BASIC 'Hearts' game

[Victragic]

Hi all,

well it's - 'Hearts', the card game that you play when you are pretending to work, now for unexpanded Vic-20. Written entirely in BASIC. (I'm wondering if someone has already done this, but I just spent the better part of an hour searching, apparently no..)

The game includes the following rules / variants :

- 2 Clubs always goes first
- You cannot lead a heart unless a point card has been played
- If you 'shoot the moon', everyone else's score increases by 26
- First round is not 'safe' - if you have no clubs, you can trump with a point card

The computer players don't play what I would consider to be an 'optimal' game, nevertheless they still provides what I think is a reasonable level of competition.

This is the first thing I've done in BASIC on the VIC since I was a kid. I was using the Programmer's Aid cartridge for the first time (really this was just an excuse to see what that cartridge does, after all these years), and I have to say - it made the task much much easier than I remember coding on the VIC to be.

EDIT : Fixed a 'randomising' issue, now plays different games each time you start it.
EDIT 25/5/20 : - Better randomising
- fixed scoring bug when player shoots moon on last round
- Various bits of screwy code fixed
- Slightly more efficient play by computer players

[beamrider]

Thanks. Very nice and clean... does what it says on the tin!

I knew I'd seen the title screen style before so I had to find it - it's similar to the Blue Meanies opening screen.

[Victragic]

I knew I'd seen the title screen style before so I had to find it - it's similar to the Blue Meanies opening screen.

Yes a bit of a nod to Commodore's Vic-21 too..

[orion70]

Well done! You really should post this HERE

[chysn]

It's really very nice. KIM shot the moon in the first hand. I was able to come back and win, but it was quite a performance.

[Victragic]

Thanks - I'm still tinkering a little with it before I post on the announcement board. I can make the computer play a wee bit more efficiently.

[Mayhem]

I’m an incredibly mean Hearts player, so interested to see how this looks heh.

[Victragic]

I’m an incredibly mean Hearts player, so interested to see how this looks heh.

You'll probably beat the computer players quite regularly, I'd think

The latest version is *just* good enough for a casual player like me though, I just played it twice and didn't win either time. (A computer player shot the moon in each game). My goal was to end up with something I wouldn't win *every* time when I played it.

[Mayhem]

Not bad, enjoyed playing that, although it's missing the "pass three cards to the next player" feature which really is an essential part of the game imo.

[Victragic]

You are right, I had forgotten that competely!

If I can do it well and within 3.5k, I'll include. But I'm not sure at this stage if I can.

[Mayhem]

If bumping to +8k means you can fit that in and expand the computer AI in the process (maybe variable difficulty levels) then I'm all for it

[wimoos]

Hi Victragic,

I suggest to make the sorting routine a bit faster / obsolete:

Replace

Code: Select all

73 t=0:n=1
74 ifd%(n,p)<d%(n-1,p)thent=d%(n-1,p):d%(n-1,p)=d%(n,p):d%(n,p)=t:ifn>1thenn=n-1:goto74
75 n=n+1:ifn<13then74
76 return

with

Code: Select all

73 n=i
74 ifn<12-rthend%(n,p)=d%(n+1,p):n=n+1:goto74
75 d%(n,p)=99
76 return

and remove D%(I,P)=99 from line 66.

Regards,

Wim.

[wimoos]

Here is the WimBasic version. Brought it down to 1912 bytes, 37 lines.
It autostarts in VICE.

Regards,

Wim.

hearts.zip

(9.42 KiB) Downloaded 50 times

[Victragic]

That's considerably more efficient!

I'll have a look at this a bit later.

BTW the original code was made on a real Vic with just the Programmer's Aid cartridge, I've no intention of expanding it beyond those specs but happy for anyone to take it further as they see fit!