?

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• Representing heightmaps, on disk and when drawing

  - by gardian06

  This is a conglomeration question when answering please specify which part you are addressing. I am looking at creating a maze type game that utilizes elevation. I have a few features I would like to have, but am unsure as to some of the implementation. I have done work doing fileIO maze generation (using a key to read the file, and then generate the level based on that file), but I am unsure how to think about this with elevation in the mix. I think height maps might be a good approach, but don't know how to represent them effectively. for a height map which is more beneficial XML(containing h[u,v] data and key definition), CSV (item1 is key reference, item2 is elevation), or another approach that I have not thought of yet? When it comes to placing the elevation values themselves what kind of deltah values are appropriate to have it noticeable at about a 60degree angle while not really effecting gravity driven physics (assuming some effect while moving up/down hill)? I am thinking of maybe going to procedural generation at some point, but am wondering if it is practical to have a procedurally generated grid (wall squares possibly same dimensions as the open space squares), or if designing to a thin wall open spaces is better? this decision will effect the amount of work need on the graphics end for uniform vs. irregular walls. EDIT: Game will be a elevation maze shooter. Levels/maps will be mazes with elevation the player has to negotiate. Elevations will have effects on "combat" vision, and movement.

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• Use Those Schemas, People!

  - by BuckWoody

  Database Schemas are just containers – they aren’t users or anything else – think of a sub-directory on the hard drive. In early versions of SQL Server we “hid” schemas, placing all objects under “dbo”, which gave the erroneous perception that Schemas are users. In SQL Server 2005, we “un-hid” or re-introduced schemas within the database. Users can have a default schema (a place where their new objects go), you can add new schemas and transfer objects between them, and they have many other benefits. But I still see a lot of applications, developed by shops I know as well as vendors, that don’t make use of a Schema. Everything is piled under dbo. I completely understand this – since permissions can be granted to a schema, they feel a lot like a user, so it’s just easier not to worry about both users and schemas when you create a database. But if you’ll use them properly you can make your application more understandable and portable. You should at least take a few minutes and read more about them – you owe it to your users: http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/ms190387.aspx Share this post: email it! | bookmark it! | digg it! | reddit! | kick it! | live it!

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• Using MVC with a retained mode renderer

  - by David Gouveia

  I am using a retained mode renderer similar to the display lists in Flash. In other words, I have a scene graph data structure called the Stage to which I add the graphical primitives I would like to see rendered, such as images, animations, text. For simplicity I'll refer to them as Sprites. Now I'm implementing an architecture which is becoming very similar to MVC, but I feel that that instead of having to create View classes, that the sprites already behave pretty much like Views (except for not being explicitly connected to the Model). And since the Model is only changed through the Controller, I could simply update the view together with the Model in the controller, as in the example below: Example 1 class Controller { Model model; Sprite view; void TeleportTo(Vector2 position) { model.Position = view.Position = position; } } The alternative, I think, would be to create View classes that wrap the sprites, make the model observable, and make the view react to changes on the model. This seems like a lot of extra work and boilerplate code, and I'm not seeing the benefits if I'm just going to have one view per controller. Example 2 class Controller { Model model; View view; void TeleportTo(Vector2 position) { model.Position = position; } } class View { Model model; Sprite sprite; View() { model.PropertyChanged += UpdateView; } void UpdateView() { sprite.Position = model.Position; } } So, how is MVC or more specifically, the View, usually implemented when using a retained-mode renderer? And is there any reason why I shouldn't stick with example 1?

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• Real life example of an agile game development process

  - by Ken

  I'm trying to learn about applying agile methodologies to game development. But seems to be impossible to find real life examples. What I am looking for are things like; Initial user stories Final user stories (complete, covering the entire game requirements) Acceptance criteria Task list Sprint backlogs (before and after each sprint) The agile books seem to have some limited examples, many of which seem contrived. In this era of open source software, there must be an documented example of the process applied to a game that is publicly available. I am asking specifically about games because they are so different from normal applications. Regular applications are built to all users to complete specific tasks in order to get stuff done(book a room, print a report etc). People play games for much less tangible reasons, so I think the process is significantly different. [it doesn't have to be scrum, it could be any process, just needs to be a real life example game and be reasonably complete]

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• Why does Clang/LLVM warn me about using default in a switch statement where all enumerated cases are covered?

