Code the Classics 5 – Joroen Vermeulen… 5!
Completing the set from the Code the Classic (Volume 1) book, Jeroen Vermeulen has now made available a RISC OS conversion of the fifth game from the book – Substitute Soccer.
Inspired by games like Sensible Soccer from Sensible Software and Kick Off before that from Anco Software, Substiture Soccer is a top-down football game for one or two players.
Each player directly controls one member of their team, with the ability to switch players, so as the ball is passed around – or, if the other team has control of the ball, to switch to the player best placed to tackle and take control of it. The objective is obviously to score against the opposing team, and the winner is the first to score nine goals.
The conversion makes use of the RISC OS port of Python 3.8 and Pygame 1.9.6, and uses the same resources used for the version in the book. It features three difficulty levels, a scrolling viewport onto the pitch, in-game music and sound effects, and runs in 16million colours at 800×600.
The game can be downloaded from !Store.
If you’re interested in the process Jeroen undertook to bring the games in the book to RISC OS, there’s a six page article on the subject in issue 25:5 of Archive Magazine, and he is expecting to give a presentation on the topic at the RISC OS User Group of London meeting, on 17th January, 2022.
