by Jonathan Gover
music by Duncan Stead
http://www.govergames.co.uk
jonathan@govergames.co.uk
© copyright to Jonathan Gover, July 2005
This game requires DirectX 9.0c

This is an entry for The Game Creators Puzzle Competition 2005. It's a game about dancing. The puzzle element is the dancefloor, it consists of a grid of coloured tiles. Enacting the role of Dance Matt, you dance around the floor, swapping the tiles around and creating lines of colours.

You need to move in time to the music, luckily there are some indicators on the right hand side of the screen to help you move to the beat. Each time you move, the tile you were on and the tile you just landed on swap colours. You can use this to move certain colours towards each other into lines. Once a line has been created across the floor, a dance begins. You have to press the arrowkeys as they appear, the more accurate and in time you are, the more points and popularity you get. Popularity is important, without it you'd have no friends, and no-one would want to watch you dancing. When the crowd gets bored and you run out (shown by the meter top left), it's game over. Some colours are worth more points than others, for example a blue line would be worth twice as much as a yellow line. Of course this is in theory, you still have to have extreme dancing skillz to get those points.

Some people have trouble with the puzzle section of the game - arranging the dancefloor into lines of colours. Below are outlined some basic techniques for getting tiles where you want them to be.

How to dance - moving tiles

To create lines on the dancefloor, you have to find the tiles you want to use, then move them into the right positions. In this case, we'll try to move the green tile down by 2 squares.

1. Move under the green tile, then move up to swap places with it and leave it one square down from where it was
2. Move around and under the tile again
3. Move upwards, swapping places with the green tile again and moving it downwards into where we wanted it

How to dance - moving tiles

The colours of the other tiles around don't matter, all that's important is the tile you want to move. The technique is to position Matt where you want the tile to be, then swap places with it.

1. Move under the yellow tile, then move up to swap places with it and leave it one square down from where it was
2. Move to the right of the tile this time
3. Move left, swapping places with the yellow tile again and placing it one square down and across from where it started

How to dance - creating lines

The simplest way to build a line is to find or place a tile next to where the line is being created, and swap places with it to put it in the line.

1. Move into the gap in the line where you can place that blue tile
2. Move down again, swapping with the blue tile and positioning it in the line between the other two blue tiles

How to dance - creating lines

This is a common situation, that green tile can be moved down and left to fill in the gap. However, if Matt moved down one square and then right to put it in a position similar to the technique above, he'd end up on the wrong side of the line, and wouldn't be able to swap the tile into place without disrupting the rest of the line.

1. Move down into the gap in the line
2. Swapping with the green tile to the right doesn't disrupt the line, as it's still within it
3. You've created a gap next to the green tile we wanted in the line, so in a similar way to the technique above, you can now just swap with it and place it in the line

How to dance - creating lines

The colour of the line you want to create could be the same as the colour tile you're standing on. This makes it easier to build lines, as you can just stand on a tile to grab it then move it about. Just be careful not to move the tiles out of the line you're building.

1. That yellow tile next to the line is just right for filling in the gap, so move right and up onto it
2. Since all three tiles you just swapped are the same colour, nothing changes except your position
3. Now you're standing on that tile, you'll swap it into wherever you move, so move across and put it in the gap

There are also bonuses to be picked up or avoided on the dancefloor:

• Gain points or popularity
• Lose points or popularity
• Switch all the tiles around
• Start a dance without making a line
• Get drunk

Bugs.

This game is a bit rushed, so there are bound to be errors in it somewhere. One of the main ones I found (at 2am this morning) was that the delete file command was refusing to work. This prevents the hiscore.dat file being overwritten with new scores, so the scoring system may not work at all. Please let me know if it does or not, and I'll try and get it fixed sometime. For news on updates and stuff for this game, check my website.

There's a hidden feature which didn't quite make it properly into the game. If custom/player.bmp exists, it will be used as the player's head instead of Matt. This works best if you have a picture of a face, surrounded by black (which appears transparent).

Thanks to all those people who made this game happen; Duncan for doing the music, Rachel for helping with the ideas and artwork, Alan, Zeroblitzt and El Go0rf for the music which didn't quite make it into the game, Bob for his encryption, and Mat, Nick and Nick, Sam, Emma, Laura, Layo, Rachel and Julia for letting me steal their faces. Sorry for the misspelling, Mat, but I expressed my comic license to make the pun more apparent.

Please enjoy my game! If you have any comments or suggestions, feel free to write to me, they will be appreciated.
Check out my website at http://www.govergames.co.uk for more amazing free games and demos!