Commutator

Please read below before downloading!

In Commutator, you take on the role of the hardworking postman, Wilson, as he embarks on a perilous journey to deliver important packages to their recipients. But there's a twist – all of the packages are scattered across the town! To make matters worse, the packages keep piling up and Wilson must strategically collect them to avoid crashing and losing everything! Will Wilson ever make his delivery?

But wait, why do screenshots look like a typical snake game that is somehow played in Microsoft Paint? Well, it's simple, it's because it is! Yeah, Commutator is a fully playable snake game in a Microsoft Paint window that allows for player input, growing snake, keeping score and increasing speed! Just pretend it's a little postman running around and collecting packages in order to fit this game with Ludum Dare 53's theme :p

HOW TO PLAY

Well, this is where it gets a little tricky. Commutator is not really a game in a traditional sense, but rather a Python script that simulates the snake game using your mouse! It requires more effort than your average game and it can be a little bit scary, but I promise you there is nothing to worry about!

Choosing a method

There are two methods you can play this game. The only thing you really need for both of these methods is to have is a computer with English version of Windows 10. The game simulates Wilson's movement with your mouse input and the first couple of inputs the game makes is setting up the canvas for the game, which was preconfigured for Windows 10 version of Microsoft Paint.  The game then assumes everything is set up correctly so it starts moving your mouse and clicking. I haven't tested the game on Windows 7 or Windows 11, but you can feel free to give it a go! If anything goes wrong, you can press the Escape button which will stop the game immediately.

Well now, off to the two methods:

Method 1: Running the Source Python script 

In order to run this script, you'll need to have several libraries installed:

• pyautogui (pip install pyautogui )
• pygetwindow (pip install pygetwindow)
• pywin32 (pip install pywin32)
• keyboard (pip install keyboard)
• for the updated version - psutil (pip install psutil)

There are two source scripts, one called Commutator_Source.py, which creates a canvas which dimension's are 800x600 and another one called Commutator_Source_NonStandard.py, which creates a canvas with dimensions of 640x480 .  Non standard screen sizes like screens with 768p should ruin the NonStandard version of the code.

UPDATE: The Updated version of source is now available, including the support for French and Spanish Display language, Automatic Canvas resize depending on the screen you have and an option to resize the dots representing the player and the pellets before the game starts!

Method 2: Downloading and running the .exe

This method may seem more straightforward, but here's the catch: antiviruses really don't like precompiled Python scripts and they flag them as potentially harmful so you'll have to go out of your way to wrestle with your antiviruses in order to play the game. I recommend this method only if you really don't want to bother with setting up Python.  The standard and non standard version of executables are the same deal, pick whichever suits your screen.

Playing the game

When you run the script, let go of your mouse! The script will take control of your mouse and keyboard to run mspaint using the run command and will set up the game board for you. If you move your mouse in a meantime, there's a chance the script will missclick something and the worst it can happen is that the game will start clicking on your files, folders and whatnot! Again, if anything goes wrong, pushing the Escape key on your keyboard will end the game and the script.

Once the screen is set up and you see snake moving, then you can control it. You can control snake with WASD buttons. Once you lose, the game will display your final score and MSPaint window will close. If you want to play again, just run the script/exe!

I hope this wall of text won't intimidate too many people. I am very happy with how this project has turned out and I had a lot of fun working on it.

Have fun!