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Starfling: A one-tap endless orbital slingshot game in a single HTML file

playstarfling.com

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Re: Starfling: A one-tap endless orbital slingshot game in a single HTML file

#131

Post by onion2k »

dalmo3 wrote: post #130
onion2k wrote: post #105

I gave Codex 5.4 Playwright MCP access to the site and a prompt of "Use Playwright CLI Skill to open https://playstarfling.com/ and load the game. Work out how to play it, and devise a strategy to win." After a about half a dozen attempts it had figured the game out. Then I prompted it to "Score as much as you can." It wrote itself an auto-play script that just keeps going. I stopped it running at 10866. That's curre…

Are you sure the script is actually testing the gameplay? Given it can see the entire source code of the game.

It started out using browser.click events and then switched to using browser.evaluate script injection. That's entirely valid for my use case.

Re: Starfling: A one-tap endless orbital slingshot game in a single HTML file

#132

Post by lossyrob »

iceberger2001 wrote: post #2

Hey HN, I built STARFLING, a simple hyper-casual space game you can play right in your browser. You orbit a star with a ball. Tap anywhere to release and sling it through space. Catch the next star to lock in orbit and keep going. Miss and it's game over. The whole thing is just one HTML file with vanilla JS, Canvas, and Web Audio. No frameworks, no build step. Loads in under 2 seconds on phone or desktop. There's a…

This game is so fun, great job.

Re: Starfling: A one-tap endless orbital slingshot game in a single HTML file

#133

Post by hdjrudni »

It's cool but the marketing is deceptive and through me off at first.

You're describing this as "orbital" and "starfling" but there seems to be constant downwards gravity. That's not at all how space works. I was expecting every 'star' to have its own gravity that would suck it in.

Re: Starfling: A one-tap endless orbital slingshot game in a single HTML file

#134

Post by hdjrudni »

Cort3z wrote: post #124
iceberger2001 wrote: post #2

Hey HN, I built STARFLING, a simple hyper-casual space game you can play right in your browser. You orbit a star with a ball. Tap anywhere to release and sling it through space. Catch the next star to lock in orbit and keep going. Miss and it's game over. The whole thing is just one HTML file with vanilla JS, Canvas, and Web Audio. No frameworks, no build step. Loads in under 2 seconds on phone or desktop. There's a…

I really like it. Here is my 2 cent: - the gravity is weird in my opinion. There is basically a gravity going down the screen. I would have expected there to be some "pull" towards the planets. I get why though, you try to prevent mega-long straight shots upward. Perhaps experiment with some drag, where the ball slows down over time. Or perhaps have the walls be gravity points, pulling the ball towards them. - i woul…

Maybe add blackholes to prevent cheesing too hard. I found the downwards gravity unexpected too.

Re: Starfling: A one-tap endless orbital slingshot game in a single HTML file

#135

Post by 47282847 »

oezi wrote: post #63
andai wrote: post #50

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You have elucidated a real gap in the marketplace: physically accurate mindless tapping orbital mechanics sandbox.

19:50 Put codex and claude (thinking high) to work in parallel to see who could come up with the better physically accurate mindless tapping orbital mechanics sandbox. 20:10 Both codex and claude finish pretty much at the same time, but my kids say claude's version is more fun. 20:50 Claude runs out of its 5h session limit while finetuning some things, while Codex has 80% left (!). https://coezbek.github.io/orbital-t…

Nice! For my taste you could remove the TAP OR PRESS bar after some time, maybe after score 3 or so including restarts.

Re: Starfling: A one-tap endless orbital slingshot game in a single HTML file

#137

Post by Sharlin »

cheschire wrote: post #59
iceberger2001 wrote: post #2

Hey HN, I built STARFLING, a simple hyper-casual space game you can play right in your browser. You orbit a star with a ball. Tap anywhere to release and sling it through space. Catch the next star to lock in orbit and keep going. Miss and it's game over. The whole thing is just one HTML file with vanilla JS, Canvas, and Web Audio. No frameworks, no build step. Loads in under 2 seconds on phone or desktop. There's a…

The "better than X%" of players seems way off. If I get zero, somehow still better than 32% of players? and 25 planets is >99% of players? The dotted line starting wide and slowly shrinking to the real orbit is a great touch. It makes the quick/fast/blazing/insane moves harder and more satisfying when they work. The angles encourage skips frequently enough to feel good. I think the only improvement I would make to th…

> and 25 planets is >99% of players?

That doesn't sound so strange because the presumably the majority of visitors are going to try once or twice and then carry on, and it's actually pretty difficult to get even 25 points in this game.

Re: Starfling: A one-tap endless orbital slingshot game in a single HTML file

#138

Post by 0x3f »

rustyhancock wrote: post #129
hirako2000 wrote: post #110

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I got so annoyed I fixed the annoyances. https://orbitup.surge.sh/ - FPS tweak to fix variable speed - Can bounce - Life points instead of sudden death - Levels - A few effects - Better adjusted difficulty

This thread is a perfect showcase of "You NEED a moat".

Also, put your business logic on the backend

Re: Starfling: A one-tap endless orbital slingshot game in a single HTML file

#139

Post by mark124mj »

Fun game! One thing I'd love to see is difficulty modes. An easy mode with some kind of aim guide (maybe a trajectory preview on tap-and-hold?) could help new players get the feel for it, and a hard mode where you control launch speed or angle would add a nice skill ceiling for people chasing high scores.

Re: Starfling: A one-tap endless orbital slingshot game in a single HTML file

#140

Post by ryandrake »

hn_throwaway_99 wrote: post #64
iceberger2001 wrote: post #2

Hey HN, I built STARFLING, a simple hyper-casual space game you can play right in your browser. You orbit a star with a ball. Tap anywhere to release and sling it through space. Catch the next star to lock in orbit and keep going. Miss and it's game over. The whole thing is just one HTML file with vanilla JS, Canvas, and Web Audio. No frameworks, no build step. Loads in under 2 seconds on phone or desktop. There's a…

I liked this game a lot! One thing I noticed is that I found the game to be pretty hard if I just tried to tap based on where I thought was a good "launching point". But then I realized I could use the dashed lines in the orbit circle as basically "arrows" pointing to where the ship would go if launched at that point in the orbit, and I instantly got much better if my strategy was (a) pick the dash in the orbit circl…

I still can't figure it out. It just seems to randomly curve away from where I want it to go. It gets boring to lose every time, so I just gave up. Could use a difficulty setting.
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