Web-based CCG - Sandscape [WTactics in your browser]

[Knitter]

Sandscape is a browser based platform that allows you to play card games (CCGs), at the moment focusing in the game created by the WTactics project ( viewtopic.php?f=22&t=513 ). I started the project after finding about WTactics merely because I wanted a browser based client to start playing the game. I've never before play any CCG, not even Magic the Gathering, but was intrigued by WTactics and the cards being created.

The platform aims to provide a complete playing system with card, user and game management, chat areas to arrange games, spectator modes and all the necessary features to provide a simple "turn key" solution that any CCG gamer community can install and use for their own games or any user can provide to his/her friends.

At the moment I'm trying to make the code more stable and usable, the current milestone is called Soulharvester and will be finished this week (I hope ). The next milestone should end with a public release (long overdue) and some performance optimization along side with some new features that should make the platform almost feature complete.

Here is an image from a previous milestone:


The project is licensed as AGPL (Affero GNU Public License). The only assets that are part of the software are icons (Fugue icon set) that are CC Attribution 3.0.

You can learn more about the project in the following places:
- SF project page, http://sourceforge.net/projects/sandscape
- Issue tracker, with milestones, http://sourceforge.net/apps/trac/sandscape/report/3
- Code repository, http://sourceforge.net/p/sandscape/git
- WTactics project, http://wtactics.org

Now the not so fun part, I need help , specifically I need one other PHP developer that can help the project keep it's pace if I'm unable to spend enough time in the project. Many of the features are easy enough but the project suffers setbacks every time I have a week or a moth that demands more of my time doing my paid job. Things like improving performance and testing new technologies (like evaluating the usefulness websockets) are being postpone due to the lack of time from my part.

NOTE:
I wan't able to shrink the image, does the IMG tag allow for WIDTH/HEIGH parameters?

[Tranberry]

Wow, looks nice. I've been waiting for a better card-type engine for browsers. The only objection I have atm is the difference in rounded corners you got there, it's personal preference but the less round the better in my opinion.

Do you got an arrow or other indicator indicating what card does what to what and such?

[Knitter]

The current interface is a bit different in the current code, though I think the some corners are still round .

Rules are completely up to the players, the system provides only a "virtual table", but you can upload images for tokens and card states and the system provides counters and labels that also can be added to a card. The orange star that can be seen in the image is an example of a token, the yellow glow in the right bottom card is an example of a state. So you can add an image with an arrow or any other thing that you need and apply it to the card while in game and thus mark any special action.

Currently I'm aiming at finishing the two milestones that are planned, then make a video and new screenshots and start improving game performance. That's why those screenshots are a bit old .

[Tranberry]

I got no problem with that

But to clarify what I meant:

[Knitter]

Ah, you're talking about one carde affecting another one. It's on the TODO list , but frankly I have no ideia of how to make that relation in a useful way. It's one other thing to think about after the current milestones are finished.

As for the rounded corners, I've gotten so used to those that I didn't even noticed the difference.

[Tranberry]

I'm more of a graphic artist than anything else so I'm bound to look at those thing.

About that arrow thing, could it be done with SVG I mean then you could stretch it and such ..

[Knitter]

I'm back to the project after a couple of weeks away due to work. There is one milestone before I'm ready to make a first public release with a proper domain and hosting and I'm trying to get more people interested in joining the team.

Can I ask that the project be featured in some future Free Game Dev blog post? I don't know if it can be used for a post since it has no way to be tested and only has as few old screenshots but it would be nice to have some more exposure, maybe also mentioning WTactics ( viewtopic.php?f=22&t=513 ) since we got back on track and have some new resources and projects going on.

[Julius]

See my reply on the other thread. We would be happy to feature it as a guest post written by yourselves.