  - by Thomas Catterall

  Consider the following enum and switch statement: typedef enum { MaskValueUno, MaskValueDos } testingMask; void myFunction(testingMask theMask) { switch theMask { case MaskValueUno: {}// deal with it case MaskValueDos: {}// deal with it default: {} //deal with an unexpected or uninitialized value } }; I'm an Objective-C programmer, but I've written this in pure C for a wider audience. Clang/LLVM 4.1 with -Weverything warns me at the default line: Default label in switch which covers all enumeration values Now, I can sort of see why this is there: in a perfect world, the only values entering in the argument theMask would be in the enum, so no default is necessary. But what if some hack comes along and throws an uninitialized int into my beautiful function? My function will be provided as a drop in library, and I have no control over what could go in there. Using default is a very neat way of handling this. Why do the LLVM gods deem this behaviour unworthy of their infernal device? Should I be preceding this by an if statement to check the argument?

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• Implementing the transport layer for a SIP UAC

  - by Jonathan Henson

  I have a somewhat simple, but specific, question about implementing the transport layer for a SIP UAC. Do I expect the response to a request on the same socket that I sent the request on, or do I let the UDP or TCP listener pick up the response and then route it to the correct transaction from there? The RFC does not seem to say anything on the matter. It seems that especially using UDP, which is connection-less, that I should just let the listeners pick up the response, but that seems sort of counter intuitive. Particularly, I have seen plenty of UAC implementations which do not depend on having a Listener in the transport layer. Also, most implementations I have looked at do not have the UAS receiving loop responding on the socket at all. This would tend to indicate that the client should not be expecting a reply on the socket that it sent the request on. For clarification: Suppose my transport layer consists of the following elements: TCPClient (Sends Requests for a UAC via TCP) UDPClient (Sends Requests for a UAC vid UDP) TCPSever (Loop receiving Requests and dispatching to transaction layer via TCP) UDPServer (Loop receiving Requests and dispatching to transaction layer via UDP) Obviously, the *Client sends my Requests. The question is, what receives the Response? The *Client waiting on a recv or recvfrom call on the socket it used to send the request, or the *Server? Conversely, the *Server receives my requests, What sends the Response? The *Client? doesn't this break the roles of each member a bit?

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• Where can I hire local programmers with very specific skillsets?

  - by Lostsoul

  I have been browsing the site and haven't found a exact fit to this question so I'll post it but if its already answered(since I'm sure its a common problem, then let me know). I have a business and want to create a totally different product in a different industry than I'm currently in, so I learned how to program and created a working prototype. I have a bit of savings and am getting some cash flow from my current business so I can go out and hire a developer(in the future hopefully it can be permenant but right now I just need a person willing to work on contract and code on weekends or their spare time and I just want to pay in cash instead of equity or future promises). At first I wasn't sure what kind of developer to hire but this question helped me understand I should target specific skills I need as opposed to general programmers. This poses a problem for me since general programmers are everywhere but if I want specific skills I'm unsure how to get them. I thought about a list of approaches but it doesn't feel complete or effective since it seems to be assuming good developers are actively looking. If it helps I want someone local(since this is my first developer hire) and looking for skills like cuda, hadoop, hbase, java and c. Any suggestions? As a FYI, I have been thinking of approaching it as: Go to meet ups for one or more skills I need. Use LinkedIn to find people with the skills I need Search for job postings that contain skills I need and then use linkedIn to reach out to that firms employees since many profiles on linkedin are not very updated or detailed but job postings generally are. Send postings to universities and maybe find a student who loves technology so much they learned these tools on their own. Post on job board. Not sure how successful it will be to post to monster. Use Craigslist, not sure if a highly skilled developer would go here for work. What am I missing? I could be wrong but it seems like good/smart/able developers aren't hunting for work non-stop(especially in this tech job market). Plus most successful people I know have work/life balance so I'm not sure if the best ones really care about code after work. Lastly, most of the skills I need aren't used in big corporations so not sure how aggressively smart developers at small shops look for work. I don’t really know any developers personally, so but should I be using the above plan or if they live balanced lives should I be looking outside of the regular resources(and instead focus on asking around my gym or my accountant or something)? Sorry, I'm making huge assumptions here, I guess because developers are a total mystery to me. I kind of wish Jane Goodall wrote a book on understanding developers social behaviour better :-p

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• Is it possible to calculate or mathematically prove if a game is balanced / fair?

