I just made my first giant clock! I am so ready for Ludum Dare now that I have this incredible custom library at my fingertips:

import os, pygame, random, math, pgu
from pygame.locals import *
clock = pygame.time.Clock()
pygame.init()
screen = pygame.display.set_mode((800,480))
timer = 0
seconds = 0
minutes = 0
timertext = str(minutes) + “:” + str(seconds)
background = pygame.Surface(screen.get_size())
background = background.convert()
background.fill((250, 250, 250))
font = pygame.font.Font(None, 500)
text = font.render(timertext, 1, (10, 10, 10))
background.blit(text,(0,0))
screen.blit(background, (0,0))

quit = 0
while not quit:
for e in pygame.event.get():
if e.type is QUIT: quit = 1
if e.type is KEYDOWN and e.key == K_ESCAPE: quit = 1
background.fill((250, 250, 250))
text = font.render(timertext, 1, (10, 10, 10))
background.blit(text,(0,0))
screen.blit(background, (0, 0))
pygame.display.flip()
clock.tick(60)
timer = timer + 1
if timer == 60:
seconds = seconds + 1
timer = 0
if seconds == 60:
minutes = minutes + 1
seconds = 0
if seconds <= 9:
timertext = str(minutes) + “:” + “0″ + str(seconds)
else:
timertext = str(minutes) + “:” + str(seconds)

CEngine is a Python library I started writing mid-2007 for doing a remake of Chaos: Battle of Wizards by Julian Gollop. The library uses PyGame and OpenGL and is still far from complete - I haven’t even started on the remake yet, but there is some functionality in the library that may be useful for this competition.

Feature list and download.

With all the C/Python/SDL-based libraries mentioned here, I’d like to advertise my/our gamedev library, Gosu. It has originally been my private library, spread only via ICQ/IRC to interested people, until I made it public to use it for my LD3. That is a while ago, and in the meantime, it has been used for some LD entries by me and other people, also for more serious projects, and is actually documented.

Long story short, Gosu is a 2D game development library for Ruby and C++. I guess the C++ version is a bit too heavy to learn until Friday *and* actually use, though. The Ruby version gets you up and running quickly.

Pro (compared to your generic SDL wrapper): *Very* fast graphics with rotations and all that, because the library was designed to use OpenGL; an API which tries not to get in your creativity’s way; examples on how to integrate it with ImageMagick and the Chipmunk physics library; serious OS X support.
Contra: Linux port misses gamepad support; can’t handle too complex text input well.

If you would like to give it a try, the library can be found at http://code.google.com/p/gosu.

The library I have is a in-progress re-write of my pgu library .. sort of a “the best bits” version. Anyway, here it is:

svn://www.imitationpickles.org/pug/trunk

The gui API is about the same as pgu, so if you wanted to use it, you probably could. It’s lots better

Other than that, I’ll be using pygame and python as per usual. I’ll also be using pyplus + swig in the event that I need to write any C extensions.

Update: check out demo2.py - for low-CPU updates and Joystick support!

Assuming I get around to entering, there’s a good chance I’ll be using this as my foundation, with Allegro.

My “Custom” Library

It’s a collection of header files and code, commonly found in my more recent prototypes. C++.

• A vector math/matrix library, plus some other math tools. Partially documented!
• A set of functions for drawing circles, lines, and rectangles with Allegro, transformed by a matrix.
• A collection of string functions to compliment STL String. Mostly for filename manipulations (get the base name, directory only, etc).
• Class building tools (including the “useful” part of Boost)
• FileIO with Compression (LZMA, BZIP, ZLIB)

And that’s that.