Have fun with programming...no, really!

 I'm currently going through the process of learning how to program for games, I'm using Construct. It doesn’t work in a language, it uses visual events, so for example instead of writing code to make a sprite move 200 pixels to the left, you would create an event, click on the sprite, click 'set position' and off you go! So it's not real programming, but it does teach you the basic logic and principles. Admittedly though - and quite unfortunately, even this can get quite tricky, some of the ideas and ways of thinking sometimes go against what you would normally assume so I basically live in the Construct Forum, learning from the kind folks who dwell there.

 Lightbot 2.0 was recommended to me by Construct guru Shviller, it's a fun puzzle game about programming but it doesn’t assume anything of the player to begin with. It holds your hand in the basic levels teaching you about its interface and mechanics. You essentially have to control a little robot through a 3D grid based world, move the guy to the goal zone and turn his head light on and the level is complete. You have a set number of moves you can perform and each level has a different amount of spaces where you can use them. So a basic level would be to move the robot for spaces forward. To do this you click the symbol indicating forward and place it four times in the available slots and on the last space, turn the light on.

 The Lightbot can walk forward, turn left or right, jump and light up (no, he doesn’t smoke). The puzzle part comes in the form of limited spaces, say if the Lightbot had to move twenty places forward; you would have to set up a 'loop' in a 'function' – both terms which are obviously recognised by programmers. You have two function slots available and each function slot has 8 move spaces within them. This is a great way to repeat the commands, say if you needed to perform the same set of moves repeatedly through a level, you would place those moves within a function and then simply tell the 'main method' to call the function at the appropriate time! Isn't that simple? No way.

 The starting set of levels are easy, easy as pie – the next set of levels introduce some more ideas but are still quite simple, but after that it starts to scramble or, dare I say bend your mind. The good thing about this game is that it always makes sure you are capable of completing a level before it presents it. Lightbot is a pure puzzle game, which anyone can play – if there are any budding, young wanna be programmers out there definitely give this game a playthrough. For the rest of us, this game isn't much different than most puzzlers in difficulty, but it's something you probably haven’t played before and it definitely flexes a different section of your brain that you may not be used to flexing.

Play it here: http://armorgames.com/play/6061/light-bot-20