  - by Lurca

  This question is not focussed on video games but games in general. I went to a boardgame trade fair yesterday and asked myself if there is a way to calculate the fairness of a game. Sure, some of them require a good portion of luck, but it might be possible to calculate if some character is overpowered. Especially in role-playing games and trading card games. How, for example, can the creators of "Magic: The Gathering" make sure that there isn't the "one card that beats them all", given the impressive number of available cards?

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• How to manage long running background threads and report progress with DDD

  - by Mr Happy

  Title says most of it. I have found surprising little information about this. I have a long running operation of which the user wants to see the progress (as in, item x of y processed). I also need to be able to pause and stop the operation. (Stopping doesn't rollback the items already processed.) The thing is, it's not that each item takes a long time to get processed, it's that that there are usually a lot of items. And what I've read about so far is that it's somewhat of an anti-pattern to put something like a queue in the DB. I currently don't have any messaging system in place, and I've never worked with one either. Another thing I read somewhere is that progress reporting is something that belongs in the application layer, but it didn't go into the details. So having said all this, what I have in mind is the following. User request with list of items enters the application layer. Application layer gets some information from the domain needed to process the items. Application layer passes the items and the information off to some domain service (should the implementation of this service belong in the infrastructure layer?) This service spins up a worker thread with callbacks for both progress reporting and pausing/stopping it. This worker thread will process each item in it's own UoW. This means the domain information from earlier needs to be stored in some DTO. Since nothing is really persisted, the service should be singleton and thread safe Whenever a user requests a progress report or wants to pause/stop the operation, the application layer will ask the service. Would this be a correct solution? Or am I at least on the right track with this? Especially the singleton and thread safe part makes the whole thing feel icky.

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• Vernon's book Implementing DDD and modeling of underlying concepts

  - by EdvRusj

  Following questions all refer to examples presented in Implementing DDD In article we can see from Figure 6 that both BankingAccount and PayeeAccount represent the same underlying concept of Banking Account BA 1. On page 64 author gives an example of a publishing organization, where the life-cycle of a book goes through several stages ( proposing a book, editorial process, translation of the book ... ) and at each of those stages this book has a different definition. Each stage of the book is defined in a different Bounded Context, but do all these different definitions still represent the same underlying concept of a Book, just like both BankingAccount and PayeeAccount represent the same underlying concept of a BA? 2. a) I understand why User shouldn't exist in Collaboration Context ( CC ), but instead should be defined within Identity and Access Context IAC ( page 65 ). But still, do User ( IAC ), Moderator ( CC ), Author ( CC ),Owner ( CC ) and Participant ( CC ) all represent different aspects of the same underlying concept? b) If yes, then this means that CC contains several model elements ( Moderator, Author, Owner and Participant ), each representing different aspect of the same underlying concept ( just like both BankingAccount and PayeeAccount represent the same underlying concept of a BA ). But isn't this considered a duplication of concepts ( Evan's book, page 339 ), since several model elements in CC represent the same underlying concept? c) If Moderator, Author ... don't represent the same underlying concept, then what underlying concept does each represent? 3. In an e-commerce system, the term Customer has multiple meanings ( page 49 ): When user is browsing the Catalog, Customer has different meaning than when user is placing an Order. But do these two different definitions of a Customer represent the same underlying concept, just like both BankingAccount and PayeeAccount represent the same underlying concept of a BA? thanks

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• What every beginner should know about website development? [closed]

