For this project we had to develop a game that had some aspect of randomness, then we had to analyze the probability in the game. The goal was to show us how probability is used in a real world situation. We also learned about programing and how to develop games.
For my game I decided to do a modified version of battleship, I didn't want the game to blatantly feel like a probability game. In my game you played against the computer, it randomly scattered 1x1 ships and it was your goal to find them. In the end the game was fairly challenging because it was on a 10x10 grid. When analyzing the probability I calculated the probability of hitting a ship on the first try, then the second, then the third, this continued until all nine ships were found. I also decided to add in a surrender button because I realized how hard the game was. To play my game you press the "Scatter Ships" button then the "Go" button. You use the arrow keys to move and the space bar to shoot, if you get a hit an orange dot will appear, and if you miss the dot will be gray.
During this project we had seven benchmarks to complete. The first benchmark was just to come up with a basic concept for the game that we would be developing. For the next benchmark we had to detail out how we are planning on creating the game, this step helped us get a clear idea of our game before we started developing. Next we began to develop the game. This was our final benchmark before exhibition. When we came back from winter break we had to analyze the probability in our games. To do this we had to create a tree diagram to show the probabilities as the game continued. We didn't have benchmark 6 for some reason. Lastly we did benchmark 7, this DP update is benchmark 7.
On this project I think I did a fairly good job. If I were to do it over again I probably would have liked to use the habit of a mathematician "start small", and done a smaller proof of concept before doing the 10x10 grid. I feel like I could have done a much better job with the randomness of my game. It turns out that it is possible for ships to get placed right on the line, but since we didn't have much time to do multiple drafts of our game I feel like it was one of the best products I could create with the time we were given.