Overview

In the Untahris Common Playground, you can play several classic fun, simple arcade games, including games similar to Tetris, Snake, Tron, Arkanoid, Pong, Thrust, Bomberman, Rampart, Liero. You can play them both in single player and multiplayer mode (on one computer, local network, or maybe Internet).

Now, Untahris has an original experimental feature, which makes it more than just a bundle of these games! In multiplayer mode each player can play a different game --- however, they play all on the same board. This may lead to funny interactions, battles or alliances between them.

The games in Untahris have been modified to make them better interact with each other. Thus, in each game you are allowed to shoot and collect bonuses, even if it was not a part of the original game.

Game released under GPL. Available downloads are:
Hosted at Sourceforge.
homepage
project information
downloads
Send kudos, flames, ideas, new games, comments, and whatever to longuens *at* users.sourceforge.net.

Version history

Main menu

I think the main menu is easy to understand, so most options do not need a long description. All options are saved automatically to a configuration file. You can use another configuration file by giving its filename as a parameter.
One interesting thing is Resolution. It says how many pixels will represent each game cell. If you change the Resolution, you won't see the icons (unless you provide a new graph.unt file for the new resolution).

How to move

To edit keys for a player, move to their menu entry and hit 'k'. Each player uses four movement keys (up, down, left, right) and four action keys (instead of being called mundanely Fire, Fire 2, Fire 3, and Fire 4, they are called Fire, Earth, Air, and Water). By default, the first player moves with QAOP, fires with space and his other action keys are 123. The second player moves with arrows, and his action keys are Return, Insert, Home and PageUp.

Bonuses

There are three types of bonuses.

Game types

Selection

First, you have to select your game. Pressing Earth and Air will change the selected game. Direction keys will change your starting position.

Note that the options available via pressing Earth and Air are not only used to start games. There are also options which modify the playground (by placing additional balls, bonuses or walls) or regenerate the world. (As a last resort you could also use them to play a game like Tic-Tac-Toe ;)

SNAKE

You control a snake who grows when he eats green bonuses. Only its head is vulnerable.

UTRON

This is similar to snake, except that it has no tail. The wall created by it can be destroyed by a shot.

THRUSTER

You control a spaceship who is flying through the playground in search of bonuses. The spaceship is subject to gravity: it will fly down if it does not thrust, and crash if it hits something. It has only a limited quantity of fuel for thrusting (green bonuses provide additional fuel).

UTETRIS

Blocks of various shapes fall from a hole in the ceiling. The player can move them left-right and rotate them. A new block appears when the last one falls to the ground.
The standard rules of Tetris are changed a bit so that it makes more sense against other games. In the original, when a full horizontal line is created between two pieces of undestructible wall, then this line disappears (all blocks above fall) and the player gets points for it (but his level increases too). Here, it happens also when a horizontal line without any holes of length at least 15 is created. Don't forget that you can shoot!

PAD

Pad is known from games such as Pong and Arkanoid. It is able to reflect a ball. Press AIR or EARTH to create a new ball.
The pad dies if it does not successfully reflect the ball, i.e. the ball fell behind it.

BOMBER

A bomber is able to place bombs, which explode (in four cardinal directions) after some time passes, or when something hits them (it can be an explosion of another bomb). The green bonus will make his bombs cover a larger area. Contrary to other players, the Bomber does not have limited ammunition. He is restricted in the number of bombs he can place simultaneously --- the red bonus gives him one bomb more.

WORM

A ninja worm soldier, eqipped with a shovel, a rope, and a bazooka, similar to ones appearing in games like Liero or Soldat (and Worms, except in real time). The keys are:
  • Left and Right move the worm left and right
  • Up and Down adjust the bazooka's firing angle. Press both of them for fine aiming.
  • Fire shoots the bazooka.
  • Water shoots or releases the ninja rope.
  • Air allows you to jump (when on the ground) and climb the rope (when on the rope).
  • Earth allows you to dig. The angle of digging is the same as of the bazooka.

CASTLE

This is based on the classic game Rampart (which has clones named Castle Combat and Kajaani Kombat). However, it has been modified quite a bit (the original game has three phases --- I feel that a game with phasses would not play well against other games here, instead you can switch these phases anytime you want).
The player can do one of three things (switched with Earth):
  • build castle --- This is done by placing blocks on screen. Enclose an area with bricks to add it to your castle.
  • place cannons --- Cannons can be placed in the castle area. You need to enclose an ammo bonus and wait some time before you can place an additional cannon. (Cannons are hard to destroy --- it takes 8 shots on average)
  • shoot --- This is quite simple. Just shoot with your cannons to hurt the other players.
You should enclose bonuses inside your castle:
  • AMMO bonuses will produce cannons
  • LEVEL bonuses will make your cannons shoot faster
  • OTHER bonuses will provide you with energy
The game is lost if you don't manage to enclose any energy bonus before the energy runs out.