  - by user975234

  I am a novice at building websites and considering to make one. But there is a lot of confusion that's going on right now. I guess every beginner faces them. Few questions that come up are: I have an idea and a need a website. That's all i know right now. But how do i start ? HTML is for sure the basic language but there are a hell of other technologies too. What is actually asp, php, ruby etc? How do i choose the right one from them? Other than asp, php there is javascript and other languages under the same belt. What are they used for? Hosting. When i am choosing the host, what considerations i have to keep in mind ? What support do i need from them (other than getting some important space obviously!). I am considering of making the website in ruby on rails. I don't know about php and what effect it would have if i choose ruby over php. I thought about ruby just because its new and i dont want to learn some thing "not new"! :P Moreover what is a framework and how does a framework effect my development process? These three questions are just to explain my "confusion" better. There is obviously a lot more to it. Just to try to answer how the flow of website development goes keeping in mind my questions!

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• Get Info From Database, or Build Inferred Info?

  - by Zaemz

  Does it make more sense to store and retrieve properties or information directly related to an item in a database, or, say in such a case that a product's ID could describe information about it, should the information be gathered from that? Example: Item SKU -- 4HBU12 4 - is the number of motors H - the voltage B - the color, blue U - the model 12 - the length Should I store those individual attributes as well as the SKU, or should I store only the SKU and build the attributes from it?

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• Should I incorporate exit cost into choosing a solution

  - by Mr Happy

  I'm currently choosing between two viable software designs/solutions. Solution 1 is easy to implement, but will lock some data in a propriaty format, and will be hard to change later. Solution 2 is hard to implement, but will be a lot easier to change later on. Should I go YAGNI on this or should I incorporate the exit cost in the decision making? Or asked differently, is the exit cost part of the TCO? I'm thinking of going back to the customer with this to ask wether or not he thinks the exit costs are relevant, but I'd like to know what the community thinks first. P.S. Is exit cost the correct term?

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• How to have operations with character/items in binary with concrete operations?

  - by Piperoman

  I have the next problem. A item can have a lot of states: NORMAL = 0000000 DRY = 0000001 HOT = 0000010 BURNING = 0000100 WET = 0001000 COLD = 0010000 FROZEN = 0100000 POISONED= 1000000 A item can have some states at same time but not all of them Is impossible to be dry and wet at same time. If you COLD a WET item, it turns into FROZEN. If you HOT a WET item, it turns into NORMAL A item can be BURNING and POISON Etc. I have tried to set binary flags to states, and use AND to combine different states, checking before if it is possible or not to do it, or change to another status. Does there exist a concrete approach to solve this problem efficiently without having an interminable switch that checks every state with every new state? It is relatively easy to check 2 different states, but if there exists a third state it is not trivial to do.

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• In-Game Encyclopedias

  - by SHiNKiROU

  There are some games where there is an in-game encyclopedia where you can know many things about characters and settings of the game. For example, the Codex in Mass Effect. I want to know if it is exclusive to Bioware, and get inspired about other encyclopedia systems. What are some other examples of in-game encyclopedias? How effective is it? I also want some examples where the in-game encyclopedia is not effective at all or an ignored feature

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• How to spawn a character at certain point and walk to a set point

  - by Robert H.

  I am making a game where I have a background image of a neighborhood. Each location has a different number of customers that are generated to walk on sidewalks. They all walk to a specific location (like a stand or cart that sells stuff), after they get to location I want them to interact with the cart. However, if another customer is already in a sale interaction then the others get in line in order of arrival. After the transaction the customers walk off screen. Any information on how I can do this and what game engine would be needed? Any one have any idea where I should go for this. I already have my game done up through Eclipse/Java without any game engine.

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• What are examples of games with "minimalist" models/art assets

  - by Ken

  When teaching game development, my student's obsess about building realistic or complex art/models/animation. And spending wayyy to much time trying to get accurate collision detection between two 3D models [despite my best efforts] However I would like them to spend more time thinking about developing the game mechanics, interaction and game play. I'm looking for some games where the visuals are simple but have good game play. Things I am thinking about are Cubes' vs Spheres or Impossible Game. What are more examples of visually simple (preferably 3D) games to help inspire my students?

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